Sonos all on Main WiFI network, active WiFI Guest Network causes some Sonos nodes to drop

Given the issues associated with Asus and Sonos, I’m somewhat hesitant to ask, but does Asus allow you to separate the WiFi channels for your main and guest networks? Based on your post, it seems like your guest network is causing enough wifi interference to be an issue for Sonos (and perhaps other devices). 

If I were you, I would recreate this issue, then submit a system diagnostic , and call Sonos Support to discuss it. Don’t post the resulting diagnostic number here, they get sensitive about GDPR.

There may be information included in the diagnostic that will help Sonos pinpoint the issue and help you find a solution.

When you speak directly to the Support staff, they have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your network and Sonos system.

I use ASUS Wi-Fi 7 RT BE96U routers by 3 to create my AiMesh *

As the guest network will use 2.4Ghz/5Gz make sure it has a different SSID and password vs your main network. Most will assign a different password but not a different SSID. 

 * AiMesh is ASUS speak for mesh networks.

EDIT:

Also, if using the 6Ghz band for your backhaul be sure to isolate it to prevent the Guess network from using it.

I’m not going to say that disabling QoS didn’t resolve the OP’s issue four (4) years ago. However, there is more to setting QoS levels than just turning the feature on/off.  *

The OP stated that they had Video and Audio Streaming set as priority. That IMO is the correct setting versus the other options. However, the OP failed to mention at what level the others were set (which shouldn’t have been too critical) but setting the “type” of QoS to be used is critical. 

QoS has three (3) types of control: **

• Adaptive
• Traditional 
• Bandwidth Limiter

Adaptive is what I use and is probably the best in most scenarios. For the casual*** user the other levels require a bit more understanding of how they work and proper adjustment settings. 

Here are screen shots of my QoS settings:

As you can see I have chosen Adaptive QoS

The above prioritizations have served me very well for over ten (10) years using various models of ASUS routers configured in AiMesh.  Anyone who has read my posts on networking (and others wherein Sonos stability is a concern) knows that I have stated I have a very stable network (even through the App debacle).

So my point here is that even though the OP resolved their issue by disabling QoS they failed to mention (and/or show) parameter settings which may have been incorrectly configured for their use case.

 * My network consists of three (3) Wi-Fi 7 ASUS RT BE96U routers in AiMesh configuration with wired backhaul 

** Here is a link with more information on QoS parameters 

 *** I do not pretend to be an expert on networking by any stretch of the imagination 😂

Hi All,

Thanks for your replies, very useful.

The Guest Network uses separate SSID and password. However I think the guest network does use the same channel as the Main network.

QoS is off

I’ll have a go at submitting a System Diagnostics.

Glad you found a workaround. However, I’m still not convinced what you are having to do is normal. I’d ask that in the RT-AX86U admin section go to Wireless settings, and then the Professional tab. Once there make sure AirTime Fairness is disabled for all bands.  

As mentioned I’m using three (3) Wi-Fi 7 ASUS RT BE96U routers that host 50 to 60 clients at anytime. Thirty-one (31) of those clients are Sonos of which none are wired to the main nor satellite nodes.

I can confirm AirTime was disabled for both bands.

Hi there

So this is a official problem with the Asus 3006.102.5.x firmware and I have logged a ticket with Asus directly. 

As you have identified, the culprit is the entire Guest Network Pro feature

You can see all my investigation here https://www.snbforums.com/threads/issues-with-sonos-since-the-latest-update.95555/#post-968042

Thank you, ​@remsta,  for providing me with a resolution. I was already desperate with the Sonos support chat - their resolution after a two-day trial-and-error process was either to connect my Arc with a 90s-style Ethernet cable with my Asus GT-AXE16000 or “to buy a new router”. In the end, it turned out that deactivating GuestNetwork Pro resolved my connectivity issues with my Arc and the Sub, and completely deleting all GuestNetwork Pro profiles finally allowed my Sub to play again, along with the Arc.

Awesome work ​@remsta !

​@Corry P I suggest you add this discovery to the existing “Asus Routers” specific article.

Hi ​@controlav 

What Asus router specific article would that be?

Edit: Ah - do you mean ​@AjTrek1’s post in the VP Lounge? It’s not an article, but I’ll add a link to the thread, sure.

So it’s important to note that this affects all aces devices on the latest 3006.x.x Firmware that have guest network pro enabled. I have already provided all this information to aces and they’ve launched an internal investigation. Hopefully it will be fixed for the next update.

No, I meant https://support.sonos.com/en-us/article/asus-rt-and-ax-series-compatibility

Hi ​@controlav 

Ah thanks!

My assumption will be that we’ll wait to see if Asus bring out a fix in their next firmware update, in which case that page will not need to be updated.

I will flag it with someone, however - thanks!

I’m still a supporter of ASUS routers. 😉

However, I have confirmed on my system that enabling Guest Network Pro causes Sonos to drop from network.

• Asus AiMesh
• GT_BE98Pro X 1
• RT-BE96U x 2
• Firmware 3.0.0.6.102_38984-g8a9326f_1432-g7f449_BB0B

My observations were that the issue seems to affect bonded Sonos gear such as surrounds and subs. The main rooms were still visible with no warning ⚠ visible. Only the bonded peripherals went missing. That may suggest that Sonos proprietary 5Ghz is being affected.

I have submitted feedback to ASUS via my routers Admin page. Indicating that Sonos drops from network when enabling Guest Network Pro; however, I left the description generic as Sonos WiFi speakers. We’ll see if they ask for further explanation because when I read the link provided by ​@remsta they appeared not to be familiar with Sonos. I didn’t want to overload them with too much detail at this time.

They asked me to provide full logs with different scenarios and firmware versions. It was actually quite a pain because I had to factory reset the router four times, including all the AI mesh nodes to try the different firmware versions and send them the logs. 
 

Interestingly enough, I put the logs into ChatGPT and it basically said that when guest network pro is enabled the router changes a whole bunch of wireless settings that you do not see as a user and then broadcast signals which interfere with the sonos 5GHz network. ChatGPT also mentioned that the sonos private network is potentially very sensitive to interference and that’s why sometimes the speakers don’t immediately drop, but over the course of five or so minutes they will start to drop off

It was actually quite amazing how it summarised all these logs

Anyway, long story short, Asus know about it and they are working on it. If you want to mention and engineer, you can mention the follow guy, he is a senior engineer managing the bug  

Mark Müller

servicecenter_emea@asus.com