Android -> Wiim Ultra -> Sonos: Options?

[Achim1811]

Involuntary suicide. I’m thinking Windows Vista. Does anyone remember that Vista/W7 made millions of printers and scanners unusable?

And a recent iOS update made it impossible to charge my iPad with anything except the official Apple charger.

Is it a Lightning iPad?

 

[Jls]

Is it a Lightning iPad?

No, USB C

 

[Achim1811]

Strange, nothing wrong here. We use our Samsung and Apple charges criss-cross and never noticed such behavior. Will start to look at

 

[Tom Schultz]

Just tried to connect turntable with an available cable directly with one of my Era 100 via the Sonos adapter. Sound is really good and streamed sync to all my other Sonos speakers. Control of speakers (incl. stereo pair) with the old Sonos App (16.1) works easily.

So, if I manage to establish my music library on the NAS and to implement it in the Sonos App (and thus do not need to stream music from my Android Phone), this might be the easiest (and cost-efficient) approach unless the long cable might cause problems. In that case another Era 100 might also be an option.

I think this is a very good solution.

I would still also consider installing a UPnP/DLNA server on the NAS, e.g. Minimserver. It's very easy. The benefit is the browsing experience with your personal music library. It is really a game changer compared to the Sonos app. You can use that Hi-Fi Cast app, or any other DLNA app to access Minimserver.
Sonos has completely neglected personal libraries in favor of streaming services for ages. That may make sense as streaming of course is the big thing. But there are better ways, as demonstrated by WiiM, Cambridge Audio, Eversolo and the developers of those DLNA apps.

 

[Jls]

Strange, nothing wrong here. We use our Samsung and Apple charges criss-cross and never noticed such behavior. Will start to look at

It is very c

I think this is a very good solution.

I would still also consider installing a UPnP/DLNA server on the NAS, e.g. Minimserver. It's very easy. The benefit is the browsing experience with your personal music library. It is really a game changer compared to the Sonos app. You can use that Hi-Fi Cast app, or any other DLNA app to access Minimserver.
Sonos has completely neglected personal libraries in favor of streaming services for ages. That may make sense as streaming of course is the big thing. But there are better ways, as demonstrated by WiiM, Cambridge Audio, Eversolo and the developers of those DLNA apps.

Can you be specific about Sonos and libraries. Ignoring, for the moment, the screwed up app.

I’m using a third party app, and find it adequate.

 

[Tom Schultz]

It is very c

Can you be specific about Sonos and libraries. Ignoring, for the moment, the screwed up app.

I’m using a third party app, and find it adequate.

With SONOS I think it’s difficult to separate app and library. It’s a system. When you use a third-party app, like I do as well, you don’t use the SONOS system any longer. You basically turn the SONOS components into stand-alone, DLNA- or AirPlay-capable active speakers.

Sonos developed a new search mechanism a few years ago. It was fast, versatile and did not work with local libraries. It queried the servers of the streaming services and ignored local libraries. In their old app at least they had an outdated search mechanism for local files, which is not available in the new app anymore. Like in, not at all, no search.

SONOS introduced Hi-Res support for certain streaming services, but not for local libraries. I suppose they assumed that local libraries consist of ripped CDs only.

The SONOS browsing experience hasn't been good for ages. Only streaming service users can work around browsing by using Search. Library users are stuck with scrolling through single columns of text, e.g. album titles, with thumbnail pictures attached to them. Nothing like double columns of artwork tiles with text underneath, on smartphones, or walls of tiles, on tablets, exists. SONOS even wastes the display space of a tablet, which is ridiculous.

There’s not even an alphabet column on the side of the screen anymore to let you shortcut scrolling vast libraries by selecting a letter.

Filtering options are very sparse when compared to other solutions, e.g. Minimserver. Say you’re looking for a song of Classical music, by a certain composer, performed by a particular artist. Without a search option you may begin by selecting “Song” and scroll until you’re blue in the face as you never get to select further filters.

I mean, why could streamers like WiiM, Cambridge audio, Eversolo etc. even become a thing? SONOS could have dominated the “Amp and speakers” segment as well as the “Just add speakers” market with their PORT streamer and AMP streaming amplifier, if they had shown some attention to detail.

While they sort this out I’m happy with the sophisticated filtering options provided by Minimserver in combination with DLNA apps. And the SONOS Smartspeakers sound as good as ever.

 

[Jls]

I’m using SonoPad, which works like the old Sonos app, only faster and better. Local libraries come up with album art.

If I search for a composer, I get a list of albums. I’m sure it could be better, but it’s so much better than anything else I’ve used, I’m happy.

What I like about Sonos is the ability to mix tracks from any source into playlists. I can still do that.