
Sonos will stop updating its 'legacy' products in May - mhb
https://www.engadget.com/2020/01/21/sonos-legacy-products-software-updates-ending/
======
cmicali
I bought two play:5 v1s from the Sonos web site in late 2014, so 5.5 years
ago. Today they announce the are EOL in May. This wouldn't be so bad except
for this part of the announcement:

"Please note that because Sonos is a system, all products operate on the same
software. If modern products remain connected to legacy products after May,
they also will not receive software updates and new features."

So if I keep my 5 year old speakers the rest of my system will also not
receive updates and may become non-functional.

This kind of anti-customer behavior is a great way to ensure your evangelists
abandon your brand permanently.

------
jld
When I bought Sonos speakers for much of my house in 2012-2014 it was selling
itself as an alternative to hifi equipment that lasts decades. In retrospect
my expectation that Sonos would be longer lived than that was short sighted, I
should have known better.

This is planned obsolescence at its finest and I guess I won’t be buying
Sonos/other smart speakers again.

There’s no reason to replace perfectly good speakers every 5-10 years because
the microcontroller inside isn’t profitable enough to continue to support.
Good sounding/looking powered speakers with a small compartment inside for a
modular brain would be a pretty good trade off, basically like driving the
same TV panel with a different set top box every few years.

------
user6
More outrage is necessary. I probably don't need their new features. Have a
separate build for legacy without the cruft, or provide a means of replacing
the logic board.

Luckily I only have two play:5 speakers and a bridge, but the play:1s are
going to be next on their chopping block and my house is full of them, not to
mention the sub and soundbar.

This, plus Sonos' lack of investment in their software clients, makes me plan
on upgrading to something else.

------
dataveg
This is crazy - they say the devices were 'introduced in 2011' but they were
actively selling them years beyond that. The trouble is I have thousands
invested in a house-wide Sonos, and half of them are now declared as 'legacy'
\-- that means that my whole system now doesn't get updates. And - the legacy
products work perfectly

------
dlandis
How does this company continue to get worse and worse every time I read about
them? People spent a fortune on their products, without ever imagining they
would be worthless only a few short years later. Without updates, the 3rd
party integrations could stop working at any point - google play, Spotify,
etc. And then it would be a brick . This move sends their resale value
immediately to almost zero in my opinion, or as soon as people realize the
implications.

------
js2
I’ve purchased $1000 of Sonos speakers. A Play:5 and three Play:1’s. (Two
working - one was damaged by lighting and Sonos has no repair program.)

I’m done with Sonos. When the app stops supporting them I’ll replace them with
some decent bookshelf speakers and a wireless adapter.

------
MarkSummer
The sonos system is an extreme example of "engineered to fail". The only issue
is lack of memory. All they needed to do was make the memory upgradable (or
supply the system with a decent amount of memory to begin with). Sonos
intentionally engineered this End of Life. Listen, we could all make our own
DIY Sonos system, but to be honest, a.) We don't have time, and b.) they're
software integrated with Spotify/Pandora/etc. (after they fixed major bugs
from each release) was actually pretty decent. Instead, unlike my Dad's 1976
RCA reciever/turntable/speakers that still pumps out a sweet sound, my Sonos
system will be relegated to the dump. If someone out there is selling an open
source sonos replacement with decent control software, post the link here, I
will buy it.

------
w0m
ooof; this is absolute crap. If you have a single 'legacy' product on your
network (like say, the 500usd Play 5 i bought 5 years ago); you're entire
network loses updates and potentially functionality (if say, a cloud api makes
a small change.

------
pintxo
The blog post by Sonos themselves: [https://blog.sonos.com/en/end-of-software-
updates-for-legacy...](https://blog.sonos.com/en/end-of-software-updates-for-
legacy-products/)

Some comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22109891](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22109891)

