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Cannot get speakers to connect to Boost

  • 13 June 2021
  • 5 replies
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A

I have a Linksys Velop Mesh WiFi system and multiple HomePods (3 original HomePods and 3 HomePod Minis). 

I’ve recently been experimenting with adding Sonos speakers for the portability, and now have a Sonos Move and two Sonos Roams. 

Setup was fairly easy and all was working pretty well, but I was having some dropouts, particularly when I had all three Sonos speakers playing at various spots around the house/backyard. 

A Sonos Boost, from what I’ve read, should be a good way to deal with this, creating a dedicated network for the Sonos speakers. I purchased the Boost and connected via ethernet cable to the main node of the Velop system. It showed up in the Sonos app, went through an update, and all seemed good. 

But...my speakers (the Move and two Roams) will not connect to the Boost, no matter what I do. I’ve power-cycled everything, multiple times. I’ve reset all speakers. I’ve deleted the wifi credentials for the Velop system from the Sonos app, but, oddly, the network seems to reappear on its own under the Network settings page on the Sonos app. If I reset the speakers and add them as new to the Sonos app, they require that I add the credentials for Velop network -- no other option is offered. (I may not fully understand how the Boost works, but shouldn’t the speakers automatically join the Boost?)

No matter what I do, in “About My System” the Boost is connected to WM:0, but the three speakers are connected to WM:1. 

All of the speakers are working, but from what I can tell, the Boost is useless at the moment, and a waste of $100, since the speakers are still connected directly to the main WiFi network. 

Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated! 

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Best answer by GuitarSuperstar 13 June 2021, 07:12

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5 replies

G
Userlevel 7

The Move and Roam are portable speakers that will only connect to WiFi. They cannot connect to the SonosNet network created by the Boost that relies on stationary speakers to create a stable mesh network.

"Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you." - Rashi
A

Thank you for the reply. I guessed that might be the case after some further research. It is very odd to me that this isn’t clearly stated on the Boost, Move, or Roam product pages or documentation — unless I am missing something staring me right in the face. Being new to Sonos I am impressed with a lot…and then some things are just head scratchers. 

J

Thank you for the reply. I guessed that might be the case after some further research. It is very odd to me that this isn’t clearly stated on the Boost, Move, or Roam product pages or documentation — unless I am missing something staring me right in the face. Being new to Sonos I am impressed with a lot…and then some things are just head scratchers. 

This isn’t so much of a head scratcher if you know the background and history.  SonosNet is a mesh networking protocol designed when most people’s WiFi could not have supported Sonos multiroom, and mesh networking was unheard of in a domestic setting.  It is still a better option than WiFi for many users, including those with modern mesh WiFis.  

But portable speakers don’t fit very well with this concept.  With every device being a potential repeater, a stable mesh would potentially be disturbed every time a speaker was moved.  Sonos therefore decided it would be best to avoid that by not allowing portable speakers to join SonosNet.  There are clearly pros and cons for that, but the decision is understandable, not baffling.

A

Sorry — the baffling part is that there isn’t more explanation of this on the product pages, not that the decision was made not to allow them to connect. 

melvimbe

Sorry — the baffling part is that there isn’t more explanation of this on the product pages, not that the decision was made not to allow them to connect. 

Very few people are going to look at getting a Boost to improve the performance of their Move or Roam.  I would even say few people even are aware that their Sonos system is running off Sonosnet rather than WiFi like other devices in their home.  Seems Sonos left off that information in order to avoid confusion.

Danny
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