Maybe add a boost to existing Sonosnet?

Well, it would suggest that something is affecting the Play:5 signal in its normal location. It could be related to signal strength owing to distance, attenuation, reflections, slow fade, etc. It could be interference, from local or more distant sources, continuous or intermittent. 

A quick thought: does your wife make use of Bluetooth when she’s listening to the Play:5? This can sometimes be aggressive towards SonosNet/WiFi.

Yes, you can do that. It’s ‘forced mixed mode’. The Connect would show WM:0 in About My System; and the Play:1 would be WM:1. 

Ratty, I’ll check with my wife regarding Bluetooth.  I know that she would not be actively using it for anything, but it’s possible that it is always enabled on her phone (if that matters).

A Bluetooth that was simply on but not busy shouldn’t have that much effect. It might be worth asking her to turn off the BT as an experiment some time. 

Just checked - her BT is always off.

I tried the Play5 connected to the router wifi yesterday (no Sonosnet) and we still had some skips with Spotify.  I submitted 2 diagnostics and then called Sonos support.  The rep said the Play5 had experienced wifi signal issues and that Spotify was not the problem.  He recommended going back to Sonosnet and getting a Boost.

He made a couple other recommendations that I thought were a bit ludicrous.  He said that the distance between my router and Play5 or Connect and Play5 (Sonosnet) should be 15 feet.  My router works fine streaming HD video to devices on the second story of our house, through the floor/walls to devices that are father away and have more barriers vs. the Play5. 

When I check the router wifi strength with the WIFI Analyzer app on my phone, the signal strength at the Play5 is pegged at the highest signal signal strength on the meter (-40 dB), which is the same reading I get when my phone is near the router.

Anyway, I went ahead and ordered a Boost and will go back to Sonosnet.  I have nothing to lose giving it a try.  I’ll simply return it if it does not fix the Spotify skipping issue on the Play5.  If the Boost does not help, I’ll contemplate hard-wiring the Play5.

To put it politely, a 15 foot range is not a figure I’d remotely recognise. 

The rep could be suggesting a Boost with a view to wiring that, and running the Connect wirelessly. Boost has rather better wireless performance.

If you choose to site the Boost between the wired Connect and the Play:5 I strongly suspect it will be ignored. We can take another look at the network matrix once it’s in place. There is a trick which will force a wireless Boost to be involved as a relay. It can have some undesirable side-effects in larger systems, but these are not relevant for a two-player system. Let’s see how things go. 

Actually, in the context of the Play5 on my router wifi (which is how I had it set up yesterday when I submitted diagnostics), the rep said to move my router to within 15 feet (not happening).

Then later in the call, he said to go back to Sonosnet and get a Boost and use it as a repeater with no ethernet cable connection.  He also said that without a Boost, my Connect and Play5 should be within 15 feet (also not happening).  I told him that if I add a Boost midway between the Connect and Play5, the distance to each will still be about 25 feet (obviously over 15 feet).  He did not have a reply to that.

I don’t have much faith that a midway Boost will fix the issue, but it’s painless to try.  I’ll report back next week, after I give it a try.

Just set up the Boost (no ethernet cable, roughly midway) and here are the matrix numbers.  The Boost to Kitchen Play5 numbers are higher than the original numbers I posted above, but not sure how significant.

I’ll next have my wife listen for and report Spotify skips over the next couple weeks (hopefully none or very infrequent.

Well, we’re still getting Spotify dropouts on the Play5, so the Boost in its current configuration did not fix the issue.

We stream Spotify to several devices over wifi to multiple non-Sonos devices throughout the house, at opposite ends of the house from the router, so Spotify on the Play5 is the only problematic situation.

Not sure where to go from here besides testing ethernet cable to Boost or the Play5, or ditching it altogether for another speaker.  I have a Riva Festival I can try with Spotify over wifi in the same location in the kitchen.

I’ll send you a PM.