Era 300 cuts in and out when configured as surround speaker

@Airgetlam thank you for this clear answer.

But why was I asked to re-enable the WiFi also on my sub?

Since it is connected to the switch where the arc is connected, it should directly communicate with the Arc or am I missing something?

Hi @Sebkulu 

I’ll try to explain why Sonos Tech Support may give advice that doesn’t appear to make sense.  Especially to those like yourself who have joined Sonos within the last 2-3 years. No offense intended...it’s all about history.

When I first jumped on the Sonos bandwagon Home Wifi was not an option. You had to purchase a “Bridge “ which is now called a “Boost”. Sonos back then was always on the SonosNet from the git go! The SonosNet (IMO) while not perfect was and is still more stable than Home Wifi.

Sonos resisted allowing its speakers to be put on home Wi-Fi for years. People in general typically purchased any router just to get wi-fi capability in their homes. Wifi was mainly for laptop computers and their portability. It was an early form of “cutting the cord”

The early days of Wi-Fi were very iffy with 802.11a and 802.11b. 802.11 throughput and signal strength really didn’t improve until 802.11g. Devices cable of running on the 802.11g proliferated over night.

I remember when 802.11n was introduced. The problem was that most routers that provided 802.11n were not backwards compatible to 802.11a/b/g. Sonos to this day doesn’t like 802.11n dedicated networks.

When Sonos finally allowed its speakers to operate over home Wi-Fi the flood gate of problems started. This community owes a lot of it’s longevity to issues stemming from home Wi-Fi.

Everyone who thinks they are a network “guru” isn’t. Add to that those who want to engage range extenders and access points on their networks; not realizing that only the main router should have DHCP capability. Let’s add ISP’s who provide their proprietary modem/router equipment to the mix. Oh...lets not forget the latest wifi setup...Mesh Networks. 

Speaking of network “guru’s (you are probably the exception)...most people don’t know the difference between a “dumb” versus a “managed” switch. The latter which can interfere with Sonos updates; if not configured properly. Therefore, Sonos tech support gave advice to connect a speaker directly to a router rather than through a switch. Also the advice to connect directly to the router from time to time to ensure updates are received.

Having worked in tech support when doling out advice more is typically given than needed. The reason being is that the tech support person doesn’t know the clients level of knowledge. Therefore  “CYA” answers are given to hopefully cover as many scenarios possible.

The client (individuals like yourself) hopefully can decide what advice is relevant to their situation; and what advice is given as a “BTW”. 

You may recall my comment in an earlier post which alluded to the problem being associated with Wi-Fi...

“However, since surrounds use the 5 Ghz channel between the Arc/Beam to receive their information; I'm not sure that wiring an Era 300/100 would make a difference. I guess I’m leaving toward some type wireless interference as the culprit 🤔’

At the time I didn’t know it was because the WiFi on the Arc had been switched off. That said my answer may not be as “scientific” as you would desire. Suffice it to say, that Wifi can be friend or foe as it relates to Sonos.

Edit: Wifi must be turned on for all devices in a home theater setup. The 5Ghz is used by the Arc/Beam to send the appropriate material to the the sub(s) and surrounds. No exception.

The normal setup for a Sonos “bonded” speaker, such as a Sub and / or a surround speaker is to connect to a unseen 5Ghz signal generated by the sound bar. It saves a “hop”/”processing time” or two, which is important for a latency sensitive connection, so that it doesn’t go to the router for additional handling. That’s the way Sonos designed it to work. There are some cases in which a direct wire can work, but there’s additional work being done by the network, so it’s not really the “best” or primary/intended use case. 

In addition to the above excellent post from, @AjTrek1 , a more concise answer to your question:

The Sub needs to connect to the sound bar’s wifi signal. So both “radios” need to be turned on. The one sending, and the one receiving the signal. 

SONOS has misnamed “WiFi OFF” because it turns OFF the radio, thus stranding wireless surrounds and communications with wireless SonosNet and WiFi.

BOOST is a different product, replacing BRIDGE. At this point one should consider BRIDGE to be EOL because they often cause issues due to hardware failure.

A history note: At one point the competition accused SONOS of lying about being wireless because at least one unit needed to be wired. The wired unit could be an inexpensive BRIDGE if it was not physically convenient to wire a player. For a while SONOS included a free BRIDGE with a purchase, but this did not eliminate the “lying” dialog. It was a relatively cheap trick for SONOS to enable WiFi and this deflated the “lying” dialog overnight. It should be noted that SONOS has been “mesh” since inception in 2005. Only lately has “mesh” become a magic word in consumer WiFi. While competition was accusing SONOS of “lying”, they struggled to serve more than a handful of wireless clients. As the competition devised more robust schemes, they bumped into SONOS patents.

On switches, as said managed switches can cause issues with Sonos, some can be cured by tweaking the switch. But also some un-managed gear seems to fall short of supporting all that Sonos needs, see the incompatible hardware page for a list of known gear.

Putting all on the wireless worked for me.

“WiFi on arc and sub must be enabled”. Does this apply only to the Era 300’s? My Home Theater setup = Arc plus 2 Fives as surrounds. My Arc is plugged directly into my Netgear Orbi via ethernet. I have wifi disabled on my Arc. My 2 Fives and Arc play TV (streaming movies, regular TV, etc.), and streaming music just fine. I can also add my 3 Play Fives to this setup via Alexa or Sonos Voice when streaming music, so the music plays throughout the house, actually the TV will play throughout the house the same way - all speakers playing the same thing at the same time. I know this is not a groundbreaking observation (grouping speakers), just curious as to why my setup will work this way with wifi turned off on the Arc, and the Era 300’s will not, since both of our setups include the Arc being connected via ethernet.

There are two types of Sonos connections.

The first is the normal peer to peer type, which can occur across multiple types of connections. 2.4Ghz Wi-Fi (b/g/n) or 5Ghz, or SonosNet ( a separate mesh Wi-Fi signal parallel to a normal Wi-Fi signal, but unseen except by Sonos). And of course wired. 

The second is a parent/child (master/slave) type, which is used for speakers known as ‘bonded’ speakers, such as Subwoofers and surround speakers. This is usually across a ‘hidden’ 5Ghz Wi-Fi connection, as designed by Sonos. In some cases, it can work over a wired connection, but that seems to be ‘spotty’, at least from what I have seen. The normal use case is the wireless connection, which requires the ‘radio’ to be turned on on both speakers. 

Thank you for your quick response. My connection is not “spotty” thank goodness. However, your response precipitated another question. Since bonded speakers are designed by Sonos to connect via a hidden 5Ghz WI-FI connection, theoretically, does that mean the sound will be better than a wired connection for bonded speakers? I guess my 2 Fives “bond” to my Arc via the home network? (since the Arc wifi is turned off).