Sonos: Still the best after all these years
I was an early adopter of Sonos. I fell in love with the system when I saw it at MacWorld in 2004 and purchased a two-room kit in 2005.
Sonos brought iPod-like ease of use and Apple-like singled minded focus to in-home multi-room digital music playback. It was plug and play, wireless, didn't require wiring of in-wall speakers or volume controls. It disrupted the market, just like the iPod The original Sonos controller had an iPod-like click wheel just like an iPod. When others entered the market and introduced - mostly buggy - video streaming, Sonos defiantly stuck with audio only streaming, just an iPod.
When we moved to a townhouse in 2006, my multi-room music needs evaporated since the only place to listen to music was through the big speakers attached to the amplifier by the TV. So I sold my Sonos and I'm sure it went to a good home.
After our move to a larger home 6 years later, I wanted to have multi-room music playback again. The kids are old enough to benefit and old enough to allow mummy and daddy to enjoy listening to the radio or music uninterrupted (well I can hope...) Six years is an eternity in the technology industry. HD-DVD, Blu-ray, SACD all came and pretty much went (how many Blu-ray disks does anyone actually buy?) Netflix now lives up to the "Net" in its name, with twice as many streaming customers as DVD subscribers. Every consumer electronics device seems to be Internet connected and streams content. Apple's AirPlay came on the scene and should have made Sonos redundant. Except it didn't. After 9 years, Sonos is still the best multi-zone audio streaming system out there.
1. Smart TVs, Blu-ray players, game consoles, streaming boxes, etc.
The only thing smart about Smart TVs is their marketing. Generally, they offer buggy apps and TV speakers. Yeah you can add better speakers and use clever things like HDMI ARC (Audio Return Channel), but a quick look at avsforum.com shows what a compatibility nightmare this is. Blu-ray players seem to have horribly slow UIs and the apps suffer from the same buggyness as the TVs. The exception is probably the players from Oppo but they start at $500. Game consoles and streaming boxes are a reasonable option but like to other two options, you're coupled to your TV.
Yup they're wireless and are a great portable solution - I personally have and love a Philips Fidelio speaker dock for the iPod, iPhone and iPad. But it isn't exactly a good multi-room solution and doesn't provide room-filling sound.
3. Standalone AirPlay Speakers
AirPlay is a great idea and it works quite well. Using AirPlay, you can transmit whatever you're doing on your iPhone, iPod, iPad or Mac to your Apple TV and see it on the screen and hear it through whatever is connected to your Apple TV. It is multi-room (or at least multi-AirPlay device).
Honestly, I figured I'd go AirPlay. I looked at the delicious Bowers and Wilkins A5 and A7 speakers. Beautiful industrial design, suitably solid and British to boot (but made in China). You get the A5 for a small space and the A7 for a larger one. I could just see them in my home. But because I research everything to death, I figured I'd take a look at Sonos' latest.
The Sonos Play:3 is a single speaker enclosure with built-in amplification, wireless connectivity and power supply. The Sonos Play:5 is the same thing but bigger. Yes it has more speakers and clever stuff inside but the bottom line is that you get the Play:3 for a small space like a kitchen and the Play:5 for a larger space like a living room.
Sonos was never inexpensive, but that was OK because it was pretty unique. The Play:3 is $300 and the Play:5 is $400. But the Bowers and Wilkins A5 is $500 and the A7 is $800! The Sonos does need a Sonos wireless bridge to make it work (it connects to your wired home network and creates the wireless mesh network that the Sonos devices use), but this is only $50. Both need a controller. Since AirPlay is an Apple technology, the controller would need to be a Mac, iPod touch, iPhone or iPad. Sonos adds PCs and Android devices to that list.
In operation, the two are subtly but radically different. First, AirPlay streams from your device. So let's say you want to listen to Spotify. With AirPlay, you run the Spotify app on your device and you then use AirPlay to stream it to your speaker. You're streaming twice, and twice over WiFi. That might not be important for one speaker but what if everyone in your home is using the same network? In that situation you can get stutters and you can get laggy controls. I hate stutters and laggy controls. Second, if you're doing all this through your iPhone and it rings, the music stops (and that just upsets Rihanna). Third, what if you to shoot some video of your kids rocking out? Yeah not so much because when you fire up the camera app, the audio stops streaming. Multi-room? It works but you're likely to compound the first issue above.
The Sonos approach is different. First, it creates its own network so it should not be susceptible to WiFi traffic and congestion (although ultimately all these wireless devices share the same sets of frequencies). Second, the Sonos players themselves stream from the music service (like Spotify); you just use your iOS or Android device to control the player. Third, if you want to use your iOS or Android device for something else, you can - the Sonos units keep doing what they were doing. Fourth, you can have multiple controllers: we have two iPads, two iPhones, and three Macs. They can all control the Sonos players in exactly the same way and share data about what is currently playing, the playlist, etc. Fifth, Sonos has done a phenomenal job of integrating various services. All the usual ones like Pandora and Spotify are there but so is a well integrated Internet radio service so that you can easily access favorite stations or shows. This is a huge usability win. Sixth, you can connect Sonos players together so you can cobble together a wireless stereo system with a subwoofer using two Play:3s and the Sonos Sub (it ain't cheap at $300 per Play:3 and $700 for the sub and I'd probably just do a Connect:Amp and some bookshelf speakers).
What about sound quality? Well I never did an A/B comparison between the B&Ws and the Sonos Plays. Heresy? Not really - look these beasties are for nice background music or radio listening. If I want audiophile listening room stereo imaging, I'll go to my wired system. But what I do want is clear, crisp, undistorted sound that doesn't break down when it gets loud. The Sonos fits the bill here and even if the B&Ws were to sound better, I don't think that outweighs the sheer usability of Sonos.
Now lest you think that I've abandoned AirPlay with all this Sonos love, I haven't. I use AirPlay through my Apple TV that is connected to my TV but in every other room, it is Sonos all the way.