Play 3 sound distortion/ terrible sound after update.

ok thanks.

one interesting fact i tried:

when i play a song with spotify to the play:3 → crackling noise randomly at any volume

when i play the exact same song over another service (like Sonos Tube or similar) to the Play:3 → Perfect sound, no cracking

Can anybody explain this to me? Is it really a complete software issue?!

Or, possibly, a physical issue with your PLAY:3, like the speaker cone breaking in some manner. I use a pair of PLAY:3s daily with S2, and haven’t experienced this issue, so my guess is it’s local to your setup in some way. 

Hello,

a little update/info for those who have the same problem.

I now tried several hours with the Streaming App “Tidal” to play some songs with the Play:3 → perfect sound and no cracking

When i switch to play songs over Spotify to the Play:3 → instant cracking noises.

So it is everything fine with the speaker, looks like a software issue?!? Very strange indeed.

Best regards,

Dominik

Since you, and we other users here, can't see the internal data you should try playing one source and submitting a diagnostic for it, then the other, followed by a call to support as that is likely the best option.

yes you are completely right and i will do this today , just wanted to share my findings, so other People can try this out to eliminate hardware problems with their speaker..

I made the diagnostics and submitted them to Sonos.

Short Summary: They did not find anything suspicious, why this cracking noises happen, their only advice was to uninstall and install the Spotify service inside the Sonos App…

Not very satisfying, but it’s ok for me, i will use the Tidal App instead of Spotify for a good sound quality.

Since Sonos uses the same software to play all streams, it would be unusual for one stream to be impacted, but not another. If Tidal is working, but Spotify isn’t, it certainly suggests either an issue with your speakers reaching the Spotify servers, or an issue with the data that your speakers are getting from them. 

yeah sounds like. 

But i have a setup of 10 Sonos Speakers in the same network. And the problem only occurs on the two Play:3 speakers and only after the latest Update from Sonos.

But as i said, i am not satisfied with it, but i am ok with it…

I’ve had exactly the same issues with Play 1’s and Play 3’s all with Spotify even my Arc with Era 100’s / Sub but it’s less common on those speakers - which is annoying as that is my preferred streaming service - I thought it was my Sonos speakers until I had the same issue with Apple Home Pods with Spotify - admittedly it’s not always happening and sometimes a hard reboot of my phone sorts it out but yep, I’m pretty convinced it’s a software interface issue most of the time… one thing I may try is if happens on my Play 5 (although it’s on the S1 app - why we have to have two apps I don’t know - ridiculous) with a line in connection when I notice it crackling - that way I should in theory be able to tell if it’s an amplifier stage hardware issue or it is indeed just Spotify wireless streaming 😂

Just noticed it with my PLAY 3. I dont use it rarely. Distortion at any volume (Distortion is same volume). However not constantly. Sound like a dirty vinyl/record or a bad Jack connecntion hower none of them is of cause the case. When the distortion is not present the sound is so good (now lossless with Spotify)
Sad if software destroys an otherwise great product.