Cant make multi-room speaker group with Amazon Alexa Echos on Netgear Nighthawk Mesh Wifi

[vitszy]

Hi there,

Piggybacking off this thread which was closed:

https://community.netgear.com/t5/Nighthawk-Wi-Fi-6-AX-Mesh/Netgear-mr60-mesh-Amazon-echo-issues/m-p/...

I have the exact same issue as described in thread above; I have multiple Echo speakers I'm trying to combine into a multi-room group to play music simultaneously, but as soon as I select one of the speakers in the app the other ones immediately get greyed out with a generic message 'network error: make sure all devices are on the same WiFi'. However the solution as suggested in the thread above did not work for me. 

My network setup is: 1x MR60 router, 1x MS60 satellite, and a AX1600 4-Stream WiFi 6 Mesh Extender.

I'm in IT and have an extensive technical background. I can guarantee the Echos are all on the same network. Nothing weird setup here, basically straight out of the box for the MR60/MS60/Extender. Single SSID.

I called Amazon support and we did a number of things trying to troubleshoot:
- Factory reset all Echos
- Ensured all firmware was up to date (both Echos and Netgear)
- Uninstalled/reinstalled Alexa app
- Tried from another Alexa app on different OS (Windows)
- Reboot all routers/extender/satellite
- Unplugged the MS60 and Extender so that all Echos were connected on the same Access Point (MR60)

No matter what we tried, as soon as I selected one device to put into the group, the rest just get greyed out. Super frustrating!

I've talked to other folks with Mesh networks and they've had no issues creating multi-room speaker groups on their Echos.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

[DarrenM]

Have you tested multiple of the echos connected to just the router to see if the same issue occurs this would tell us if it is an issue with the devices connected to satellites and extenders.

DarrenM

[shawnparks1969]

Former Netgear owner here. I have the same problem with my Asus Zen Mesh. All devices show online when trying to choose speakers, but when I click one of them, 1/2 of the devices go away. It might be a coincidence that only the speakers that are nearest to the first mesh router are present, and the ones that are closer to the other node in the mesh or not.

If I turn off the other node, I have better luck, but poor signal issues. And some songs will stop playing halfway through. I don’t know how it synchronize between devices, but I would assume there’s some sort of timing that is done periodically between the echoes. But I can barely make it through one song without a long delay on one speaker where I can hear it playing in another room, and then it just goes to the next song. Never reconnects. It’s infuriating. Still unresolved.

[vitszy]

So what finally got it working for me was actually going through Amazon support. After the initial call as described in my OP finished unresolved, the Amazon support guy said he would escalate up to next tier support. He said the next tier wouldn't be calling me, but to 'keep trying to setup multi room speakers over the next few days' because the engineer would likely be able to fix it for me remotely. Low and behold.. a few days later I tried to setup multi-room again, without having changed anything, and it worked.

I have no idea what the next tier support engineer did to my setup remotely, but whatever it was, it worked. So looks like something on Amazon end, they must have changed some setting somewhere??? Very strange.

[FURRYe38]

Glad they helped you get it working. Please mark your thread as solved so others will know. Be sure to save off a back up configuration to file for safe keeping. Saves time if a reset is needed.
https://kb.netgear.com/24231/How-do-I-back-up-the-router-configuration-settings-on-my-Nighthawk-rout...
Enjoy. 📡