Answered

Asus + Sonos = trouble. Who’s gonna fix this?

  • 16 August 2021
  • 7 replies
  • 992 views
M
Userlevel 1
  • M.W.
  • Contributor I
  • 2 replies

I’ve owned Sonos product since 2012. Brilliant. Many have purchased on my advice. However, as of late, Sonos is insufferable.

My kit: two ZP:90s and a Move. Special note: my ZP:90s have always been wired Cat5e to my router, whereas “community” posts flagging up “Asus + Sonos” trouble are almost exclusively a WiFi setup.

My .FLAC music Library resides on a NAS also connected Cat5e.

Issues started 8-10 weeks ago. Except for (background) S1 controller updates which may have gone unnoticed, I had not pro-actively changed any equipment, wiring or configuration for over 12 months. My router is not set to “automatically” update firmware.

Problem. Sonos “Rooms” unexpectedly “disappear” in S1 controller. Unplug/re-plug ZP:90 to (temporarily) remedy. Repeat as necessary :(

Problem. Sonos’ TuneIn radio station playback stutter and/or stop-start and/or disconnect. Repeatedly.

Problem. Can’t reliably play music Library on NAS. Playback stutter. Playback stops mid-song then randomly resumes next song, next +1, +2, +? song. Playback stops altogether, ushers me back to top of song queue. S1 controller “freezes”. Error messages. “Unable to play [NAS library song]”. “Cannot find [NAS library]”. “Network connection speed insufficient to maintain playback buffer”. Etc etc. Re-indexing Library doesn’t help; deleting and reinstalling Library doesn’t help.

My router, an Asus RT-AC68U. Unfortunately, I did not write down my Asus firmware version when the above mentioned problems surfaced. What I did do is flash to the latest Asus RT-AC68U firmware 3.0.0.4.386_43129 (21-May-2021). Per Asus advice, I upgraded firmware, did a “factory reset”, and reconfigured my router from “scratch”. This did nothing to help.

Next, I swapped out my Asus router for an older router I had lying about. TP-Link Archer C7 V2, firmware 3.15.3 Build 180305 (15-Jun-2018). Stress test. Sent 2x .FLAC Library stream & 1x TuneIn stream to two ZP:90s and one Move. Result? Sixty (60) hours of continuous playback without a hitch. No “Rooms” dropped. TuneIn reception all good. Streaming .FLAC files from NAS without incident. No error messages.

A few observations when I swapped in the TP-Link router:

1. My S1 controller for iOS (an iPad Air A1474). With TP-Link in the mix, to my great surprise, and for the first time, an S1 mini-control on the iOS lock screen “magically” appeared! Who knew?

2. When the above mentioned problems surfaced, and still using the Asus router, I looked into “Settings > System > Products : ZP:90 #1 (and #2) > Connect” and discovered that both ZP:90s had “Enable Wi-Fi” checked. Hmm! Both ZP:90s have always been wired Cat5e, and showed in “About My System” status “WM:0”. Praying this “Enable Wi-Fi” setting was a source of conflict and the root of my problems, I tried to “Disable Wi-Fi”. No go! Sonos S1 controller message replied something like “you can’t do that unless your ZP:90 is wired to your router”. What?? But when I swapped in the TP-Link router, all changed. I managed to “Disable Wi-Fi” in both ZP:90s. Went to the relevant screen, selected “Disable Wi-Fi”, got “this may take a few minutes” warning, ZP:90 rebooted, Wi-Fi showed “disabled”, and both ZP:90s still on “WM:0”. Great – but why couldn’t I do this with the Asus router?

Last thing. By coincidence, my son also has an RT-AC86U and (on my advice) lots of Sonos kit. He has reported zero issues. So I rolled back my own Asus firmware to match his, 3.0.0.4.385_20253 (10-Mar-2020). Twenty-four hours later, no problems.

Clearly, my Asus RT-AC68U hardware has not failed. 

This is a lot of detail. Apologies if the “community” thinks it ponderous – but I’m hoping (praying?) the Sonos thread moderator not. Perhaps my info moves the yardsticks towards a fix. Speaking of which …

What changed 8-10 weeks ago? Why is Asus suddenly a problem with my Sonos controllers/devices? Using older Asus firmware means I cannot benefit from a great number of security patches and router feature upgrades.

Who is going to take charge of giving a long-standing Sonos customer the solution?

I await with anticipation your reply and assistance.

My configuration details follows Best,

M.W., Ottawa, Canada

 

ZP:90 #1, hardware ver 1.1.16.4-1.0, series ID S100
ZP:90 #2, hardware ver 1.16.5.5-1.0, series ID P100
Move, hardware ver 1.25.1.7-1.2, series ID A100

Internet modem > Cat5e > Router

Router > Cat5e > Synology NAS (my .FLAC music Library)
Router > Cat5e > unmanaged 8-port switch >
     Cat5e > ZP:90 #1 > audio cable > multi-room A/V receiver
     Cat5e > ZP:90 #2 > audio cable > multi-room A/V receiver
Router > WiFi > Move

iOS S1 controller: v11.2.10 build 57719010
Android S1 controller: v11.2.10

BTW, re Asus router configuration. Both ZP:90s and Synology NAS assigned “static/reserved” DHCP addresses. Separate 2.4GHz & 5GHz SSIDs. QoS “disabled”. IGMP snooping “disabled”. Guest network “disabled”.

Also, NAS configuration. “SMB range: SMB1, SMB2, SMB2 and Large MTU, SMB3”.
 

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Best answer by Ken_Griffiths 16 August 2021, 22:48

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7 replies

Ken_Griffiths

@M.W. 

You actually end your mentioned problems here by saying …(quote): "So I rolled back my own Asus firmware to match his, 3.0.0.4.385_20253 (10-Mar-2020). Twenty-four hours later, no problems."

If I’m not mistaken, then surely that tends to infer that the Asus firmware update was perhaps at the heart of your woes here, don’t you think🤔? Particularly as the only updates that a Sonos S1 system ever receives are ‘security updates’, there are no other changes to that type of Sonos System.

Perhaps you should be messaging ASUS Support here instead?.

M
Userlevel 1

Ken, while I’m grateful for your input, not sure I agree. Why did a setup stable and unchanged for 12+ months suddenly go screwy? It is only when the problems started 8-10 weeks ago that I tried changing the Asus router firmware. Or to put it another way, my Asus firmware was unchanged for 12+ months, and then the problems arrived. In fact, during that time, the only possible change to my setup would have been Sonos S1 controller updates!

Ken_Griffiths

…and yet right now @M.W., with the alleged Sonos updates/changes still in place, you rollback just your Asus routers firmware only and in your own words you have no problems… "Twenty-four hours later, no problems.”

The only thing you did was to rollback your router update. If that is the case, then there is more evidence to suggest it was a router-related matter, rather than a Sonos issue, simply because the rollback appears to have fixed your problem. Whatever Sonos may have changed (if anything) it’s certainly working perfectly for you right now

Ken_Griffiths

Perhaps also see this old thread relating to an ASUS router update back in November 2020:

 

Ken_Griffiths

Also see this thread about another Asus router update from earlier this year too, where users pointed the finger towards a matter being caused by an Asus update:

Your original post @M.W. asks “Who’s gonna fix this? - if you haven’t done so already,  I think you should perhaps go ask Asus that same question.

controlav
Userlevel 7
Badge +23

Evidently ASUS are not interesting in fixing their router. Get another one, from an actual networking company. I personally recommend AmpliFi.

Author of the leading independent Sonos app for Windows, the only Sonos app for Xbox, and a Sonos app for iOS
Ken_Griffiths

Also see this new thread reported a few minutes ago…

 

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