Sonos five dies out after 2.5 years

Hi Sonnno, sorry to hear that. It scares me. I don’t think a buyer of two Sonos 5 is a kind of customer that a brand wants to throw away. If you already spoke with the retailer, try directly with Sonos, I don’t think they try to solve it with a 30% voucher.

I’ll follow this thread, because is interesting to know how repairable these speakers are. We cannot survive many decades with the “buy-a-new-one” philosophy. 

In my country we’ve 3 years of warranty, since a couple of years, still not enough for this kind of devices. 

Also, ask your neighbours, perhaps a power surge fried some others’ equipments and you can claim to the electric company. 

Thanks Tritcale, I appreciate it. 

Unfortunately I’m writing here after long chats with both Sonos support and the reseller (i have the chats saved). They do seem determined to “throw me away as a customer” as you say.. I own two 5’s, two 1’s and one Move. They don’t seem to care, maybe they think i am too invested and will cave. disappointing.

But the real disappointment is how unfixable the thing is.   

About a power surge - something caused it so i guess it’s possible. All i know is that the speaker was behind a surge protection device. Plus, nothing else happened to any of my other appliances on that same device (TV, another Five, a soundbar, a subwoofer, a MacBook etc) so it’s unlikely caused by a network spike or a guard malfunction… 

I’m in the US and there are no commercial repair options for any Sonos speaker. If you can diagnose the failed components you may find a YouTube video on how to effect a repair.

I’ve had my Fives for over two years and having no issues. As far as the chatter about two years of life span being normal I personally think that a false statement. Sonos has had its share of bad publicity of late regarding the app but there are Sonos speakers from 10 years ago still operating. So again I find the two year claim of expected failure for a Five to be rubbish.

To say that the speaker failed overnight IMO points to an external cause. Maybe a power surge as suggested by ​@Triticale . On the other hand electronics do fail sometimes for no known reason most likely due to a faulty component that took a couple of years to manifest.

I don’t know what country you live as you mentioned the failure occurred just out of warranty. In the US the warranty is only one year. My point being maybe you might try pleading your case again for a replacement. If successful the replacement would most likely be a refurbished unit.

30% off a new Five is more than any manufacturer I know of would offer. One more question… when you spoke to Sonos tech support did they run a remote diagnostic to determine a failed component? Doing so may help your case for a replacement unit.

Edit: Our posts crossed as you were the faster typer.

​@AjTrek1 thanks,

1. I made no claim about the the life expectancy of Five. On the contrary, i think its uncommon which is why i’m surprised they don’t offer any solution. I have another Five (and other Sonos speakers) that’s working well. I just said that it happens - one out of two Fives died on me after two years - and it seems to be a known issue (meaning, Sonos know this happens from time to time, they know how often, and probably know exactly what breaks and why) - IF the reports online are correct - i cannot know that for a fact this could have been a random thing. That is not to say it’s the common case. But still likely a known issue. Regardless, and especially if it’s not a common malfunction, I’d expect a good expensive brand to own up to their faulty designs and take responsibility for it: both for the fact that it broke after 2 years (and likely due to a known issue), and for the fact that it’s build to be unrepairable.
2. In my country there are laws that require the importer to provide reasonable fixing services for any appliance over 100$ for 7 years from purchase, these are clearly violated here. 
3. Yes, I sent the app diagnostics data to Sonos, but since the Speaker is completely dead it cannot run diagnostics. I also sent it to the importer’s lab for evaluation - they simply returned it saying that some electrical board is bad and it cannot be fixed.
4. I’d gladly take a working refurbished unit. One wasn’t offered.

You say there are no commercial repair options - and that the warranty is for 1 year. Are American consumers happy to buy a 600$ disposable appliance? or do Sonos offer lab services?

1 year is the standard warranty in the US, and Sonos is the only manufacturer I know of that offers 30% towards a replacement for an out of warranty unit.  Warranties are just one way the US culture differs from UK/EU.  We don’t have the consumer protection other countries have, and this has conditioned us to accept that sometimes things fail, a 1 year warranty only lasts 1 year, and a 30% off replacement is better than nothing (especially when “nothing” is what 99.9% of the other companies offer). 

​@Ronnno 

If as you say in your country importers are required to provide 7 years of repair service for goods over $100 dollars then you may have a legal claim to purse. How does your country define “importer”? Is it the reseller or manufacturer? Also, do you reside in your country or in the US. 

Yes, I know - if it comes to it i can bring it up - but big companies know private people have better things to do than battle with windmills. and No, I’m not in the US

Of course things fail sometimes. That’s why you plan for what happens when they do.

If a 600$ appliance is designed so that if some small thing in it break it must be thrown away and bought anew, it’s not right.

Why would i buy it again? It’s highly unlikely that the thing that broke cost 400$ to replace. If they don’t allow me to repair it for a fair cost it means that i’m just not rich enough to be buying Sonos, at best, or, plain disrespectful at worst. 

You asked “Are American consumers happy to buy a 600$ disposable appliance?”  So I was just explaining the cultural differences vis warranties between the US and other countries.  As your reply aptly demonstrates, the culture in other places is to get irate over something the US just shrugs off as business as usual.  No judgment either way was intended. 

American brands set the standard for good service and customer experience worldwide. this isn’t about America vs EU. My expectations are set by other leading brands which are all American. 

Whatever.  You asked about American consumers.  There are distinct cultural differences between how the US and places like the UK/EU view warranties and I explained those differences.  Make of that what you will.

​@Ronnno, You are required to return the broken item to Sonos by filling out an RMA request in order to get a replacement. A courier will deliver the replacement device and collect the damaged one. Sonos has internal workshops in the Netherlands and Poland, where the devices are refurbished and afterwards resold as second hand items.

Sonos Official | eBay Stores

But I suppose the 30% voucher doesn’t include returning the broken one… Because it would be make business three times in one…

RMA returns and new purchases are treated the same, down to the warranty terms and conditions.

I have filed the request and am in contact with both Sonos support and their local representative. But i was not offered any replacement, just a 30% voucher to “upgrade”

Just want to clear up a few things regarding the 30% discount (at least as it works here in the US):

1. Under the Sonos Upgrade Program if you own the product and it’s registered in your Sonos account you may have a discount up to 30% towards the purchase of a new product.  There is no stipulation that the product (working or not) be returned under an RMA to Sonos. See the particulars here .
2. If Sonos offers a 30% discount as compensation for a defective product that is out of warranty you may (emphasis on may) be required to return the defective product via RMA. Sonos pays for shipping. That makes sense to ensure people aren’t trying to get a discount towards a replacement product under false pretense. *

All said if in your country you have a 30% discount under the Upgrade Program for your Five just; use Option 1 above and do as you wish with the defective Five. I’m not suggesting that you do...just explaining options that may be available.

 * The RMA may direct shipping to a 3rd party location. That is a common business practice as manufacturers typically don’t want the product unless they feel there are extenuating circumstances that require research to determine the cause of the failure. Manufacturers may also have the 3rd party retrieve components that can be reused.

A replacement item isn’t cost-free, it’s also discounted by 30%. The difference between a replacement and a discount offer is purely of legal nature.

Sonos offers extended warranties for folks not happy with the standard (in the US) year. I buy them for Sonos that I am gifting to someone, not for myself.

So far I haven't had a Sonos speaker or component fail, some of my Sonos remotes did fail or suffer battery failures.

Offering a repair service needs to make economic sense to Sonos, hopefully they will see something good in the refurbish operation and expand it. Many repairs are not cheap, it may cost $200 in labor to replace a part that costs a few pennies. Might make more sense for a small repair shop to add Sonos to their repair skills but I haven't seen any reports of folks fixing Sonos commercially doing well out of it. 

Repair can often involve uncomfortable costs — especially for units that don’t often fail. The technician must spend time diagnosing and often put the unit aside while parts are ordered. Then there is the other side where all failures of a popular unit are sent to one large national repair shop and routed to a single bench. The unit typically fails in one of three ways and the tech can sort this in a minute or two. Parts for all three failures are sitting at the bench. The tech is very familiar with disassembly and can process through 10-15 units per day.

I don’t have any hard data, but I suspect that SONOS FIVE falls near the “don’t often fail”, hard to disassemble end of the spectrum. This increases the cost to repair for those units that do fail.

Would you be comfortable with a $200-300 repair and shipping cost for an out of warranty unit?

A certain number of failures is inevitable. Warranty costs must be built into the initial cost of a unit. Long warranties may increase the initial consumer cost to the point where sales dwindle. A nice marketing ploy is to publicize an ‘n’ year warranty, but internally finance an ‘n+1’ or ‘n+2’ year warranty. This results in a popular company because it can be generous with seemingly out of warranty coverage. This extended coverage can also bite because a customer might claim that the company knew the product was unreliable because the warranty was graciously extended.

There can be bad batches with a high failure rate. Companies are usually generous if a failed product is in one of these batches. I know a speaker company that had a batch of speakers fail soon after purchase or in shipment. Repair parts failed during shipment. This was decades ago and most of these speakers, pre and post bad batch, are still in service. The fundamental issue was finally traced to a technician working on the assembly line during a three day period who was not following written procedures.

Bottom line: keep talking with SONOS because you may get lucky. In the future you might consider purchasing extended warranties for any products that you purchase (from any company).

I haven't taken any Sonos apart since I wanted to play with the chassis of my bricked (early upgrade program) ones and unless the newer ones are very different getting to the electronics, for testing and/or repair, isn't going to be fun.

​@buzz i also don’t have hard data on how often power suppliers fail in Five before a reasonable period.

But, see this thread below of about 6 years and 3 generations of Five speakers where people find cheap and easy fixes to power supply issues (what i’m having).

Making fixing cheap or expensive is a design choice, and then a policy choice. It’s a choice the company made when they designed the product, and then again when they defined their policies - to use too much glue inside, and to demand that broken speakers be sent back for the discount. it’s not fate and it’s not an economical necessity that fixing would be is too expensive. 

I asked Claude (Opus 4.1 to summarize the thread):

Bottom Line

Success Rate: Very high for simple fuse/rectifier failures (most common issue)

Cost:

• Simple fix: €3-10
• Medium complexity: $15-30
• External PSU bypass: ~$30

Time Investment: 2-6 hours typically (mostly fighting glue)

Verdict: The thread shows overwhelmingly positive results. Even complete novices succeeded with basic soldering skills. The main barriers are:

1. Excessive hot glue (solvable with patience and isopropyl alcohol)
2. Identifying the specific failed component(s)
3. Desoldering the rectifier (universally described as difficult)

The thread represents a community-driven reverse engineering effort spanning 14 years, with users helping each other identify components and solutions. Most repairs cost under $20 in parts, making it very worthwhile compared to replacement.

Yes, the glue makes disassembly and reassembly tedious, but it minimizes miscellaneous noises.

Great,

This sort of brings up the question again - are there non official labs that will take this on?

Regardless of the point of principle here (should Sonos put their customer satisfaction first or short term profit)  

If the cost of fixing it is only a couple of hours work of a talented electrician, and the parts are negligible, i can probably find someone to tinker with it and maybe just get my speaker back...

Yes there are. 
 

Where do you live? 

Thanks ​@nik9669a, I’m in Tel Aviv.