XT8 - Sonos Issues - Potential Solution

[minimos]

Hello,

I'm making this post in the hope that it can help others resolve there issues with Sonos and the XT8

To give some quick background, on firmware version 25790 I had a very stable Sonos setup for my various Play:1's and my beam with One SL as satellites. I could group devices, use voice assistants and use all my streaming services on them without issue.

New firmware's since this version, I have had frequent problems getting all devices connected consistently, especially my Beam. I have done many things with the wireless settings as detailed on many posts in this forum like disabling AX mode, smart connect off, channel width to 20mhz etc etc. The only way I could have a stable connection with working streaming services etc was to wire my Beam to a switch and it then enables SonosNet routing all Sonos traffic though this device, I'd learned to live with the extra wire, but recently I upgrade my TV and hiding the ethernet cable due to the new stand is way more difficult, so much so that my wife notices it, and I'm sure people can appreciate the discussions that can create .

Anyway, I recently upgraded to 43169 from 41793 which prompted me to test whether wireless was back up and running, so I pulled out the ethernet cable rebooted my Sonos devices and waited, I was delighted to see they all came back online, I could use voice assistants, group and stream music. Excellent I thought, issue solved, fast forward 24 hours, and my Beam and some but not all of my other devices had disappeared from the Sonos App, so I started doing some testing.

I disabled my 2nd node in my mesh setup and rebooted the devices, all of them came back online and were accessible, so I left it another 24 hours and they were still there. I plugged back in the 2nd node and left it, but a few hours later some of the Sonos devices disappeared again.

The above test got me thinking, are the devices disappearing from the app because they are roaming between nodes which is then causing them to appear to be not on the same network! I grabbed my tablet, manually connected to the 2.4ghz network and ran the find my system option in the Sonos App. It asked me which device was missing, I selected the Beam, it asked me for the wireless password again, and then after the beam flashed orange a few times the app said updating, where is sat for approx 2-3 mins, it then popped up a message saying my Beam was connected but it was on a different wireless network to my current device and would I like to switch to the same network, which it then prompts you to go to the android settings and select the same network. However, I only have 2 ssid setup, one for 2.4ghz and one for 5ghz

What this pointed me to is that my theory was correct, and the Sonos devices are connecting themselves to a specific SSID which for them is seen as being on a separate network. If you look in your router settings or use a WIFI analyzing tool you will see that there are multiple SSID with the same name that have different MAC addresses. To see this in the router go to AiMesh > Select a Node > Network. You will see all the MAC addresses for each band, and you'll not there are different ones for each band and node I think despite the main node only showing one SSID for all nodes (which is the correct operation), the Sonos devices lock onto the individual nodes, and if separate Sonos devices end up connected to a different node they cant see each other, in fact if your mobile/tablet device is not on that node, you may not see any if they have all connected to a different node, and I believe this explains why other users have reported devices 'dropping' from the network. I think this is a bug in the Asus firmware though as it has only happened for me on the latest firmware's as I said at the beginning of this post.

Anyway, to further test my theory, and which I believe is the solution, I bound my Sonos devices to the same node, instantly they all came back online and were like this for the last 48 hours.

I'll continue to test, and I am currently doing an experiment with just binding the Beam to a specific node, and despite it only being a few hours in its all still working reliably.

If you want to try this for yourself to see if this resolves issues of players dropping, not being able to use voice assistants or streaming services go to the routers web page > AI Mesh > Select your Sonos device down the side (if you want to bind a specific device look in the Sonos App > Settings > System > About My System to get the MAC id of the Sonos device so you can match it to the one you want in the routers GUI) > click the Bind Button (the chain link icon) and select a Node to bind it against). You tend to find it will always display about disconnect or stability due to it not being a strong node, but I think this is a badly worded dialog meaning to say it could happen, or a bug irrespective of the actual connection strength.

Hope this helps other get a better experience with Sonos products.

Thanks

Minimos

 

[minimos]

Hello,

I'm making this post in the hope that it can help others resolve there issues with Sonos and the XT8

To give some quick background, on firmware version 25790 I had a very stable Sonos setup for my various Play:1's and my beam with One SL as satellites. I could group devices, use voice assistants and use all my streaming services on them without issue.

New firmware's since this version, I have had frequent problems getting all devices connected consistently, especially my Beam. I have done many things with the wireless settings as detailed on many posts in this forum like disabling AX mode, smart connect off, channel width to 20mhz etc etc. The only way I could have a stable connection with working streaming services etc was to wire my Beam to a switch and it then enables SonosNet routing all Sonos traffic though this device, I'd learned to live with the extra wire, but recently I upgrade my TV and hiding the ethernet cable due to the new stand is way more difficult, so much so that my wife notices it, and I'm sure people can appreciate the discussions that can create .

Anyway, I recently upgraded to 43169 from 41793 which prompted me to test whether wireless was back up and running, so I pulled out the ethernet cable rebooted my Sonos devices and waited, I was delighted to see they all came back online, I could use voice assistants, group and stream music. Excellent I thought, issue solved, fast forward 24 hours, and my Beam and some but not all of my other devices had disappeared from the Sonos App, so I started doing some testing.

I disabled my 2nd node in my mesh setup and rebooted the devices, all of them came back online and were accessible, so I left it another 24 hours and they were still there. I plugged back in the 2nd node and left it, but a few hours later some of the Sonos devices disappeared again.

The above test got me thinking, are the devices disappearing from the app because they are roaming between nodes which is then causing them to appear to be not on the same network! I grabbed my tablet, manually connected to the 2.4ghz network and ran the find my system option in the Sonos App. It asked me which device was missing, I selected the Beam, it asked me for the wireless password again, and then after the beam flashed orange a few times the app said updating, where is sat for approx 2-3 mins, it then popped up a message saying my Beam was connected but it was on a different wireless network to my current device and would I like to switch to the same network, which it then prompts you to go to the android settings and select the same network. However, I only have 2 ssid setup, one for 2.4ghz and one for 5ghz

What this pointed me to is that my theory was correct, and the Sonos devices are connecting themselves to a specific SSID which for them is seen as being on a separate network. If you look in your router settings or use a WIFI analyzing tool you will see that there are multiple SSID with the same name that have different MAC addresses. To see this in the router go to AiMesh > Select a Node > Network. You will see all the MAC addresses for each band, and you'll not there are different ones for each band and node I think despite the main node only showing one SSID for all nodes (which is the correct operation), the Sonos devices lock onto the individual nodes, and if separate Sonos devices end up connected to a different node they cant see each other, in fact if your mobile/tablet device is not on that node, you may not see any if they have all connected to a different node, and I believe this explains why other users have reported devices 'dropping' from the network. I think this is a bug in the Asus firmware though as it has only happened for me on the latest firmware's as I said at the beginning of this post.

Anyway, to further test my theory, and which I believe is the solution, I bound my Sonos devices to the same node, instantly they all came back online and were like this for the last 48 hours.

I'll continue to test, and I am currently doing an experiment with just binding the Beam to a specific node, and despite it only being a few hours in its all still working reliably.

If you want to try this for yourself to see if this resolves issues of players dropping, not being able to use voice assistants or streaming services go to the routers web page > AI Mesh > Select your Sonos device down the side (if you want to bind a specific device look in the Sonos App > Settings > System > About My System to get the MAC id of the Sonos device so you can match it to the one you want in the routers GUI) > click the Bind Button (the chain link icon) and select a Node to bind it against). You tend to find it will always display about disconnect or stability due to it not being a strong node, but I think this is a badly worded dialog meaning to say it could happen, or a bug irrespective of the actual connection strength.

Hope this helps other get a better experience with Sonos products.

Thanks

Minimos

OK.

Here's an update, the Beam, dropped off the app when separate from the other devices, so it further proves my theory.

Going to move all the other devices to the main node now (where the beam currently is bound to) to see if it comes back online

 

[minimos]

So interestingly.

Putting the Sonos devices on the main node, makes all the devices unaccessible unless your phone/tablet is connected to that node.

I moved all the devices back to the satellite, and my phone can see the devices when connected to either the router or satellite. I tested this also with a tablet.

I am going to leave it in this configuration now and report back how it holds up in a few days

 

[leerees]

I would guess that roaming is what causes all the issues people have with IoT devices / smart speakers etc.

I'm of the thinking that the blame lies with the makers of the devices as opposed to Asus. These devices should do more to get back online after roaming.

I'm pretty certain you can set specific devices not to roam. It's also worth noting that load balancing will make devices roam. Roaming is also not limited to nodes, sometimes devices will switch between 5Ghz and 2.4Ghz.

As a fix, you could try locking down your speakers / door bell to a specific node on 2.4Ghz.

To summarise, AiMesh is doing what's it's supposed to do, but certain devices can't handle it.

I notice a brief 404 page on my phone browser when roaming, it doesn't always happen but when it does it's only visible for a split second, the page then automatically refreshes. Despite this minor inconvenience, I've left it alone as having a mesh is still infinitely better than my old setup of range extenders / repeaters etc. I can go to the end of my garden and my phone will always switch the 2.4Ghz network which still gives me around 80mb/s. By the time I've re-entered the house it's already switched back to the 5Ghz network. Not only that, I can be on a WiFi call and all of this still happens without any disruption to the call.

 

[minimos]

@leerees I think you could be correct for the majority of devices however in this instance, I do know it was very stable on 25790, so something has changed on the Asus side as well for this.

I am happy to report as well, that as I suggested and @leerees has also alluded to that setting the Sonos devices to all use the same access point makes the whole system usable. I have had no drop outs since my last post on Thursday.

So the 2 known working solutions for me are:-

1. If you require full wireless, use the Asus Router Web Interface to bind you Sonos devices to a single node. For me this did not work by binding them to the router, it only worked on the satellite. As with all things YMMV, so try it on both if you have one closer to your kit, but every device MUST be on the same Asus device or you'll get drop outs eventually.

Asus Web Page > AiMesh > Locate Your Sonos devices in the Client List > click the chain link > assign them all to your preferred node

2. If you suffer from the issue of not having enough signal near your preferred satellite, and bounding Sonos devices to the router gives you the same problems like me, then you will need to wire 1 Sonos device into either the satellite or router node. You could use a switch in the interim, or power line adapters if needed should your devices not be near your Asus kit. This will setup Sonosnet and it should be good to go.

It would be great if others could certainly try option 1 to see if it works for them (especially as option 2 is a known working solution for most).

 

[afool622]

I do have 5 sonos speakers and for the most part it is working fine. Had some on and off connection issues on the latest firmware, however I have since reverted back to 42095. The configs i used:
Follow OEs install post for the most part where he talks about what to configure
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/o...-supported-products.44375/page-14#post-381537
Along with asus recommendations [URL='https://www.asus.com/support/FAQ/1042475/']https://www.asus.com/support/FAQ/1042475/[/URL]

 

[bertucaru]

Hello,

I'm making this post in the hope that it can help others resolve there issues with Sonos and the XT8

To give some quick background, on firmware version 25790 I had a very stable Sonos setup for my various Play:1's and my beam with One SL as satellites. I could group devices, use voice assistants and use all my streaming services on them without issue.

New firmware's since this version, I have had frequent problems getting all devices connected consistently, especially my Beam. I have done many things with the wireless settings as detailed on many posts in this forum like disabling AX mode, smart connect off, channel width to 20mhz etc etc. The only way I could have a stable connection with working streaming services etc was to wire my Beam to a switch and it then enables SonosNet routing all Sonos traffic though this device, I'd learned to live with the extra wire, but recently I upgrade my TV and hiding the ethernet cable due to the new stand is way more difficult, so much so that my wife notices it, and I'm sure people can appreciate the discussions that can create .

Anyway, I recently upgraded to 43169 from 41793 which prompted me to test whether wireless was back up and running, so I pulled out the ethernet cable rebooted my Sonos devices and waited, I was delighted to see they all came back online, I could use voice assistants, group and stream music. Excellent I thought, issue solved, fast forward 24 hours, and my Beam and some but not all of my other devices had disappeared from the Sonos App, so I started doing some testing.

I disabled my 2nd node in my mesh setup and rebooted the devices, all of them came back online and were accessible, so I left it another 24 hours and they were still there. I plugged back in the 2nd node and left it, but a few hours later some of the Sonos devices disappeared again.

The above test got me thinking, are the devices disappearing from the app because they are roaming between nodes which is then causing them to appear to be not on the same network! I grabbed my tablet, manually connected to the 2.4ghz network and ran the find my system option in the Sonos App. It asked me which device was missing, I selected the Beam, it asked me for the wireless password again, and then after the beam flashed orange a few times the app said updating, where is sat for approx 2-3 mins, it then popped up a message saying my Beam was connected but it was on a different wireless network to my current device and would I like to switch to the same network, which it then prompts you to go to the android settings and select the same network. However, I only have 2 ssid setup, one for 2.4ghz and one for 5ghz

What this pointed me to is that my theory was correct, and the Sonos devices are connecting themselves to a specific SSID which for them is seen as being on a separate network. If you look in your router settings or use a WIFI analyzing tool you will see that there are multiple SSID with the same name that have different MAC addresses. To see this in the router go to AiMesh > Select a Node > Network. You will see all the MAC addresses for each band, and you'll not there are different ones for each band and node I think despite the main node only showing one SSID for all nodes (which is the correct operation), the Sonos devices lock onto the individual nodes, and if separate Sonos devices end up connected to a different node they cant see each other, in fact if your mobile/tablet device is not on that node, you may not see any if they have all connected to a different node, and I believe this explains why other users have reported devices 'dropping' from the network. I think this is a bug in the Asus firmware though as it has only happened for me on the latest firmware's as I said at the beginning of this post.

Anyway, to further test my theory, and which I believe is the solution, I bound my Sonos devices to the same node, instantly they all came back online and were like this for the last 48 hours.

I'll continue to test, and I am currently doing an experiment with just binding the Beam to a specific node, and despite it only being a few hours in its all still working reliably.

If you want to try this for yourself to see if this resolves issues of players dropping, not being able to use voice assistants or streaming services go to the routers web page > AI Mesh > Select your Sonos device down the side (if you want to bind a specific device look in the Sonos App > Settings > System > About My System to get the MAC id of the Sonos device so you can match it to the one you want in the routers GUI) > click the Bind Button (the chain link icon) and select a Node to bind it against). You tend to find it will always display about disconnect or stability due to it not being a strong node, but I think this is a badly worded dialog meaning to say it could happen, or a bug irrespective of the actual connection strength.

Hope this helps other get a better experience with Sonos products.

Thanks

Minimos

THIS IS NOT A VIABLE SOLUTION FOR ME - my speakers are too far apart for them to connect to one node due to reinforced concrete ceilings (plus tile/stoneflooring) and stone interior walls hence my nodes are cat6 hardwired for backhaul

BESIDES, while all windows android and smartdevices see an NTFS USB NAS drive attached to the router as SMB or dlna as applicable, SONOS S2 cannot map the NTFS music folder as music library
SONOS S2 only recognizes a USB Fat32 stick music folder, but not NTFS NAS drives.

p.s. you can add any immobile wi-fi connected devices to the "roaming block list" in the wireless tab of the windows ASUS controller - e.g. printers, air conditioners, garage door motors, Televisions, BluRay players, washing machines.....