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Linux HiFi: The Sonos Digital Music System
TractorJector writes "Mad Penguin published a 5 page review of the Sonos Digital Music System, a wireless music distribution system built on Linux. According to the site, you can use a single remote to control up to 32 "zones" (locations throughout your house where the receivers are placed). The interface is intuitive and well done for such a compact device. According to the review, it's extremely simple to setup as well."
I ended up just putting a computer with some decent speakers in each room I wanted music and accessing my music files over my existing network.
One thing in Sonos' favor is that their system is a lot more consumer-accessible.
Very neat.
.. pa-ra-bo-la, pa-ra-bo-la, 2 pi R, 2 pi R, where's your latus rectum, where's your latus rectum, 2 pi R
i wonder if they will get sued for apple, or got the proper rights for that clickwheel
won't this cause people to desert Windows in even greater numbers?
...
I mean, think of all those MSFT coders
[grin]
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
What if your house only has one zone? Do you still have to pay full price?
Looks like a very cool system - well outside my price range (and with 3 small children, outside of my "what can my heart stand when the little buggers touch the expensive equipment").
My only question is on the school wheel interface. My understanding is that Apple had purchased the rights to use the patents to the scroll wheel touchpad system for their technologies (I don't recall the actual patent holder). Does this mean that Sony's scroll wheel is not touch pad based (could be a physical wheel and *not* violate the patent, I guess), or did they also get a piece of the patent license somehow?
Just curious.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
I could buy a cheapo $299 Dell for each bedroom, network them wirelessly to a huge 300GB drive and have far more functionality than this setup. Am I wrong?
of things that I don't need, can't afford, will never get, but want anyway, updated.
Interlink Electronics http://interlinkelec.com/
If you forget about the future, the future will forget about you.
I assume you are trolling, but here you go.
The Sonos sounds more like what I had hoped the AirPortExpress would be: awesome looking remote control and multiple zones. Although Apple's product is much cheaper...
Jobs has hinted at a remote control feature for AirportExpress, but nothing has materialized so far.
The biggest need I have in this realm is for a UPnP media player that runs under linux and can play streams from a Windows server. I'd be happy with one that only supports audio, but so far no dice. I'd like to interface with Real's Rhapsody from a Linux box.
There seem to be plenty of UPnP servers being developed under Linux, but no clients.
Are there proprietary codec issues that are hindering this?
Therefore, what I did opt for is a system from Russound. Their "CA-Series" is very nice. Check them out at russound.com. I have two six-zone systems, creating a total of twelve integrated zones.
You definitely loose the oohs-and-ahhs factor that Sonos brings with their remote LCD. However, when I walk into a room in my house, I can control that zone from any one of six sources: two AM/FM radio tuners, XM Satellite radio, a CD player, my MP3 collection, and even a cable TV feed. Yes, I can even tune the station I want on the radio, skip tracks on the CD player, etc.. This is all done via the in-wall control panel.
It's not as [fancy|sexy|cool] as the Sonos, however, it's more functional for my listening style.
1. Will it interfere with existing wireless networks?
2. Have they now beaten Apple to the crunch ahead of their proposed Airport expansions?
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
What are you talking about? Running linux on the Sonos system? That would be retarded. As for the Sonos system...it works with Windows as well as OS X, and you can get it to work with Linux. Please explain yourself.
Of course, the excellent is pretty much what you'd expect given that you're paying $1200 for a remote control and a pair of wireless bridge+tuner boxes.
I checked this out via an ad at Engadget, and it is pretty nice, but man, that price tag is way too expensive to even consider them. While I like the remote control that has the built-in monitor (for the love of God, all remotes for small devices should have that, otherwise you can't see what you're navigating around in unless the player is at arm's length, in which case, who needs a remote?), $1199 for two wireless boxes and a remote w/monitor is waaaaaaay out of my price range.
What sort of interference will this cause, or will be affected by? My grandson showed me something with his cell phone: turning it on near his computer speakers would cause them to emit unusual reverberating sounds. And before the phone rang, the speakers would emit a squeal. Would this sound system be affected by cell phone or wifi or wireless networking or other similar devices and technologies?
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
A system that will let me create a different playlist for each of my 3 bathrooms.
How many people need different music for different rooms anyway? Aren't most people listening to the music in the same room as the device? Plus, unless you happen to be cruising around you house with the giant remote control, you're just going to have to run to the room with the remote in it instead of the room with the stereo...
/. ++
I'm not even an employee and their support team treated me great. Respect was shown through the three conversations I have had with them. Two convo's with their Santa Barbara crew and one with their Cambridge people. Sniff some more glue! Sonos is great!
Wow, you almost covered all the bases.
Except for the ones with "
" in them.
You are the weakest link! Goodbye!
Are you afraid that your boxen will get virii?
Damn it! I clicked on the link thinking it was a system I could emerge on my Gentoo box. Never post something again that has the word 'Linux' in it and requires you to actually pay for something.
Essentially Airport Express and a bunch of less usable products from Cisco et al do everything Sonos does except the analog loophole (which is a cool feature ... but only useful in rather odd situations).
Consider possible users:
1. Hi Fi enthusiast.
This person is not going to pay $1200 to use a cheesy 50W amplifier.
2. Computer Nut.
Already has all his/her audio digitized and several spare computers lying around along with a wireless network and some decent stereos. Why pay $1200 for Sonos when $129 per Airport Express hub gets you even more?
3. Idiot with too much money.
Sonos only started providing speakers as an afterthought, and the speakers do not match the rest of the gear. The standalone server hasn't been released yet. So now you need to install software, show them how to rip media, etc. Hmm, iTunes sounds better every minute.
So what's their target market?
Check out the screen shot
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
"[if (blahblah) and if (blahblah2)...] then the Sonos Digital Music System is for you. It's the current state of the art for wirelessly controlling music in a large home or business where you need just the right music in the right room at the right time.
Analog loophole, analog loophole... a whole page raving about that and the fact that you can rip CDs to MP3s on your computer and play them on this thing! And there isn't even a single real-life photo, only those found on the official site. Nobody seems to be complaining about the slashvertisment now, eh?
That's not ironic. That's targeted.
For more information, click here.
The company I work for. http://magnoliaav.com/ sells these and I had a change to demo them for use on our network. We only used three zone but they were dead simple and worked great. If you can afford them (I can't) you will love it. Before I hear the cries of "astroturfing, astroturfing!" I did not submit the article.
My dad got the Sonos a couple of months ago, and I saw it in action last weekend. It's really cool stuff and well implemented.
The big selling point for him was being able to have all the "zones" synchronously play the same song in every room. None of the other solutions he looked at were able to do that.
As far as I remember, the scrool wheel doesn't move- it's touch based, like on the recent iPods.
I just wish I had the money to buy one for myself...
Completely agree! Russound/Niles/Nuvo/etc/etc systems are WAY beyond this system for the price. There are TONS of options to add WAY more oohs-and-ahhs (including the LCD remotes) by integrating with a good HA system like Homeseer.
"reality has a well-known liberal bias" - Steven Colbert
What I really want to know is which approach they use for synching audio between multiple rooms/zones. That's pretty much the biggest hurdle to designing a home-brew version. The only reliably synched method I can think of would be a custom streaming protocal that partially relies on LAN performance to keep many rooms/zones playing the exact same audio so that your ears don't hear delay from the speakers in an adjacent room. When I tested this at home I think I had to get down to 40-60ms offsets before my ears couldn't tell.
Nice, but for a complete solution I would at least expect a surround module for the home cinema room. I'd seriously consider buying this then.
Couldn't they lower the price a little bit by selling a version of the box to integrate with your existing stereo. Just a receiver box with a RCA and digital output jack on the back. For a lot of applications I would image people already have the amp covered and don't need to spend the extra money on a part of the system that isn't going to get used.
...
approval of RIAA and the MPAA - where is the DRM how dare they create a device that lets us play music that doesn't have any DRM - how absurd.
You are not suppose to be able to play you music in any room you like - when you buy a song/cdrom you can only play in one room and one place - you want to play everywhere you have to pay for multiple copies.
Come on where is the humanity.
That would be a "plug". The male (sticky-outty) thing is a plug. The female (takie-innie) thing is a jack.
I'm about to run speaker wire to the upstairs bathroom, to put a pair of car speakers in the ceiling above the sink. That means crawling in the attic, pulling wires, etc. I'm not about to spend $1000 to do that!
But then, I'm a hands-on kind of guy.
sigs, as if you care.
I see a lot of people out there discounting the capabilites of Sonos because they really don't understand what exactly the system does versus alternate setups. To be fair, Sonos competes directly with high-end multi-room, multi-source systems such as http://www.elanhomesystems.com/, http://www.crestron.com/, and http://www.amx.com/. All of these systems can cost tens of thousands of dollars for product/install and require that you hardwire your whole house.
Sonos
=-=-=
*multi-room capability (control up to 32 rooms on one controller)
*multi-source capability (play different songs in different rooms)
*synchronization capability (play the same in different rooms, or in groups of different rooms)
*built-in amplifier (not everyone has a speaker amp in each room)
*line-out to existing amplifier (for those beefy existing home theatre setups)
*line-in on each zoneplayer that can be streamed to any other zoneplayer (connect any legacy device like cd/dvd/tape/sat radio/etc.)
*integration with music services (rhapsody)
*integration with internet radio streams
*wireless controller w/ lcd (huge benefit on getting the wife/gf to use it)
*ease of use (anyone can use that scrollwheel interface)
*ease of setup (not everyone is a tech)
Now let's look at the other talked about solutions and compare their capabilities:
Airport Express
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
*line-out to existing amplifier
*can play one audio source at a time (so can either play on my computer, or my airport express)
*walk back to computer each time you want to change anything
Cheapo Dell ($500 - I have yet to actually see anyone get a computer for $299)
=-=-=-=-=-=
*computer functionality at each room [benefit, assuming you have a montior, keyboard, and mouse to take advantage of it]
*no sychronization (might was well have a indepent cdplayers in each room and burn cds)
*need powered speakers at each location (more $$$)
*walk up to computer and change tracks on it
Besides all the extra functionality (link/separting rooms of audio, rhapsody integration, ease of use/setup,...) everyone is missing the most important thing [and what makes the iPod so successful]. THE INTERFACE! Why do people buy iPods in droves instead of getting a regular flash/hard drive based player. It's because the iPod has blended simple but powerful functionality with elegant design. Sonos wireless lcd controller gives that same beautiful abstraction and gives *anyone* control of the audio in their house seamlessly.
He rides in on a skateboard with a doobie in one hand and an iPod in the other.
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
I'm a RealNetworks employee, and we recently saw these things demoed after they added support for RealNetworks' Rhapsody service. Add a Rhapsody subscription to the cost of the device, and you get a massive library of music accessible for high-quality streaming. It was pretty impressive.
I have a Sonos, and I can say definitively that it's an excellent system. It has the ease of use of an iPod (I would say that its remotes' UI is actually better than the iPod's) and the power of a Squeezebox. The only problem I've had with it is that it doesn't have FairPlay permissions, and thus can't play iTMS music. But other than that, it's great.
Hmmm, cool looking product but from looking at the last page of the article, the reviewer rates the ease of setup on WindowsXP 10/10 but gives the ease of linux setup as a measly 2/10.
The reviewer said he had to ask the Sonos community (maybe a web forum?) for help getting it to work under Suse. Apparantly you need to run Samba for the Sonos controller to be able to access the music and gave the reviewer enough trouble that he writes:
"For Linux wizards, this is probably just another opportunity to play and have fun, but for me it was some serious work, and I would not have been able to do it but for the graciousness of the Sonos community. "
It seems that they haven't put a lot of polish on the linux support for the server end yet. I'm wondering why is there no NFS support which should do away with needing Samba... I have my entire music collection on an NFS share, and I'd expect any linux client to simply mount it over the network and away we go.
Should we be giving much credit to a product just because it runs linux if it's really that difficult to make it play nicely with existing linux networks?
Why would you want to connect a CD player? That seems crazy. Almost the whole point of this is to get rid of your CDs. Rip them to disk, then put them in storge. Now streaming support, that would be nice.
It solves some problems of the AirPort Express (no display, no ability to control the host computer).
Has anyone here used it?
(And to answer the question of why get this instead of an actal computer--some people have home theaters or stereos and want something that integrate with that, instead of having another computer.
Yes, I was actually thinking about doing this this morning independently. It'd be hot to write a Qt app for my Zaurus to control the system from any room. Goddamn, I'mma go do this when I get home.
--- What
Russound does have a streaming media player. This isn't the best link for it, but if you click on the "SMS3 Media Server" towards the right, you'll get a pop-up. The SMS3 supports up to three simultaneous streams, I think. (Meaning that different streams can be playing in three separate zones at the same time.)
Also, somebody below posted about how the Sonos is the only system which supports a "syncing" of different zones. The Russound I have supports "party mode", meaning that all zones play the same source. And, of course, its got nice hookups for muting when the phone or doorbell rings, and an "all off" feature on every keypad for turning the whole house off when it's bedtime.
Like a different reply said, Niles makes similar equipment, and these Sonos-competitors (Russounds, Niles) just seem to be a whole lot more flexible and extendible than the Sonos if you are looking for more than just MP3 streaming.
I mean don't get me wrong, this device seems to be good at what it does, but the cost! You could buy a plasma screen TV for how much you'll be paying for audio!
I'm really surprised no one has come up with a full opensource do-it-yourself solution. The squeezebox from slimdevices.com seems to work all right, but at $200 ~ $300 a pop, they are also kinda pricey for an overglorified wi-fi audio system.
With mini-ITX boards so cheap, you could build one of this things easily for under $100. What's missing is embeded Linux software to make it work.
The tickey part is syncing audio. The best way to acomplish this is probably to send the audio data as UDP datagram broadcasts to ever device on the media players subnet.
Although I'm sure there are a few free software solutions that exist here and there, I'm waiting for the day when one becomes as efficent and popular as say MythTV giving us nerds to make cool systems like this on a budget.
-Sumit
I just want a USB port, or audio in jack on my car stereo so I can plug my flash mp3 player in.
It looks like a very nice piece of hardware... My only complaint is that the zoneplayers do not have the same control screens as the remotes do. I do not think this is to much to ask considering how much the zoneplayers cost and the remotes pricey as well. What if you are in one room and the remote is in another and you want to listen to some tunes? It would be very costly to have a remote for each room but this system is not about cost effectiveness.
Move your mouse pointer over that link. Just hold it there for a while. You'll see your status bar change to
http://www.architechsystems.com/images/ ironic_sonos.jpg
Aitch tee tee pee colon slash slash arch eye tetch cyst ee em ess dot calm slash eye magus solidus ironic underline sonos dot JPEG.
(Score: -1, Improper Use of Minus One)
For more information, click here.
Actually, Sonos has something even better. Every unit has a set of inputs on the back that allows you to plug in another audio device -- CD, XM, radio, whatever. And once it's plugged in, you can then stream that device's audio to the all of the other units, synchronized. So just like that, your old cd player is now a whole-house music system. It's a brilliant feature, and one that is unmatched by any of the competitors (afaik).
The sonos is a nice little gadget, however Leviton has released the LE&AP which is a linux based audio, video and image distribution device. A centrally located 120g hard drive which also acts as your gateway/firewall/switch. It reaches out to your local machines and pulls in the audio video and images and stores them in the 120g drive. Now you can stream any of that data to any of the locations in the house you have a unit located. You can have up to 8 simulataneous audio streams or 4 simultaneous video streams. http://www.leviton-lin.com/news/pr.display.asp?PRn ame=2.24.2005
Although you can plug in an auxillary source, you can't control that source via the remote. For example, you can't change the XM channel via the Sonos remote.
In the Russound/Niles/competitor world, you can. The key here is to be able to control the source feed from within the zone you are physically standing in, not going back to the closet to change channels/stations/discs.
Although I might not have been clear in my original post, this is exactly where the Sonos falls down for me. It's geared towards someone who's music listening preferences are 100% digital. For me, I prefer to bounce around; mp3s, XM radio, sports radio on AM, local news on FM, even putting the TV feed for the ballgame on in the bathroom.
There are so many little apps and widgets available which can be used to control iTunes. Couldn't Sonos write a little app to sit on your system which would respond to the commands from the remote allow you to control iTunes, see your playlists, etc. The PC or Mac could have its lineout going to one of the Sonos units, so you could then get your iTunes DRM'd songs anywhere you had a zone player. How hard would this be? Why hasn't Sonos done this already?
The Russound looks like what I might need. How much did your system cost?
I'm thrilled to see this post and admittingly biased. I've had 4 ZonePlayers and 2 Controllers for a few months now and can't recommend them enough. I've plugged them into a B&W Speakers and they just rock.
Why is Sonos great? (in no particular order)
1. No need to put your MP3s on it's HD. You store them where you want and simply mount a drive
2. A remote anyone can use with no training. My previous hacked together PocketPC device accessing internal website via 802 was a disaster.
3. Use traditional audiophile grade gear (amps with sonos as preamp) and input devices (DVD, tape deck, LP, etc) as inputs to Sonos. Nothing beats an LP streamed all over the house
4. Play multiple zones "in Sync" (all playing the same thing in time) or each zone plays what it wants
5. It just works. Well. Hugely high Wife Acceptance Factor (WAF).
6. Software upgrades (flashable ROM) to hardware. I've never got an upgrade to my old, black rack audio gear.
7. water-resistant remote
8. Desktop client, if you can't find a remote, use your laptop
9. we just listen to more music.
10. whole home networking without running wires (here in Boston, old home networking can be tough)
11. programable interface
12. active developers community
What I don't love about Sonos:
1. Cost
2. No support for real/MS/quicktime, only shoutcast. For now, hoping for an upgrade
That's really it. The wife and I just love it.
I can't recommend it enough.
Feel free to post questions about the devices if you like and I'll try to answer.
The Russound system is also, of course, an entirely wired solution.
Installed in an existing dwelling, it will cost at least 10x as much as a comparable Sonos system.
As an electrician, I'm all for running wires (for purely selfish financial reasons), but it's not a great bang for the buck solution.
In last two months I have worked on 2 different jobs where clients have dropped $80k+ on systems that could have been duplicated for under $10k using Sonos systems.
Would they have had centrally distributed FM radio? No, but the FM signals are already present in every room!
8 room, 2 controller Sonos system + 8 Bose wave radios = $8k.
8 room Russound/NuVo with in wall contollers, installed > $40k
i forget
I am familiar with both the Sonos system and Niles/ Russound/other lines. I'm curious as to what type of setup you have, and how much cheaper you were able to achieve it.
number of zones? number and type of sources? wiring?
In specific cases, its possible that another solution is cheaper, but it seems to be that above 3 or 4 zones, the Sonos is competitively priced.
it also depends on what typeand amount of existing networked music data you have.
Of course, an innumnerable number of factors go into that final decision, which is why I ask for more information.
--kevin
(not affiliated with any of the above companies, nor any other manufacturer of consumer goods)
vOv
As a "Computer Nut" I do the Airport Express solution now. It's not perfect, and strongly lacking in some ways:
- With the Airport Express you don't get a nice GUI or remote control device.
- With the Airport Express, you can't play the same music in multiple rooms at once.
- You also have to have a computer running. I'm told the Sonus will play interenet radio without requiring a computer or file server running. (Roku does this as well, and apparently the new Slim Devices product does as well)
Sonus is too expensive now, but the price should come down.
As a HiFi enthusiast I don't care that it only a lame 50 watt amp, I'll use the line level outs to drive powered speakers, because active speakers sound better. (Why send audio over high current AC over big thick cables when you could put the amp in the speaker?)
An Idiot with Too Much Money(tm) probably has in-wall speakers and won't buy them from Sonus anyway.
It doesn't cost nearly that much. I did my entire house for about $10K. (Twelve zones; six sources.) Yes, that includes speakers, wiring, panels, receivers, everything.
And, please remember, this is Slashdot. "News for nerds". If you are afraid to run a couple of your own low-voltage wires for some in-house audio, perhaps you shouldn't be surprised at the labor costs of having someone do your geek work for you. :-P
I had no existing "networked music".
I did my entire house for about ten grand. (Twelve zones; six sources.) Yes, that includes speakers, wiring, panels, receivers, everything.
Perform your own research. Perhaps a wired solution isn't an option for you. For me, it was an option, and, more important than anything else, I wanted to be able to control different sources in different zones. My listening habits include flipping around XM, AM, and FM; I want background music everywhere; I want the system to look "integrated" into the house (in ceiling speakers, inwall controls, doorbell muting, etc...) In the larger living room, I easily upped the amperage a bit, put in some larger speakers and a sub. It sounds great. I've got one zone controlling rock speakers out by the pool.
You get the idea. I'm taking nothing away from the Sonos. Great product, and I'd love to see more of it's kind. But, for me, mp3's are just a small part of what I listen to.
I did my entire house for about ten grand. (Twelve zones; six sources.) Yes, that includes speakers, wiring, panels, receivers, everything.
Man... this has to be the most out-of-date headline I've ever seen on Slashdot. On the other hand, the Sonos does rule; we've been testing it out at MP3.com with Rhapsody, and it works great. Of course, if you already have an amp and speakers that you like, it loses a little appeal... I'd like to see a thin client version too. -eliotvb