End of Software Support - Clarifications

End of Software Support - Clarifications
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G
Userlevel 4
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Am I missing something!

I understand that older Sonos speakers may become incompatible with the latest innovations due to hardware limitations, for instance older speakers can’t support voice commands or receive a bluetooth signal,, but I can’t see a  technical reason why they shouldn’t be usable in the future using the existing software ( if you didn’t wish to add a newer one then this wouldn’t be a problem.)

As all these speakers are connected through wifi over a mesh network (SonosNet ) I don’t understand why a new speaker would be incompatible with an older speaker (so called legacy), unless Sonos plan to change how they transmit the data (music) requiring a hardware change,  If so why don’t Sonos just say that they are going to change to a new system (Sonos 2) instead of saying the older speakers are “legacy”?

If not, why couldn’t a new speaker act as a lead speaker and transmit the data to the other ones (old and new), with the caveat that older speakers would be no longer be standalone when using the Sonos (2) software.

 

F
Userlevel 4
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i agree

why not design an adapter or “bridge” so that the old will interface with the new and continue as a whole system

id buy it ….i say again …. id buy it !!!!

ps

I don't give hoot about all the future advance updates ,

Don't want them at the expense of my working system

Ken_Griffiths

Here’s another thought, given there are lots of eyes on this forum at the moment a few of them have to be bright spark techies or electronics wizards, unlike myself I hasten to add😁 

what we need is one of these clever guys to whip the top off a play1, 3 or 5 and figure out how to retrofit a line in,  aux Jack, possibly even a Bluetooth module. I love the sound quality of my Sonos kit and always have and I would personally pay to have my gear retro fitted and thus make it independent of any software shenanigans. I think people would queue up for this to be done. 
 

come on one of you bright sparks get the soldering iron out and get yourself a profitable ready made business all in one go 😁👍🏻

The play: 5 has a line-in already and just to say the Play:1 and 3 devices are not part of the annoucement .. hope that assists. 👍

Hi Ken,

yep my Play 5 does have a line in but it still needs the Sonos app to work, I’m talking about making each unit wholly independent of the software and app, a standalone powered speaker. Whilst the 1’s and 3’s are not the issue at the moment Mr Spence’s mealy mouthed reply sure made it clear they will be part of the issue at some point…...

Just to say (briefly) the line in, when set to Autoplay, will always work without the Sonos App and without WiFi for that matter. Some folk take them from Home to Work and run them off their mobile with the usual 3.5mm cable. Just so you know that option remains open to you. Not that I think you will ever need to go to such lengths, personally speaking. 

U
Userlevel 6
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Out of interest, as I’ve never used this feature on my 5, would you be confident that you’d NEVER need to go in to your app to do this? Eg, does it work automatically after a long time without power, without WiFi etc?

I’m interested in starting to use this as a way of continuing to use my 5 after Sonos kill it. 

J

 

Earlier in the thread some poor sod, had a playbar for sorround, backed by 2 Play 5’s as rear speakers.

He can either go legacy og pay up for 2 new speakers to replace the relatively expensive speakers he bought 4 years ago in 2015/2016, when resellers were still selling their remaining stock of gen 1 play 5’s.

 

Imagine buying 2 speakers ~4 years ago, paying over $1000 for them, only to be told they are obsolete now.

There has been a fair bit of misinformation peddled by the baying mob on this thread, but this wins the prize for the biggest pile of doo-doo.  THE GEN 1 PLAY:5 CANNOT BE USED AS SURROUND SPEAKERS AND NEVER COULD.  So this is pure nonsense. 

G

I’m new to Sonos, I really like the products. I was planing a house full to add to the three I have. I appreciate your honesty in pointing out the vunerability of modern electronics, but I have stopped buying music and rely on streaming to supply all my music needs. I need to know that your sound system will continue to work until I want to replace it. I dont want to find one day that my whole system no longer plays my music source because of some minor software tweek. Your brand confidence relys on all your equipment flawlessly working together which historically it has. But now? You need to ensure that backwards compatability is maintained and assured, I will need some serious reasurance before I buy another Sonos product. I cannot imagine buying a whole system that the manufacturer may through disinterest render obsolete.

A

Ryan,

On opening up the Sonos ‘Important  Notice’ - posted 21. Jan - my first reaction was anger.  I’ve spent a few thousand €’s building a sound system which I absolutely love - and which suits my needs.  Was it Sales Dept. or Streaming companies pressure behind this??  How could a company like Sonos literary shoot themselves in the foot like this and destroy their great reputation.

Having now read Patrick Spence’s apology and other posts where other Sonos users give their heated opinions I think Sonos really needs to reflect on how they can provide long term software support to our so called legacy products.

I look forward to hearing from you as to how Sonos will deliver long term software support!

One final point. You could do with updating the Sonos ‘Important  Notice’ as posted 21. Jan to reflect the Patrick Spence’s apology.

Viele Grüße

Alan in Bayern

M
Userlevel 4
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I genuinely wonder how much it would have cost Sonos to develop a Media/ Legacy hub (which I'm sure people would buy in droves) vs what this last week will have cost them in lost sales and share prices.

Why would you employ the man that killed Blackberry to run your company, doesn't make any sense. My 8 year old daughter could do a better job it seems..


agreed, or they could simply add the functionality to the newer speakers. no one really cares about voice control or bluetooth, these are the ideas of a brain dead leadership. personally all i want is higher quality formats, and if the legacy speakers cant handle flac or other hd audio(a known limitation, and known when i bought them), how about streaming 256 or the maximum bit rate to legacy speakers with the HD going to the newer?

M
Userlevel 4
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Ryan,

On opening up the Sonos ‘Important  Notice’ - posted 21. Jan - my first reaction was anger.  I’ve spent a few thousand €’s building a sound system which I absolutely love - and which suits my needs.  Was it Sales Dept. or Streaming companies pressure behind this??  How could a company like Sonos literary shoot themselves in the foot like this and destroy their great reputation.

Having now read Patrick Spence’s apology and other posts where other Sonos users give their heated opinions I think Sonos really needs to reflect on how they can provide long term software support to our so called legacy products.

I look forward to hearing from you as to how Sonos will deliver long term software support!

One final point. You could do with updating the Sonos ‘Important  Notice’ as posted 21. Jan to reflect the Patrick Spence’s apology.

Viele Grüße

Alan in Bayern


keep in mind his apology changes nothing about the original announcement. he literally said “we are sorry, we made a mistake, we are still doing everythig we said, please bear with us”.

what kept me from denon heos, audio pro, that blue whatever company and all the others that offered higher quality audio was sonos long standing support of legacy products and fanatical supporters. now both are dead.

J

I genuinely wonder how much it would have cost Sonos to develop a Media/ Legacy hub (which I'm sure people would buy in droves) vs what this last week will have cost them in lost sales and share prices.

Why would you employ the man that killed Blackberry to run your company, doesn't make any sense. My 8 year old daughter could do a better job it seems..


agreed, or they could simply add the functionality to the newer speakers. no one really cares about voice control or bluetooth, these are the ideas of a brain dead leadership. personally all i want is higher quality formats, and if the legacy speakers cant handle flac or other hd audio(a known limitation, and known when i bought them), how about streaming 256 or the maximum bit rate to legacy speakers with the HD going to the newer?

All Sonos products can handle FLAC. None do hires because Sonos don’t believe it makes an audible difference.  This is completely irrelevant to legacy vs modern.  And the fact that you aren’t interested in voice control doesn’t mean nobody is.  If there is a threat to Sonos it is Google and Amazon.  Far more so than even the fury demonstrated on this thread.

S
Userlevel 1

I am in a holding pattern until May. I will spend my time looking at an alternative systems.

 

 https://www.zdnet.com/article/so-long-sonos-meet-the-open-source-audio-system-that-will-never-die/

S
Userlevel 1
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It's kind of absurd that Sonos, who brought us a device to hook up our old speakers, can't do the same for their own...

 

Bingo. This is where Spence lost the plot. 

The solution was/is staring at him in the face and he dropped the ball.

Every issue, every complaint, every pissed off poster and loyal customer boils down to this one simple solution. 

J

It's kind of absurd that Sonos, who brought us a device to hook up our old speakers, can't do the same for their own...

 

Bingo. This is where Spence lost the plot. 

The solution was/is staring at him in the face and he dropped the ball.

Every issue, every complaint, every pissed off poster and loyal customer boils down to this one simple solution. 

Ah the confidence that total ignorance of even a single line of the Sonos system code can bring!

M
Userlevel 5
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What I don’t understand is why SONOS does not create a middleman box that can exist between the older network and whatever they want to change to.  Lets assume you want to move onto a more modern network technology.  The “Legacy Bridge” or what ever you want to call it could pass along all streaming needs to the old network items and provide all the new features to the older products.  At the end of the day they are speakers.  Today they have to be able to do everything that the newer products do because you may want to stream a different channel on every speaker/connect/whatever.  But if the heavy lifting was done by a dedicated device then it could relieve the older units from that duty and let them play nicely with the new.  As others haves said, there are 20 year old 10 megabit network devices that still happily connect to our new gigabit networks.  

I would pay for this.  I would then be able to happily add and replace with new equipment without issue anytime I need or want.  And I would not be throwing perfectly good working equipment into the landfill.

It seems really simple to me.  If there is a reason this cannot be done then tell us.  Otherwise we simply are left to our own conclusions that you simply want to make more money by forcing the older systems out and their users to repurchase.

Lastly, your stated purpose is to allow for all these new features.  What are these new things?  I can’t imagine that voice control even plays into this.  I can already do it today on my whole SONOS system young and old via a single Alexa device (Not that I do very often as it easier to use the Controller App in my opinion.).  All that Alexa does is translate our voice commands into something the receiving system understands.  Its not like every speaker needs to have Alexa/Google/Whatever on board.  Maybe some of us would be more accepting if we knew what the goals here really are.  That’s still a big “maybe” since we all seem to believe that are solutions that are not being worked on.

A
Userlevel 1

Agree with all the complaints. What numbskull decided to treat customers this way?

30% discount is NOT anywhere near enough for expensive products to persuade us all to trade up.

 

In one room I have 2 Connect:Amps - only one of which is eligible for the trade in despite being a similar age, which leaves me to either cough up 70% for one Amp and 100% for another Amp or risk them not working together properly/fully as a grouped pair in future.

And then, I have a Connect in another room… driving a separate (non Sonos) amp to replace.

 

The only way out of this for Sonos which sees their brand survive is to increase the discount so the replacements are at cost price (so I guess a discount more like 65%) and accept ALL items if, like me, you have them paired up to work together. Otherwise, like others, I will switch to other, cheaper brands having learned the lesson.

R
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I agree with all these post. Complete BS.

Like others, I’ve slowly added speakers over the years and spent thousands of dollars, all because I believe Sonos is second to none in quality and performance. I can’t wrap my head around how they thought this would be the best route to take. Not a whole lot of people can afford their speakers. They literally halted any sales from current owners until May or maybe forever. I don’t want to give up on them and I hope they retract their decision on this. However, even if they do retract their position and make a bridge to use new and “legacy” systems together, I’ve still lost valuable trust moving forward. 

 

Why wouldn’t Sonos just come up with their own streaming service that’ll support both new and “legacy” systems. Then they could offer this as a monthly subscription service... Why would they allow other companies to dictate how their products are used or performs. 

 

The next announcement better be a home run or they're in a world of trouble.

Rich
J
Userlevel 4
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I am a bit curious - Sonos had other crises in the past, for instance the one around requiring registration, as illustrated by the following cut-out from Amazon.de:

How did Sonos manage to stear through this crisis - and the previous round of retiring products? What arguments or acts ended up calming down their customers again?

As for the registration, I myself got annoyed but then just registered; as I remember it with a kind if reasoning for myself that I was registered with so many other vendors (and also already with this one), so it wouldn’t make much of a difference for me. But others were unhappy - did they leave, did they end up accepting the new terms, or what happened?

“This is a chance now to come up with a system that doesn’t cause massive planetary damage in exchange for disposable stuff,” Proctor said. (https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/3a8dpn/sonos-makes-it-clear-you-no-longer-own-the-things-you-buy)
S
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I’m new to Sonos, I really like the products. I was planing a house full to add to the three I have. I appreciate your honesty in pointing out the vunerability of modern electronics, but I have stopped buying music and rely on streaming to supply all my music needs. I need to know that your sound system will continue to work until I want to replace it. I dont want to find one day that my whole system no longer plays my music source because of some minor software tweek. Your brand confidence relys on all your equipment flawlessly working together which historically it has. But now? You need to ensure that backwards compatability is maintained and assured, I will need some serious reasurance before I buy another Sonos product. I cannot imagine buying a whole system that the manufacturer may through disinterest render obsolete.

 

I think come May, we’ll know the party’s over for sure.

J

Agree with all the complaints. What numbskull decided to treat customers this way?

30% discount is NOT anywhere near enough for expensive products to persuade us all to trade up.

 

In one room I have 2 Connect:Amps - only one of which is eligible for the trade in despite being a similar age, which leaves me to either cough up 70% for one Amp and 100% for another Amp or risk them not working together properly/fully as a grouped pair in future.

Why 100% for the second C:A? Why anything for the second C:A?

D
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I bought my first Play:5 (gen 1) and Play:1 two years ago, after much thought, consideration and research – Sonos is not cheap! – indeed my speakers were registered in January 2018. And then, after just 24 months I’m told that they’re Legacy and potentially obsolete?? Cripes that’s mean!

The product sales description includes the following: 

“ Futureproof
Designed with tomorrow in mind, the speaker combines sleek looks with agile internal sensors and ongoing software updates. This ensures that you always have the most future-proofed audio solution, even as you grow your system over time.”

I am staggered after believing this sales pitch, and now we have the current situation – and all that after two years only! My Play:5 (and presumably soon the Play:1) will be no longer ‘current’ after May. I was about to ‘grow my system’ and buy a couple more – but this has knocked me sideways.

What’s more (and it’s very nice for you to offer ‘30% off’ a gen2 Play:5) – But your Sonos pricing is higher than other ‘retail’ prices. And not sure if I want to pay £4-500 every few years for a new unit.

It’s a shame that two years ago, when it must have been known to at least some at Sonos that this was going to be happening soon  – that the prices were not ‘reduced/lowered’ in-store to reflect the ‘short life’ that would be available, but I guess then Sonos may not have sold so many units.

We all do expect our ‘tech units’ to last for more than 24 months – probably more than 10 years with audio – and by that I mean ‘last in fully-rounded working order with all the updates’.

G
Userlevel 4
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Forget discounts etc. what is the reason why the older products won’t work with the new ones to come? Sonos is meant to be about quality speakers that connect together, why do they want to change that?

And why do they think people will pay lots of money building up a system for it to become obsolete?

Just make the system work, new and all! 

J

I bought my first Play:5 (gen 1) and Play:1 two years ago, after much thought, consideration and research – Sonos is not cheap! – indeed my speakers were registered in January 2018. And then, after just 24 months I’m told that they’re Legacy and potentially obsolete?? Cripes that’s mean!

The product sales description includes the following: 

“ Futureproof
Designed with tomorrow in mind, the speaker combines sleek looks with agile internal sensors and ongoing software updates. This ensures that you always have the most future-proofed audio solution, even as you grow your system over time.”

I am staggered after believing this sales pitch, and now we have the current situation – and all that after two years only! My Play:5 (and presumably soon the Play:1) will be no longer ‘current’ after May. I was about to ‘grow my system’ and buy a couple more – but this has knocked me sideways.

What’s more (and it’s very nice for you to offer ‘30% off’ a gen2 Play:5) – But your Sonos pricing is higher than other ‘retail’ prices. And not sure if I want to pay £4-500 every few years for a new unit.

It’s a shame that two years ago, when it must have been known to at least some at Sonos that this was going to be happening soon  – that the prices were not ‘reduced/lowered’ in-store to reflect the ‘short life’ that would be available, but I guess then Sonos may not have sold so many units.

We all do expect our ‘tech units’ to last for more than 24 months – maybe even 10 years with audio – and by that I mean ‘last in fully-rounded working order with all the updates’.

Where did you buy a gen 1 Play:5 two years after Sonos discontinued sales?

D
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In John Lewis , Ipswich, UK

D

Update 2/22: A message from our CEO

<...>

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

 

Patrick Spence
CEO, Sonos

 

This email (Update 2/22: A message from our CEO) changed my decision: my Sonos systems is no longer up for sale!

 

But on May 1st, if you don’t have a very efficient way to split my system so that all my Sonos devices work together and you keep them updated with bug fixes and security patches, I’ll will get rid of them!

U
Userlevel 6
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It's kind of absurd that Sonos, who brought us a device to hook up our old speakers, can't do the same for their own...

 

Bingo. This is where Spence lost the plot. 

The solution was/is staring at him in the face and he dropped the ball.

Every issue, every complaint, every pissed off poster and loyal customer boils down to this one simple solution. 

Ah the confidence that total ignorance of even a single line of the Sonos system code can bring!

You don’t need to know anything about the code. Decoding a synchronised audio stream from other Sonos devices is something every one of their devices can do right now and could therefore do until the end of time. How many software updates have you applied to your DAB radio (as one example) to enable that to continue to work?

Decoding online streaming services MIGHT become infeasible in future. Maybe. Still fairly unlikely though. Again, all of their devices manage this today and the problem is unlikely to change dramatically. The updates that are periodically required to keep these things working are essential but minor. 

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