Sonos Roam - Stuck In Sleep Mode

Thanks for all the comments here. My Roam is also stuck in sleep mode. To be honest I haven’t used it much and mainly it has sat on the window sill on its magnetic charger, probably for about six months. I also have a Move that I carry around the house when I need a portable speaker so the Roam is more for when I’m travelling. Now I’m trying to get it working again and none of the solutions suggested seem to work.

• It isn’t charging on the magnetic base
• With a USBC cable connected the LED is permanent orange
• Holding the power button for 15+ seconds has no effect, regardless of whether on power or not.
• It isn’t visible on my WiFI network so I can’t check the battery status through a browser (I can see the Move)

Just about to log a support call. Wish me luck!

So, here is the conclusion to my story.  My Roam was seen as faulty and fortunately just within warranty.  It was replaced under warranty once I had sent back the faulty product.  Annoyingly the returns process in the UK involves sending it to Poland and since UK is now out of the EU then it has to pass through customs.  My return got stuck in customs for 2 weeks and it was hugely frustrating emailed various people in the UK and Poland.  No one could tell me if there was a problem.  The returns process includes a pro-forma invoice to aid the customs process.  But as a failed product it really had minimal commercial value.  Then as if by magic the return left the customs warehouse and made its way to Sonos.  Within a day the replacement had been shipped and 2 days later I had my new Roam.  Setting it up was a breeze.  No issues with me calling it what the old one was which had of course inexplicably to the app become permanently offline.  This work has worked faultlessly.  It goes to sleep and so preserves the battery power.  That said my experience will mean I am not going to allow it to run fault and be left flat for any extended period.

Alternatively the Roam may be, to all intents and purposes, dead.

I have two Roams.  In the early days I had problems with battery life.  If left off the charger (and why buy a battery speaker if you have to keep it on the charger all the time), they would run down in a matter of 3-4 days even if just on standby/sleep.  Then I think Sonos did a software update to improve sleep mode.  One Roam improved hugely.  The other didn’t. It always seemed to need a charge whenever I needed to use it.    After almost 2 years the problematic Roam exhibited the problems as described here.  The wireless charger did not seem to do anything.  I could, but not always, get the charge light to glow solid orange on a wired charger.  But solid orange is not a recognised LED state.  The charge LED is supposed to glow orange and then go out after 10 seconds.  And as soon as the charger was unplugged the light went out and it was totally unresponsive.  Nothing from the status LED.  No tones.  No response to holding the power button for any amount of time.  No difference if I left the Roam on charge for a day.  

The eventual conclusion was that the Roam was faulty. 

Best open a support case unless one of the suggested ways of coaxing it back to life works.  The support desk will suggest much the same so you need to have tried that first.  That said the suggestions also included things that were clearly not going to work  (like power the Roam off by holding the power button until you hear the tone) but I guess they have to try the simple things first.  

I am inclined to believe that there was a design flaw lurking in there somewhere which means the Roam did not cope well with its battery being completely discharged.  Or there was a problem with a batch of batteries or charging circuits or something.  Or maybe, like all rechargeable batteries, they don’t last more than a certain period.  Perhaps because the problematic Roam was always being re-charged then it ‘wore down’ the battery.  That said even charging it every 4 days for 2 years should be seen as reasonable usage.  If I actually used it for 8 hours to play music on battery power then I would be charging it up even more often.  But I am sure Sonos knows exactly. 

Mine are two years old now.  My gut instinct is that if I bought a Roam today then I would not get the same battery issues.  

Equally if you have an older Roam and you still experience problems with battery life then beware.  You may well find it does not live as long as you would expect.  

I have noticed that chargers will sometimes get into a mode where they won’t charge their ROAM. A simple reboot of the charger has worked around this. This has been the case with the SONOS wireless charger and 3rd party chargers.

There is a 3rd reset method for ROAM. Make sure that the ROAM has at least some charge, even if it does not seem to be responding. Remove ROAM from the charger and hold the power switch for about 15 seconds. This reboots a small auxiliary processor involved in power management. Now, reconnect the charger and charge to full capacity. This is not a Factory Reset.

I tried many times to reboot and factory reset both option software pressing the back button, and pressing play button and later back button etc for a factory reset with and without  USBc power cord connected and disconnected, giving time in between. I compare everything to my working Sonos roam. working one you can feel the battery is warm when it is charging and Orange light goes out after connecting power cord. On non-working Sonos Roams orange light never goes out. Battery is stone cold.  I think issue is once both speakers depleted batteries (I left both in the garage while working and deplete overnight) it cannot restart the charge, either it needs some minimum charge for it to start charging like a software gate or there is a battery issue as it gets old and looses full charge can never reengage) . There is no way two Sonos Roams develop the same problem randomly. 

This weekend I am planning to test my 3rd and working Sonos Roam, currently it charges and works without problem but it is on a magnetic charger at all times; I shall deplete it and, this will mean more than likely it will reproduce  same fault and  I shall  end up with 3 x Bricks , but better now than later, than I have a good case against Sonos if I document this all and I do not want to live with the fear of battery depletion, these units are supposed to be mobile.

And yes I agree with above the fact that Sonos help is useless on this subject just following same protocol . they must known they have a problem, they are just running your round and round and tossing you a 30% discount coupon after 1 year warranty as per their script. I am now not going to return back my first Sonos Roan for 30%. 

To be honest, all they see to do is quote the ‘help’ available on website(s).

I bought a total of 5 Sonos Roam from Costco with wireless battery charger for 2 houses I have as I liked to sound quality and the compact size and want to have a change move away from my Bose.  reading all above It is clear that Sonos Roams develop a problem as battery ages, or maybe there was a software update and caused the issue recently. 

My First Roam failed as described above. Nothing happens, you cannot reset, on its magnetic charger it does not charge, and no light, When you connect to USBC cable and no matter how strong the charger is you only see solid orange light come on and never turns off. I called Sonos support , first the Chat robot is useless and this option with Solid orange light does not exist and I finaly chat to an operator which is a challenge also to by pass the  robot they asked me to do  all the above what you mention, reset it, use big charger, leave it for 30 min and call us back  etc etc/ same result,  22 seconds etc etc  then they offered a 30% discount on another product if I return it. While I first agreed to return it I still do not ant to pay 70% of something that should have never failed in 18 months. And bang, a second Sonos Roam had the same problem this week. 2 in a row is not bad luck it is a bad product. 

Then I thought over it and both Sonos Roams were in my garage when I was listening music on batteries without being charged and basically failed when battery was drained overnight. Is it batteries or the software that cannot restart ut I do not know but SONOS should know right? . I am trying different combinations and now will try this charge-disconnect-reset-charge-disconnect-reset  options (Sonos never said to reboot without USBC cable connected by the way, I learned it here) 

So rule number 1 do not buy another SONOS Roam there is a product issue. 

Rule number 2 do not get your Old Sonos’roams drain fully. I had this when they were younger and was not a problem to recharge and restart, should be either poor  batter lifespan  or a new software. Sonos should know they have a problem and giving you a 30% discount is very poor acceptance of a product fault. My Bose speakers and batteries  have been working for 7 years to date and still working… 

Rule number 3 buy Bose. 

I resolved it, quite simply by turning it off on the rear switch leaving it for 15 minutes and then starting it up again…. Worked for me but might not work for everyone.   

Did not work for me.

Thanks, that solved it for me.   

I’ve found the root cause of the problem and solution in another forum discussion. It seems there is a communication problem with the WiFi network when you have this problem.

Solution: you need to reset your WiFi network (switch off and on). 

Please note that resetting the Sonos Roam SL to factory settings didn’t solve the problem. The device was not visible anymore in the system. So when you have this problem, reset your WiFi network.

Hah!  Famous last words. Like you, my Roam was absolutely fine until it wasn’t. Sonos has a problem with the Roam and they know it. It certainly feels like buggy battery charging / power management software or maybe they had a bad batch of batteries. Don’t know, don’t care.

I do care that Sonos is replacing my pre-order and way out of warranty Roam for the second time, even though the warranty expired more than 8 months ago. In my opinion, they are quietly taking care of a well known issue.  

If this happens to anyone else, Sonos support can easily get an exception to the one year warranty. Just don’t be a d***, like some folks in here and support with treat you right. 

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