Spotify Spotify Connect Limitation?

[bmrowe]

We have 5 WiiM Pro Plus devices connected to a couple amps with the intent of whole home audio. However, the devices inconsistently show up in Spotify as Spotify Connect devices. For the past couple days, only 3 have shown up in my Spotify app while my wife just sees the other 2. When they aren't showing up as Connect devices, they are available as "google cast".

I contacted WiiM support who said that the WiiMs are tied to specific Spotify accounts. They stated that the 3 devices I saw were tied to my Spotify account (per the logs I shared) and the other 2 I couldn't see were tied to my wife's account. They advised using one Spotify account for all clients in the home.

This isn't practical for a number of reasons, perhaps the biggest point being that it would limit us to one concurrent stream in the house at a given time.

Is this limitation real? If so, how are people working around it? I would just use airplay but the audio quality is noticeably worse.

 

[Burnside]

WiiM devices don’t have any notion of accounts and my recollection is that Spotify Connect is tied more to device MAC or IP addresses. It seems they’re suggesting that Spotify Connect sessions don’t finish cleanly on WiiM devices, so perhaps a ticket to WiiM identifying your issue with Spotify’s response and a question of what this “tie” is may be fruitful.

I’d try both of you logging in to your Spotify accounts in a browser and choosing “sign out everywhere”, and then reboot (power cycle) your router and possibly your WiiM devices to see if that helps.

Edit: the suggestion of one account per home is rather ludicrous coming from Spotify given their one stream per account limitation…
Edit 2: ignore my first edit, I misread the opening post…

 

[DRC]

I contacted WiiM support who said that the WiiMs are tied to specific Spotify accounts.

so perhaps a ticket to WiiM identifying your issue with Spotify’s response and a question of what this “tie” is may be fruitful.

The OP contacted Wiim.

 

[Burnside]

The OP contacted Wiim.

Sorry, misread that…

I’d still ask again how they can be “untied”

 

[bmrowe]

The OP contacted Wiim.

Yeah, I did. Here is their last response verbatim:

"From your device logs, it appears that the Bedroom, Kitchen, and Office are using the Spotify account redactedAcct1, while Exercise and Patio are using the account redactedAcct2. We suggest logging in with the same account across all devices to see if this resolves the issue."

 

[Burnside]

Yeah, I did. Here is their last response verbatim:

"From your device logs, it appears that the Bedroom, Kitchen, and Office are using the Spotify account redactedAcct1, while Exercise and Patio are using the account redactedAcct2. We suggest logging in with the same account across all devices to see if this resolves the issue."

Even that suggests scant knowledge of Spotify accounts - you don’t login to a Spotify Connect target device as such. How do you log in to the devices you can’t see from your account?

 

[jfbuk]

I think this is a Spotify issue not a Wiim one

Take a look at this thread

Spotify Connect working ONLY with one account

Hi! Me and my wife have 2 Premium accounts (linked to the same Family account), and used Spotify Connect on our Cambridge Audio (Minx II) device in the living room: both were able to see the Connect device and start playing music. However since a couple of weeks I am no longer able to see...

community.spotify.com

 

[jfbuk]

Thinking about it, the target Spotify Connect device must need to lock itself to only one Spotify account at a time or else multiple accounts would be able to send competing instructions/streams to it simultaneously causing chaos.
Does a reboot of one of the Wiims you cannot see make it visible ?

 

[Burnside]

I think this is a Spotify issue not a Wiim one

Take a look at this thread

Spotify Connect working ONLY with one account

Hi! Me and my wife have 2 Premium accounts (linked to the same Family account), and used Spotify Connect on our Cambridge Audio (Minx II) device in the living room: both were able to see the Connect device and start playing music. However since a couple of weeks I am no longer able to see...

community.spotify.com

Interesting, but I go back to what I said earlier, how do you “login” to a Spotify account on your WiiM device, or more importantly, log out? (I note the comment in that link about Alexa and its linking, I wonder if that’s a factor here?)

 

[Burnside]

Thinking about it, the target Spotify Connect device must need to lock itself to only one Spotify account at a time or else multiple accounts would be able to send competing instructions/streams to it simultaneously causing chaos.

In my experience, that’s expected behaviour with Spotify - another Spotify app using the same account can grab the use of a device leaving its original player confused as to what has just happened. I don’t see a different app/account behaving any differently.

 

[bmrowe]

Thinking about it, the target Spotify Connect device must need to lock itself to only one Spotify account at a time or else multiple accounts would be able to send competing instructions/streams to it simultaneously causing chaos.
Does a reboot of one of the Wiims you cannot see make it visible ?

Rebooting the wiims does not change their visibility. I had the same thought - if somehow the wiim was hanging onto a connection then rebooting it should fix that. If I reboot my phone, I see all spotify connect targets for a second or two and then it goes back to the limited subset.

 

[Burnside]

I wonder if the second account holder goes into their Spotify app and uses the three dot menu against a device the first account can’t see and chooses the “forget device” option whether that then makes it visible to the first account?

 

[Burnside]

I think this is a Spotify issue not a Wiim one

Take a look at this thread

Spotify Connect working ONLY with one account

Hi! Me and my wife have 2 Premium accounts (linked to the same Family account), and used Spotify Connect on our Cambridge Audio (Minx II) device in the living room: both were able to see the Connect device and start playing music. However since a couple of weeks I am no longer able to see...

community.spotify.com

Guess this is similar https://community.spotify.com/t5/Pr...amily-accounts-can-t-see-devices/td-p/5442808

Still leaves us with the issue of how you log a WiiM device off a Spotify account that you didn’t log in to in the first place…

 

[bmrowe]

I wonder if the second account holder goes into their Spotify app and uses the three dot menu against a device the first account can’t see and chooses the “forget device” option whether that then makes it visible to the first account?

Good idea. I just tried this - I forgot 3 devices on my phone. My wife could then see all 5 as spotify connect devices. On my phone I now see all 5 devices as google cast only. Something seems super broken.

 

[Burnside]

Good idea. I just tried this - I forgot 3 devices on my phone. My wife could then see all 5 as spotify connect devices. On my phone I now see all 5 devices as google cast only. Something seems super broken.

Maybe she’ll need to connect then forget them for you to see them again

 

[Burnside]

Maybe submit a feature request ticket to WiiM to force disconnect Spotify Connect sessions after a configurable period of time. That might upset some people who will complain about having to reconnect each session but maybe it could be implemented like standby time which has “never” as an option.

I wonder what devices like Bluesound etc do in this situation?

 

[jfbuk]

if you forget them all 5 on on your phone and then your wife also forgets all 5 what happens ?

 

[Burnside]

There be dragons

 

[jfbuk]

Found this

Spotify connect: multiple accounts - how to disconnect

Hi, we are using a Spotify family account. The usage is manly done with Android phones with different Android versions. We also have a radio which has Spotify Connect (Medion MD 87090). If my wife connects to this radio, everything is fine. But if I want to cenntc, I get the error "Kann zurzeit...

community.spotify.com

So it seems there may be something Wiim can do about automating disconnect if it is configurable in the Spotify API

 

[Burnside]

Found this

Spotify connect: multiple accounts - how to disconnect

Hi, we are using a Spotify family account. The usage is manly done with Android phones with different Android versions. We also have a radio which has Spotify Connect (Medion MD 87090). If my wife connects to this radio, everything is fine. But if I want to cenntc, I get the error "Kann zurzeit...

community.spotify.com

So it seems there may be something Wiim can do about automating disconnect if it is configurable in the Spotify API

Thanks, good hunting - sounds like WiiM could perhaps implement some disconnection or idle timeout as I suggested earlier.

@RyanWithWiim , @WiiM Support , @WiiM Team - is this something you could consider implementing to increase the usability for Spotify users with multiple accounts?