I'm surprised they're issuing a statement admitting they made a "misstep". Surely they knew in advance the original update (removing support for their earliest adopters) would be received extremely negatively. I would have thought their comms strategy would have been to hold the line and wait for it to die down rather than revising their status so quickly.
Either way the damage is done. It's become clear through the "recycling" program, the revision of the Sonos ONE after only 16 months and now the lobotomizing of the original Play 5 that they are not going to stand behind their products like they used to. I'm not buying more $400 speakers from a company that's aim is to force upgrades by deprecating support to bring up their quarterly sales figures.
Time to buy some Chromecast or Airplay 2 devices and sign up for an ecosystem from a company that has a different revenue stream and doesn't need to force rapid hardware refreshes.
What I like about the '70s stuff is almost everything uses standard parts you can get from any reasonable factor, and the few unique components are usually still simple enough that some hobbyist or small machine shop will be turning them out and selling them. Providing it hasn't been abused it's possible to refurbish something using only simple tools and a bit of testing, and some of the equipment is seriously good even by modern standards. (One of the main reasons I ended up with a '70s turntable is I couldn't find anything new under £1000 with the same sound quality, or that didn't require directly fiddling with belts and pulleys to change the speed.)
By comparison, whenever any of my modern kit breaks down I find the offending part will be unique to that unit, the spare parts supply is nonexistent, and there will be no published specs allowing one to cobble something together.
It seems to be like that for cars too --- you can still easily get parts for a complete "classic 60s-70s" American car powertrain (carbureted V8 with points ignition, 4-speed manual/3-speed automatic, RWD live axle), with lots of aftermarket support and performance enhancement, but later models when computers were introduced are far more difficult and expensive to find parts for.
My Sonos system is bridged to the perfectly fine 1980's hi-fi setup in the lounge but that bridge is now out of support from Sonos. Feeling a bit ripped off here as I only bought the bridge four years ago.
How much more complex is streaming sound going to get that a play5 gen1 won't be able to do it anymore? Lossless already audio works fine. It was maybe even Sonos themselves that solved that problem in the first place
I mean $400 dumb speakers can be expected to last for decades with minor repairs now and then. Sonos just wants to turn speaker ownership into a subscription like with phones.
That is the new news today. The previous news was they would eventually no longer continue to function, todays announcement reaffirms no new features but now says they are working on a plan to make sure they continue to function with other legacy hardware as they do today.
At least from the screenshots of emails I read, it stated that old devices won’t get software updates, but will continue to work. Additionally, any newer devices will not get software updates _while they’re on the same Sonos network as the old one_, because they all have to run the same version.
Buts that’s “continue to work as is” but if the whole world moves on, then features will stop working. E.g. they’re not gonna get updates to deal with breaking API changes from music providers.
Which presumably means when you buy a very new device and hook it up to your network with a very old device, there will be no software version that runs on both...
Imagine buying a product from a store, taking it home, and having to wonder whether it will one day stop functioning for reasons other than manufacturing defects or normal wear and tear! The fact that it is even possible for a manufacturer to decide to remotely disable or degrade the function of a product after the sale was unthinkable 25 years ago but is now a risk consumers have to seriously consider.
People do that every day. Ever bought a mobile phone? You only get software updates for a few years at most, and I don’t think any phones from 25 years ago are usable today due to old networks being shut down. Some of the devices being deprecated pre-date the iPhone!
You seriously misunderstand what’s happened here. Sonos didn’t change anything at all, they just explained it again because (clearly you) didn’t get it.
All you people suggesting chrome cast as an audio solution are hilarious. It’s literally already in the unsupported state without updates that Sonos is going to do with products ten times as old. Wtf are you thinking? What is the difference in your mind between Sonos issuing bug fixes but not new features, and relying on chromecast audio which already stopped supports years ago? It’s absurd
They’re admitting a misstep, but they’re not actually changing much.
At best, there’s a vague pledge to update legacy players a bit longer, but they’re still breaking your current whole home audio system, because legacy and modern players will need to be split into two separate systems.
No the article says the opposite. It says they’ll continue working together:
“First, rest assured that come May, when we end new software updates for our legacy products, they will continue to work just as they do today. We are not bricking them, we are not forcing them into obsolescence, and we are not taking anything away.”
"We are working on a way to split your system so that modern products work together and get the latest features, while legacy products work together and remain in their current state. We’re finalizing details on this plan and will share more in the coming weeks."
I just found this [0] in their forums from Sonos employee:
“In May, you’ll be able to decide if you want to keep your legacy devices operating with your modern devices, and you’ll be able to put them all into a non-updating legacy system”
So they are actually reversing course to a certain extent.
If there’s one thing Sonos has shown throughout this mess, it’s that they’re really quite poor at communicating things clearly.
> I'm surprised they're issuing a statement admitting they made a "misstep".
Here's the original Email Sonos sent on Jan. 21 (Tuesday). It's pretty bad and implies that your legacy products might stop working in the future and almost definitely won't work with new products.
> End of software updates
> In May the following products in your system will be classified as legacy and no longer receive software updates and new features. This will affect your listening experience.
[My products]
> Legacy products were introduced between 2005 and 2011 and, given the age of the technology, do not have enough memory or processing power to sustain future innovation.
> 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.
> You have options
> Continue using legacy products
> You can continue using legacy products after May, but your system will no longer receive software updates and new features. Over time this is likely to disrupt access to services and overall functionality.
> Trade up legacy products
> Save 30% on a new product when you upgrade through the Sonos Trade Up program.
Well, this blog post seems to suggest the blowback from their "we're killing off legacy hardware" was too much that they had to make this blog post.
I hope the blowback doesn't cease and people stop buying Sonos, but maybe I'm just being vindicative. If they stop their greedy policies, that would also make the world a better place.
discontinued 4 years ago - that's a pretty long tail and in line with Apple
>Time to buy some Chromecast or Airplay 2 devices
Airplay support depends on mfg of your device. Apple has a similar policy to sonos (5 years for phones, i believe) - but they state it on their site!
I think Sonos' biggest mistake was not having a transparent policy like Apple does. The real issue here, to me, is that they broke an unstated and unwritten promise: consumers inferred that devices had lifetime support - an inference that i think is completely reasonable!
My stereo system is from 2003. There is something deeply warped about accepting this idea each electronic product we buy should have a 2-4 year life expectancy.
That's the point. Separate the "smart" components, which are short-lived and at the whims of the manufacturer, from the "dumb" components that are not at the mercy of constant updates, online accounts and sunsetting. You can connect to Shopify from a chromecast, airplay, bluetooth from a phone or anything else yet to be devised.
I've been saying this exact same thing about "Smart TVs" for so long. There really aren't options these days, if you want a good current-gen TV, you're getting a "smart" TV.
The smart components in these will get outdated quickly (perhaps slower now than 5 years ago, but still quite quickly), but I'm gonna be fine with my current TV panel for far longer than I will the OS that's on it.
I'm very concerned about what will happen to all of these TVs when consumers feel that they are too slow or can't install the apps they want to use. I fear they will just replace the TV with another smart TV that will last 3-4 years.
Sure, for a complex device like a TV. But for a small, self contained speaker? That's messy and complex, and frankly, people buy Sonos units to avoid that very situation.
My stereo is from 1973 and the Raspberry Pi I have connected to its inputs can play Spotify just fine and will get updates for much longer. Or I could plug my phone up. Or a more consumer friendly device like a Roku. Or a bluetooth module that pairs wirelessly with my phone. If and when I do decide to update the Pi is a single device that costs $40 or so instead of having to do that much per speaker. Sonos devices just aren't worth it, they're insanely overpriced and provide little to no real benefit over any number of other options that separate out the stereo from the thing that plays music.
Sure, because one of my old laptops has been relegated to music-player duty. If I hadn't had a spare laptop it'd have been a spare phone. Or maybe I'd add a Bluetooth dongle to stream media to it from any other device.
My family has a Sony receiver bought in 1966. It works great with sources from phonograph to smartphone. There is no feeling of anything disappearing, on the contrary it is a device which is extremely pleasant to use and otherwise unthought of. Tuning its radio using a heavily weighted and lightly damped knob is faster than digital, the power-on latency is a few milliseconds, and most sources can be selected with a single press instead of scrolling an endless, feelless knob like many modern models.
Who is making receivers now that people will enjoy in 2073?
I go to hamfests often; if I ever need old audio gear, I can get it there (recently picked up a home-built crystal set with the galena cat-whisker still hooked up - I have yet to try to see if I can get it to work, but it looks complete).
Not too long back I bought a bluetooth adapter for my old Realistic component stereo system (that I bought as a high-schooler in 1989) - my wife likes to use it to listen to music and audio books, both inside the house and outside on the back patio.
If I ever wanted to do some kind of "streaming music/speaker system" - there are plenty of open source options out there. Or I would run wiring for speakers like others here have done. But for now, our needs and simple, and we're fine with that.
I went to a small record store just the other day and they were selling fancy brand new turn tables that I could have bought. They also had a bluetooth module, and even a very fancy device that had 2 RCA connectors on one end, and a 3.5mm jack on the other so you could plug up something called a "phone" without even spending all the money on wireless. It's amazing how audio, for the longest time, just worked and I didn't have to think about it. When you keep things simple and standardized it pays dividends for years.
I’m not sure that’s a fair comparison either. One primarily makes computers which change quite fast (though my 10ish year old Macs actually work better than when they were purchased) and one makes audio stuff, which really doesn’t change that much.
After announcing the Sonos ONE with heaps of fanfare they introduced a 2nd Gen revision only 16 months later and said that in the future only the 2nd Gen ONE would receive new features. Considering past Sonos products had been sold with the same hardware for multiple years updating after such a short time signaled a move to planned hardware obsolescence and quicker upgrade cycles confirmed by their latest moves. As someone who rushed out and bought a 1st Gen ONE this had already soured me before they crippled all my Play 5s.
Either way the damage is done. It's become clear through the "recycling" program, the revision of the Sonos ONE after only 16 months and now the lobotomizing of the original Play 5 that they are not going to stand behind their products like they used to. I'm not buying more $400 speakers from a company that's aim is to force upgrades by deprecating support to bring up their quarterly sales figures.
Time to buy some Chromecast or Airplay 2 devices and sign up for an ecosystem from a company that has a different revenue stream and doesn't need to force rapid hardware refreshes.