Sonos 'End of Life' products to not get any new updates

[dangb9]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-51206604

 

TD;LR - Sonos will no longer be updating 1st Gen play 5's, CR200 and Bridge devices from May. While they still can be used (or 'trade up' with 30% credit for each legacy product), over time without software updates sonos stated that;

Quote

Without new software updates, access to services and overall functionality of your sound system will eventually be disrupted, particularly as partners evolve their technology.

 (https://blog.sonos.com/en-gb/end-of-software-updates-for-legacy-products/)

 

 

From my point of view I have 4 play 1's, I only added more devices recently to the original 1 I had for a few years, with the feeling that been tied into one eco system (ie the need to use the sonos app to stream anything to the speaker) was a bit of a risk. Now it seems that risk is potentially going to come into play. If the future rather than new speakers I think I might just look to stick with my Bluetooth HiFi system rather than expanding by sonos system any more.

 

 

[Velcade]

This is pretty standard.  I have equipment that is at 'end of life'.  It gets no updates and has no replacement parts, when it dies that's it. It's gone. Lots of companies do this.  You can't expect companies to continue to support products indefinitely, that's insane.

 

There's a lot of hate for Sonos lately...

[dangb9]

2 minutes ago, Velcade said:

This is pretty standard.  I have equipment that is at 'end of life'.  It gets no updates and has no replacement parts, when it dies that's it. It's gone. Lots of companies do this.  You can't expect companies to continue to support products indefinitely, that's insane.

 

There's a lot of hate for Sonos lately...

agreed, but I can still turn on my XP laptop and use it for its intended purpose - with this are we going to see speakers become useless bricks due to app updates which then refuses to play anything to them because they are too old?

[lewdicrous]

9 minutes ago, Velcade said:

There's a lot of hate for Sonos lately...

Deliberate bricking, the Sonos way. - Tech News - Linus Tech Tips

Maybe cause of this.

[Velcade]

10 minutes ago, dangb9 said:

agreed, but I can still turn on my XP laptop and use it for its intended purpose - with this are we going to see speakers become useless bricks due to app updates which then refuses to play anything to them because they are too old?

 

They'll still work. They just won't receive updates. 

[kokakolia]

31 minutes ago, Velcade said:

 

They'll still work. They just won't receive updates. 

If that’s the case then it’s really not an issue: 

 

- It should still work through Spotify connect

- Bluetooth 

[dalekphalm]

40 minutes ago, huilun02 said:

What Sonos is doing is making perfectly working speakers useless by shafting the artificially required Sonos app's ability to communicate to the speakers.

No hardware failure. Deliberate software downgrade, Sonos deliberately make perfectly working speakers useless.

 

This does not happen with non-proprietary bluetooth connections.

Not exactly. Sonos isn't forcing you to update the software. If you run the old software, your old Sonos speakers will continue to work until the day they die.

 

However, if you want newer software with newer features that the old speakers cannot handle (usually due to limitations with the onboard SoC I'd imagine), you'll have to decide whether you want the new features or the old speakers.

 

The old speakers, of course, can be sold to someone who doesn't care about the new features, and then you can use that money towards newer Sonos speakers, if that's what you want to do.

[Velcade]

41 minutes ago, lewdicrous said:

Deliberate bricking, the Sonos way. - Tech News - Linus Tech Tips

Maybe cause of this.

If this bothers you don't turn in your old equipment.  It's not a mandatory program. 

[RejZoR]

"Smart" devices are generally pretty dumb considering they just stop working over time coz "services"...

[TechyBen]

2 hours ago, Velcade said:

This is pretty standard.  I have equipment that is at 'end of life'.  It gets no updates and has no replacement parts, when it dies that's it. It's gone. Lots of companies do this.  You can't expect companies to continue to support products indefinitely, that's insane.

 

There's a lot of hate for Sonos lately...

Because they sell a product that has historically always worked. No, not wifi/IOT speakers... but audio equipment has and does last decades, if not 100 years. AM and even long wave radios STILL WORK. I really should boot up my valve radio just to be pedantic and prove the point!

[Commodus]

I really dislike the tech community's tendency to shoehorn companies into narratives based on simplistic or incomplete versions of events.

 

Case in point, Sonos.  Yeah, the Recycle Mode thing was stupid, but I don't think company execs were cackling supervillains conducting a fiendish plot.  And then comes the lawsuit against Google, and suddenly Sonos is the evil one... why?  Not because of facts, but because people didn't want let go of their hate-on for Sonos.  Then we get to today, where people are demonizing Sonos for daring to suggest that hey, maybe someone with a decade-old speaker shouldn't expect to get new features the hardware can't handle.  Never mind that Sonos offered years more support than you'll likely ever get for your Home/Echo/HomePod, it's been pre-labeled as the devil because people don't want to change their preconceived narrative.

[RonnieOP]

Whats the issue here?

 

Its asinine to think a company should update products for life. 

 

I dont own anything sonos personally but even if i did this wouldnt bother me. 

 

Seems people just want to bitch.

 

[Commodus]

3 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

Whats the issue here?

 

Its asinine to think a company should update products for life. 

 

I dont own anything sonos personally but even if i did this wouldnt bother me. 

 

Seems people just want to bitch.

 

In short: people decided Sonos was bad some weeks ago and decided that any action that could even be vaguely considered negative was a horrible, horrible crime.

[RonnieOP]

1 minute ago, Commodus said:

In short: people decided Sonos was bad some weeks ago and decided that any action that could even be vaguely considered negative was a horrible, horrible crime.

Basically.

 

If someone buys a tech product in 2020 and thinks it going to be supported in 2040 thats not an issue with the manufacturer but an issue with the buyer for just being ignorant.

 

If you want a speaker that is not reliant on software updates theres plenty of options. Go with those products.

 

 

[Arika]

 

4 hours ago, Commodus said:

maybe someone with a decade-old speaker shouldn't expect to get new features the hardware can't handle.

As long as they don't forcefully update apps and stop offering the compatible apps for older models, then i dont see an issue.

 

if they do, then yeah, that's a bit shitty

[Tristerin]

Sounds like my old old laptops.  Current Windows makes them useless because they cannot handle the amount of hardware required.  If I choose to install Windows 10 on these two laptops, may as well call them bricks. 

 

However if I use them with an old OS, or a light Linux distro - they work.  

 

The way I see it, is this is very similar to how that works out for me.  I paid for these laptops, the hardware is still good - but the software of today makes them bricks.  If I use old software from its time, or light Linux they are usable computers.  So basically use old software with your Sonos speakers or they wont work?

[Commodus]

5 minutes ago, Arika S said:

 

As long as they don't forcefully update apps and stop offering the compatible apps for older models, then i dont see an issue.

 

if they do, then yeah, that's a bit shitty

Well that's the thing, the apps will still be around and the speakers will continue to work.  Sonos just isn't promising to deliver updates for those models, and there may be a point where certain features break as Sonos' service partners change things up.  Basically: we won't break playback on purpose, but you should start preparing for a day when you may have to replace your speaker to get all the features you'd like.

[mr moose]

If you need to create a condition that hasn;t yet happened in reality in order to justify an accusation then your accusation is based on fear not reality.  If sonos don't want to keep updating a 10 year old product then fine.  I find it a bit rude to stop supporting a product that was only sold 4 years ago (I personally think we have the technology and resources to keep these things working for 7+years at least), however not to stop supporting old products in general. 

 

Now if due to this,  the device does actually stop doing what it did originally (like the original ipads did after apps wouldn't load because ios was too old thus making a perfectly serviceable computing device a paper weight) then that would need to stop.  But we have to wait and see if this happens before complaining that it is actually happening.

6 hours ago, TechyBen said:

Because they sell a product that has historically always worked. No, not wifi/IOT speakers... but audio equipment has and does last decades, if not 100 years. AM and even long wave radios STILL WORK. I really should boot up my valve radio just to be pedantic and prove the point!

 

I did just the other day, I have a valve radio from 1965, all original. I tuned into an AM station and listened to some inane talk for a while.

 

[kokakolia]

11 hours ago, Commodus said:

Well that's the thing, the apps will still be around and the speakers will continue to work.  Sonos just isn't promising to deliver updates for those models, and there may be a point where certain features break as Sonos' service partners change things up.  Basically: we won't break playback on purpose, but you should start preparing for a day when you may have to replace your speaker to get all the features you'd like.

All the features you’d like? Like what? It’s just a wireless speaker... 

[Commodus]

5 hours ago, kokakolia said:

All the features you’d like? Like what? It’s just a wireless speaker... 

New services, smarter audio processing (think about that room tuning feature, but more advanced), that sort of thing.  But I think your "it's just a wireless speaker" partly explains why I'm not worried about the old systems feeling immediately obsolete.  This isn't a smartphone that has a ton of computing demands placed upon it; it's an audio device.

[LeSheen]

Just read an updated statement from them on tweakers.net (a dutch tech news site). They will still receive security updates and updates if possible. No new features.

[Sauron]

On 1/22/2020 at 4:10 PM, Velcade said:

You can't expect companies to continue to support products indefinitely, that's insane.

But you could expect them to release the firmware source code so the community could support it. And to make sure that they maintain the basic functionality people paid for on purchase even after support ends - it's a speaker, why does it need to stop functioning as a speaker when it can no longer connect to sonos servers?

 

This is a combination of trash engineering (which unfortunately applies to most IoT) and lack of respect for their customers, all of which is enabled by hopelessly broken intellectual property laws.

[Velcade]

3 minutes ago, Sauron said:

But you could expect them to release the firmware source code so the community could support it. And to make sure that they maintain the basic functionality people paid for on purchase even after support ends - it's a speaker, why does it need to stop functioning as a speaker when it can no longer connect to sonos servers?

Did you read the release from Sonos?  They aren't disabling the speakers, they just won't receive new updates.  It'll work just as it does currently. 

[Blademaster91]

19 minutes ago, Velcade said:

Did you read the release from Sonos?  They aren't disabling the speakers, they just won't receive new updates.  It'll work just as it does currently. 

Until apps stop supporting the speaker, and a IOT device is usually enough of a security risk, one without updates is something I wouldn't want on my network.

[straight_stewie]

On 1/22/2020 at 9:19 AM, dangb9 said:

but I can still turn on my XP laptop and use it for its intended purpose

Eventually this won't be true if you either stop turning it on (capacitor degradation), or keep turning it on (heat degradation).

Or in other words, this isn't a valid argument against the point that @Velcade made when he said "when it's gone, it's gone", because, although your XP laptop currently works, it will fail, and the parts or software to fix it will no longer exist.

However, your point that "a speaker is a speaker and should still work as a speaker" is totally valid. This is one of the problems with IoT and smart devices. I have a Klipsch Tangent system that was bought new in 1990. I've replaced the head unit since then, but that was mostly due to physical damage that occurred during a move. The system still works fine, I'm literally listening to it as I type this. But, this is why you should always buy the not-smart version of things unless the products' "smart capabilities" are absolutely necessary for the product to be of any use.