era 300 line in

That’s odd…I have both PLAY:3s and Era 300s, and haven’t noticed an issue with either type.

My suspicion is that something changed on the line in aspect. Since the PLAY:3 doesn’t have a line in, I have to assume you were connected some other way.

So, a couple of questions…

Since a Sonos line in is expecting a line level input, and not a phono level input, which does your ‘mixer’ provide to the Sonos? Does the ‘mixer’ provide for two phono level inputs to one line level output? Or, perhaps more easily, does this ‘mixer’ provide two inputs that are labeled ‘phono’ and an output labeled something else?

My guess is that your ‘mixer’ isn’t providing any of the benefits of a normal pre-amp to the signal, and you’re getting a regular ‘phono’ output, which requires cranking up of the Sonos line in settings, since it wasn’t designed for it, and misses out on all the extra equalization done by a pre-amp. I haven’t bothered to look up the technics to see if they have a built in pre-amp that should be turned on. 

Do you have a link to the instructions for this ‘mixer’?

Hi Bruce

thank you so much for your reply.

ill send you a couple of photos of the set up I have connection wise.

This worked perfectly with the 3’s speakers?

steven.

Hi Bruce

thank you so much for your reply.

ill send you a couple of photos of the set up I have connection wise.

This worked perfectly with the 3’s speakers?

steven.

 

By 3, do you mean a Play:3? If so, how were you connecting to that: it doesn’t have an input other than Ethernet? 
 

Is the Aux an input or output, and what signal does it provide? 
 

Are the channel “line” connectors outputs? 

The top picture, I think, is a Sonos Port. So the Sonos PLAY:3s would be a ‘room’ associated with it. The Era 300s should just take those two RCA jacks that are currently connected to the Port, and be connected to the Era 300’s line in (wire the correct adapter, to switch from RCA to USB-C sold by Sonos). There’s zero difference between those two line ins, other than the form factor. 

However, if you’re using a non-Sonos connector to the Era 300’s line in (which you didn’t picture), it’s possible there’s an issue.

on the other hand, you could just leave it connected to the Sonos Port in the first place, and choose in the Sonos software controller to output the information to the Era 300s. 
 

And yes, I’m taking the assumption that a 3 is a PLAY:3, since Sonos has never made a 3. 

Is the sound distorted, or choppy/cutting out?

Are any other Sonos devices plugged into Ethernet/router?

How far away are the Era-300’s from your router/WiFi?

Try with compression enabled:

https://support.sonos.com/en-gb/article/adjust-line-in-audio-compression

Also, try to increase the audio delay (not ideal) but may help if there are network performance issues:

https://support.sonos.com/en-gb/article/adjust-line-in-settings

Hi Bruce

apologies for my lack of technical knowledge in these kind of things which is all a bit knew to me (which is why I thought the photos of my connections might help )

My Era 300 speakers are just plugged in to a normal mains socket around 15 feet opposite my turntables,mixer and Sonos Port.

My router and WiFi is in a separate room next door.

My speakers are just connected by the WiFi.

The port was connected to let me play vinyl on the speakers opposite which is now the Era 300’s.

I hope this makes sense?

If the turntables have a built-in or external phono preamp, disable or remove this phono preamp, or disable the mixer’s phono preamps. There can only be one phono preamp in a turntable connection.

Also, the mixer input should not be set for microphone input.