This is not directly relevant to the article - more a critique of the Sonos product which I've wanted to get off my chest.
I was a Sonos skeptic then a convert before becoming skeptical again. I stopped buying after the third Sonos 3 speaker.
Some basic features are missing which mean that users like me are clearly not a focus. Primarily I want to play my own, ripped-to-FLAC media.
The most irritating thing is that users have been requesting these features for 5+ years on the fora.
A random list of grievances:
- No regain support - this renders the playlist feature useless unless you want to constantly fiddle with the controller to adjust the volume between tracks.
- No cue support (i.e. single FLAC with a .cue file) which allows transitions between tracks. This breaks play back for lots of classical, Opera, ED music and classic rock albums like the Beatles' Abbey Road.
- Multi-disc support is poor - no grouping or separate disc images. 2 CD boxsets are o.k. but larger (4+) are unnavigable.
- Can't handle higher than 16/48 digital rips.
- No airplay, bluetooth, etc. support. This means you cannot use Sonos to replace all audio speakers in your home.
- Wierd/undocumented rules for file naming - silently ignores tracks with quotes, colons and maybe others (these are the ones that hit me)
- Finally the controller software has gotten worse with every update: poor album art caching, illogical navigation, confusing search, artist search cannot find tracks on compilations, etc.
Then again, it seems going the "smart speaker" route has boosted their revenues. I have no interest in such functionality so I guess I'm not the target market for Sonos.
This is a pity because much of the package is quite compelling and it wouldn't take much effort to support libraries (rather than streaming).
(edited for formatting)
I was a Sonos skeptic then a convert before becoming skeptical again. I stopped buying after the third Sonos 3 speaker.
Some basic features are missing which mean that users like me are clearly not a focus. Primarily I want to play my own, ripped-to-FLAC media.
The most irritating thing is that users have been requesting these features for 5+ years on the fora.
A random list of grievances:
- No regain support - this renders the playlist feature useless unless you want to constantly fiddle with the controller to adjust the volume between tracks.
- No cue support (i.e. single FLAC with a .cue file) which allows transitions between tracks. This breaks play back for lots of classical, Opera, ED music and classic rock albums like the Beatles' Abbey Road.
- Multi-disc support is poor - no grouping or separate disc images. 2 CD boxsets are o.k. but larger (4+) are unnavigable.
- Can't handle higher than 16/48 digital rips.
- No airplay, bluetooth, etc. support. This means you cannot use Sonos to replace all audio speakers in your home.
- Wierd/undocumented rules for file naming - silently ignores tracks with quotes, colons and maybe others (these are the ones that hit me)
- Finally the controller software has gotten worse with every update: poor album art caching, illogical navigation, confusing search, artist search cannot find tracks on compilations, etc.
Then again, it seems going the "smart speaker" route has boosted their revenues. I have no interest in such functionality so I guess I'm not the target market for Sonos.
This is a pity because much of the package is quite compelling and it wouldn't take much effort to support libraries (rather than streaming).
(edited for formatting)