Retired Sonos Staff

End of Software Support - Clarifications

Dec 8, 2022 11:29 AM UTC
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We announced yesterday that some of our oldest Sonos products will be moving into a legacy mode in May of 2020. Our commitment is to support products with regular software updates for a minimum of five years after we stop selling them, and we have a track record of supporting products far longer.

Here is some public information we’ve shared, gathered into one place to respond to some of your questions in one easy thread, so that people can find the correct information easily.

Beginning in May, software updates and new features from Sonos will only be delivered to systems with only modern products.

After May, systems that include legacy products will continue to work as before - but they will no longer receive software updates or new features.

Sonos will work to maintain the existing experience and conduct bug fixes, but our efforts will ultimately be limited by the lack of memory and processing power of these legacy products.

We don’t expect any immediate impact to your experience, but access to services and overall functionality will eventually be disrupted, particularly as partners evolve their own services and features.

Customers with both legacy and modern products have time to decide what option is best for them. You can continue to use your whole system in legacy mode - in this case, it will stop receiving updates and new features.

You will also be able to separate your legacy products from your modern products, so that the modern products can still receive updates and new features, and legacy products can still be used separately. We’ll have more information on how to do this in May when you can take that action.

Another option available to all customers with legacy products is to take advantage of the Trade Up program, which allows you to upgrade older Sonos products to modern ones with a 30% discount. Trade Up will be open to customers at any time should they decide to upgrade.

We recognize this is new for Sonos owners, just as it is for Sonos. We are committed to help you by making options available to you to support the best decision for your home.

If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate with asking.

Update 2/22: A message from our CEO

We heard you. We did not get this right from the start. My apologies for that and I wanted to personally assure you of the path forward:

First, rest assured that come May, when we end new software updates for our legacy products, they will continue to work as they do today. We are not bricking them, we are not forcing them into obsolescence, and we are not taking anything away. Many of you have invested heavily in your Sonos systems, and we intend to honor that investment for as long as possible. While legacy Sonos products won’t get new software features, we pledge to keep them updated with bug fixes and security patches for as long as possible. If we run into something core to the experience that can’t be addressed, we’ll work to offer an alternative solution and let you know about any changes you’ll see in your experience.

Secondly, we heard you on the issue of legacy products and modern products not being able to coexist in your home. We are working on a way to split your system so that modern products work together and get the latest features, while legacy products work together and remain in their current state. We’re finalizing details on this plan and will share more in the coming weeks.

While we have a lot of great products and features in the pipeline, we want our customers to upgrade to our latest and greatest products when they’re excited by what the new products offer, not because they feel forced to do so. That’s the intent of the trade up program we launched for our loyal customers.

Thank you for being a Sonos customer. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback. I hope that you’ll forgive our misstep, and let us earn back your trust. Without you, Sonos wouldn’t exist and we’ll work harder than ever to earn your loyalty every single day.

If you have any further questions please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Patrick Spence
CEO, Sonos

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patbla

Enthusiast II

It’s interesting to see that this was clearly in the works for a while. There is no way that the offer of a 30% discount would be taken up by many given that Sonos components had maintained much of their value until this announcement. Why would anybody take 30% when used Sonos equipment would easily sell for more than 50%?

At first I thought Sonos didn’t understand the resale value of their equipment but I guess they knew they were about to crash that value.

What I guess only time will tell is whether the value of the brand will ever be the same. As can be seen by the reaction there are at least thousands of early adopters who say no.

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lawhhh

Lyricist III

Pro tip.

QUICKLY put your Play 5 for sale on yellow pages or similar..Sell it fast and right before shipping it, you trade it in for the new play 5 gen 2 on the sonos website.

The new user has a working play 5 for a couple of weeks and then it dies, but you have another couple of hundred dollars to put toward the purchase of the new gen 2.

NOT saying that you should do this, but i BET that scrupulous people will do this.

If we did that I would feel we are as unscrupulous as Sonos themselves, two wrongs dont make a right, but it is tempting...

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luvlylou

Lyricist III

I have loved Sonos and have made so many recommendations to friends to buy systems… now I feel embarrassed to have done so…

I was going to buy yet more kit the other day - thank god I delayed that decision…! Because had I bought more kit it would gave been deemed to be ‘legacy’ if connected to my existing, extensive and expensive system…

Let’s say I maintained the rest of my system - because I am not about to go out and give £1000’s more of my hard earned money - until bits of it stop working… how do I know that by the time I upgrade other parts of the system, the two speakers I was going to buy today would not by then be considered ‘legacy’?

I will keep what I have got until it crashes and then buy something else because unless they change this decision right now I am never ever giving them another penny…

I am really angry but I am also really sad and feel completely betrayed.

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MrSwadge

Enthusiast I

SONOS, you need to explain WHY FROM A TECHNICAL STANDPOINT these are considered legacy products! They are speakers. THE SPEAKER PART WILL WORK FINE FOR A 100 YEARS. Exactly what technical issue is it that can not be overcome? There are lots of music apps which will work with sonos.

All you are talking about is music ‘bits’ being sent to a receiver built into the speaker.

EXACTLY WHAT IS THE TECHNICAL ISSUE?

UNTIL YOU ANSWER THAT QUESTION, YOUR COMPANY IS FOR INTENTS AND PURPOSES DEAD.

Prevo, you’ve hit the nail on the head.

These so-called legacy players currently stream music and co-exist on the same network with ‘modern’ players which have better functionality such as built in voice control. So whats changed that you can’t support them ?

The more I think about this, the more I think this is a pure and simple cynical attempt to force users to upgrade their players.

You're correct, it's a stream of digital signals. Music can be encoded in different formats, but there is no reason why existing encodings cannot be delivered. If providers move to a new format, then maybe the landscape changes, but given that most people cannot hear the difference between 192kbps and 256kbps music, why should it make any difference and why would providers change a perfectly good audio format. Most of us just want to be able to listen, we don't care about voice commands. We can buy a much cheaper system to provide that... which makes you wonder if Sonos is even needed at all.

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lawhhh

Lyricist III

It’s interesting to see that this was clearly in the works for a while. There is no way that the offer of a 30% discount would be taken up by many given that Sonos components had maintained much of their value until this announcement. Why would anybody take 30% when used Sonos equipment would easily sell for more than 50%?

At first I thought Sonos didn’t understand the resale value of their equipment but I guess they knew they were about to crash that value.

What I guess only time will tell is whether the value of the brand will ever be the same. As can be seen by the reaction there are at least thousands of early adopters who say no.

To true, I have said this previously but the problem that there is so much outpouring of anger on here that our messages get buried before people have chance to read them, who is going to read over 50 pages of anger before posting? That's not including the 60 or so pages that were posted yesterday before they closed yesterday's thread.

The 30% discount (yeah really?) was part of the strategy that links into this weeks announcement.

It is possible to technologically keep existing devices functioning as they are without introducing new features.

However Sonos are trying to blame the inevitable bricking of devices on partners future ability to remain compatible. I bet the API roadmap means it will be impossible to operate a sonos component without using new API features (probably identification or authentication) that of course Sonos will not roll out to older devices.

It is morally corrupt.

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Rojam35

Lyricist I

I spoke to the customer service person on the phone. Gave him my opinion of this decision but he was a talking robot “30% trade-in, legacy issues, new technology, etc.”. Complete BS. I have been an early adopter and a loyal Sonos advocate. As most on here have stated having $1000’s of dollars invested in this system that will be obsolete after the first update in May.

Sonos - either do better or your product will no longer sell as most who use your system will find other, cheaper products.

This is one of the worst customer friendly decisions I have seen in a long time.

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padge

Lyricist II

patbia!The residual sales and value of sonos products has just gone completely up in smoke Im afraid!Who in their right mind is going to pay out on a system that wont work in possibly 6 months time?Sell if you can and your punter hasnt read the “legacy” bombshell!I personally couldnt sell to a somebody unaware of the sonos service I couldnt sleep at night!Sonos hopefully will rectify this bollocks or be the masters of their own demise! Outrageous way for a company to behave!

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nputtick

Trending Lyricist I

This is a TERRIBLE way to treat loyal customers. Making multi-£$€1000 systems obsolete will be a disaster for the company. Don’t talk about technical obsolescence by calling perfectly good working equipment “legacy” - what an insult, Aldo an admission of failure on your part. Also you have just killed the resale value of our equipment - until recently residual value was much higher than 30%!

Now, I have spotted the lie inherent in the announcement. Recently it was possible to add an Airplay2 device (such as a One) to an older Sonos setup, which would then make it possible to feed the ENTIRE system via Airplay2. The conclusion is that only one device needs to have the new features in order for the whole system to work - all that is happening is that a digital stream is being sent to the other devices over the mesh wifi (or cat 5), and decided in those devices. The peripheral devices don’t need the new features, so there is no issue with their hardware capability. Sonos can solve this quickly and cheaply for all of us, and save their company, by producing a host device (doesn’t even need to have any audio) with the new features to keep an existing multi room setup working indefinitely. Come on Sonos, DO THE RIGHT THING.

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patbla

Enthusiast II

patbia!The residual sales and value of sonos products has just gone completely up in smoke Im afraid!Who in their right mind is going to pay out on a system that wont work in possibly 6 months time?Sell if you can and your punter hasnt read the “legacy” bombshell!I personally couldnt sell to a somebody unaware of the sonos service I couldnt sleep at night!Sonos hopefully will rectify this bollocks or be the masters of their own demise! Outrageous way for a company to behave!

I have 17 components on my account that are now listed as legacy (I have supported installations for friends, I think 10 of those components are in my house).

I cannot in good conscience dump this equipment on unsuspecting people. I hope that one of two things happen, either Sonos reverses course and allows “legacy” and “modern” components to coexist or that a community of developers take up the development of an alternative OS. I have asked in a previous post that if Sonos is no longer going to support these components that they release the code base so that it could be used for non-commercial purposes. I am sure that there would be a community happy to support the continued development.

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sjschmid

Avid Contributor I

With this announcement, it should be clear to anyone that there is no reason to buy any Sonos product that has a speaker or an amplifier in it, because they may become prematurely obsolete. The only product that makes any sense at all is the “Port”, to which you can connect your own amplifier and speaker. And even then, the price point for the Port is quite high for a product that may be obsolete in a few years.

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