Second time a whole 'group' has dropped off my Sonos net


Userlevel 2
Badge +4

I’ve a pretty big sonos system divided into rooms:

ARC, 2 play 1 and a sub gen 2 - Living Room

Two Fives (prev gen) and a Gen 3 sub - Dining Room

Move - Kitchen

Move - Bedroom

2 whatever the Ones with mics are called - Office

 

The ARC is wired to the router. They are all running on Sonos Net

 

A couple of weeks ago, my dining room dropped off and required a cold start (unplugging and waiting) before it was working again.

 

It has just happened again. This is now concerning me as it’s the only products that consistently have issues. The are not the farthest product from the ARC.

 

Seems to be trying to play Spotify that causes it.

 

I have submitted a diagnostic: 820969651

 

I have Google wifi mesh as my router, with three nodes around the house. 

 

I want to know what’s wrong with this product. Why are these the only speakers that just suddenly drop off?

 

 


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5 replies

Due to some apparent multicasting issues with Google WiFi, what most Sonos/Google WiFi users appear to do, is turn their ISP provided router into “modem/bridge mode” then wire the main Nest hub to that, followed by an unmanaged switch (plugged into the other Google hub port) just for any wired connections ...and then put a 'more recent’ Sonos device (Boost or Sonos One etc.) into the switch for use as a SonosNet bridge. If not using the switch, then just plug the Sonos device direct into this first main nest hub. Keep these devices at least a few feet apart from each other.

Importantly, if the ISP router can’t easily be placed in modem mode then the WiFi on that router needs to be switched off and the network ports should not be used for any further (other) wired connections.

Once the remaining Nest pucks/hubs are placed around the home and connected,  it’s then good to establish what WiFi channels are in use on the 2.4ghz band by those devices. To do that, you can use a piece of free software downloaded to  a laptop called “WiFiInfoView”, or similar software, which scans the airwaves and can identify the channels in use nearby.

There is similar wireless scanner software available for Android devices, but not much out there for Apple mobile devices (sadly). 

Over a day, or two, scan  and make a note of each WiFi channel in use by the Nest devices and try to find the  “least-used” non-overlapping channel ... eg. channel 1, 6, or 11.

The go onto set your SonosNet channel to that least used WiFi channel... and from time to time, just rescan and check that the channels haven’t changed. Always use the least-used channel for SonosNet.

Note that communication between any Home Theatre devices and surrounds uses a 5ghz ad-hoc Network, which is faster for surround sound purposes and there is no way to set the channels for this, or change the Google Hub 5ghz channels, but if you do get issues, it’s occasionally worth just rebooting the HT device, rather than the Google WiFi hubs and let the HT device choose the best channel  for itself. 

Two further final points that are really worth doing here too..

  • Remove/reset the WiFi credentials in the Sonos App “SettingsSystem/Network/Manage Networks” These are not needed when running the devices on SonosNet.
  • A final further useful thing I would choose to do in your particular case, is to add all the Sonos device IP addresses to your Google Nest networks DHCP Reservation Table.

Hopefully if you can understand and follow these few network suggestions you should find that your connectivity will improve and hopefully then see an end to your device dropouts. 🤞

Hope that information assists. 

Userlevel 7

Is the Arc wired to the main router? Have you tried changing the SonosNet channel in the Sonos app? Sometimes Sonos devices don’t always work well with mesh networks.

Userlevel 2
Badge +4

Hi Ken. My setup is already effectively the best practice you have outlined - switch with the ARC wired into it for the ‘bridge’ mode, wifi settings deleted from Sonos app, Sonos products reserved IP etc.

 

I check the wifi congestion regularly and use the least congested 2.4 channel etc.

 

Is Google wifi the worst mesh? I have my suspicions too - what mesh works best with Sonos? 

 

Would getting a sonos Boost be a good idea? Or is that bad?

 

I just want it to work.

 

It’s back up again now, but I still don’t see why it’s just those products that fall off.

@Andrewnoob,

I sometimes use a Sonos Boost myself, but the more modern Sonos devices have better WiFi adapters and will perform the function of the Boost as a root Bridge, so I don’t see you gaining any benefit from purchasing a Boost - choosing any standalone modern Sonos speaker is perhaps your best option, i believe. (Just don’t ever use a bonded surround, or sub, as a root bridge). 

A number of reports in the community seem to show users with Google WiFi have what appears to be some mDNS SSDP multicast/unicast issues, but most users resolve the issue with the SonosNet setup described earlier.

I would persist with what you have, as things keep improving with each new firmware update and often a reboot of devices will get the Sonos system back up and running and can often last for a long period before an issue may rear its head again (often caused by devices auto-seeking different WiFi channels).

I’m sure there are perhaps better WiFi systems on the market, but don’t personally know enough about them all to recommend any one of them in particular.

Userlevel 7
Badge +20

In addition to the advice from @Ken_Griffiths. You may want to read my post here