[Feature Request] USB audio support - Era Speakers

The latency has nothing to do with any ADC going on.  ADC is instantaneous.   The latency is to build up the buffer required for reliable multi-room play, and as such is not going away.

Hi @Siegfried_4 

Thank you - I've marked this thread as a feature request and it will be seen by the relevant teams for consideration. Whether it is possible or not, I do not know. Keep the ideas coming!

Please please please implement this! I'm interested in using a pair of the Era 100 as my full-time desk speakers for my Mac. A direct line in via USB-C would be a game changer. The 3 second delay via AirPlay is not viable for full time use.

Airplay should not result in a three second delay.

AirPlay delay is two seconds. 

@ratty . Though essentially you agree with me, that’s more than I expected - I do not use Airplay very much.

@conor8 Why would the delay be a problem for you? What’s your use case?

@conor8 said the use case was desktop speakers with a Mac. I can see how that would be absolutely hopeless with a 2 second delay. Bluetooth might be rather better, at ~200ms, but the lowest delay would be with an analog Line-In via the 3.5mm-USB adapter.

Full-time desktop use, including audio production, video editing, etc. Anything like that or playing games makes these very hard to use as desktop speakers. The line-in USB-C adapter could be used but then I’m unnecessarily going from digital to analog back to digital again, only for the Sonos speakers to then convert it back to analog on output. Would be better if a firmware update could be made to keep the audio digital through USB-C input.

Using the USB-C also introduces the 75ms lag, that is part of Sonos design, used for syncing with other speakers.

75ms is fine compared to 2-3s.

Sonos was not designed for use as computer speakers.  It's best to use computer speakers as computer speakers.  

Thank you for your input. I am still interested in USB-C audio input.

You aren't going to get it, and even if you did, it's not going to alleviate the need to buffer the input, so using the Eras for computer speakers is still going to be less than optimal.

FWIW it’s a mystery to me why Sonos didn’t enable digital USB input from the outset. WiiM has digital aux input into their multiroom system (not to mention AirPlay, Chromecast, and so forth).

Maybe Sonos are saving that digital input for the next gen ‘Port’, aswell as Bluetooth, that was my thinking? I also wonder if they might bring the ‘touch controls’ back to the Port too🤔?

If they allow a shorter delayed input (USB C), then there would be hell to pay in support for people who use those speakers, and then want to group them with other Sonos speakers….like the current issue that we talk about with home theater ’rooms’ and other Sonos ‘rooms’. I think direct input speakers for computers/DJs just aren’t in Sonos’ plans. 
 

Yes, good point, a user would have to ‘group’ rooms, I guess, over the faster 5Ghz connection similar to what we see now with ‘bonded’ HT surrounds, but WiFi mesh systems are certainly improving these things all the time, giving rise to such possibilities.

Not similar at all. The connection to surrounds is vastly different than the connection between Sonos peer speakers, or that’s my understanding. Sonos would likely have to rewrite much of the codebase to do this kind of thing. 

Nearly all my Sonos products are now using a 5Ghz WiFi connection - the exceptions of course, are the main Home Theatre products, Arc, Beam etc. which use the 2.4Ghz band, but even that ‘perhaps’ may change in the future.

I'm not really sure why everyone is jumping in to debate whether or not this is worth it on Sonos’ behalf. I am a user that would like to see this feature, I think it would be great if others that would like to see this feature as well would add their vote here. If you aren't interested in this feature and aren't a Sonos employee then this thread is not for you. 

People aren't discussing the worth, they are discussing if it is even possible.  Regardless, you aren't the forum ombudsman, people can post what they want within the TOS rules. Stop trying to censor folks.    

Very sorry for “censoring” you on the *Sonos company forums* 

“Must have feature” for one person might be a “must not have feature” for another. I think we need both viewpoints the discussion. I’m not lobbying for this feature. If it is included there should be as a ‘direct’ connect option that blocks the speaker from access by other SONOS speakers on the network, thereby converting the speaker to a traditional computer speaker. Operationally, I think that this would insert clumsy options into the user interface that would result in more support requests. I don’t think that SONOS would go for this.

Maybe something like a selection that allows the speaker to operate as a normal Sonos speaker on the network or removes it from the network and enables the direct no-delay input?

The App could then show it as “Unavailable - Direct mode in use” in the Group screens.

That might be a nice option for the Play 5 and Five too giving folks a no-delay input there and making them usable as DJ speakers as well.

Why would this be a “must not have feature” for anyone? If you aren’t interested in this then just.. don’t use it? Don’t plug anything into your USB-C port? I’m not asking for anything revolutionarily new here, I’m asking for the existing functionality of USB-C line in but without needing the 3.5mm adapter. This has literally all been coded and handled already. However they’re handling it now is probably fine.