SONOS Compatability with Orbi

[Gabbyrn]

 Is Orbi compatable with the SONOS mesh network? I have an extensive SONOS system throughout my house (7000 sq ft). It works flawlessly and I have wondered why a mesh network for a LAN application has not been available before now. If Orbi works like my SONOS system and is compatable, it will be a real game changer. 

[TheEther]

The underlying technical question is whether Orbi will support the spanning tree protocol (STP) because STP is what Sonos depends on.  Given that none of Netgear's other home networking products support it, it seems unlikely that Orbi will have it.  Hopefully, someone from Netgear will weigh in.

[Gabbyrn]

Just to clarify. I'm not interested in making my SONOS components run on the Orbi network. I just do  not want the two networks interfering with and causing issues with one another. I am hoping that they can coexist. I do not know enough about this to know if it should be a legitimate concern. 

[TheEther]

AFAIUI, Sonos components can use their own wireless connection to communicate.  It should not interfere with the Orbi's network any more than a neighboring Wi-Fi network would.  The only difference would be signal strength.  Provided the two channels used by Orbi and Sonos, respectively, are far enough apart, it should be fine.

[adamfox]

Any new info on this? I just hooked up my Orbi and having frequent droupouts on my Sonos now.

[DarrenM]

Hello adamfox

I would try changing wireless channels on the orbi it could be interfering with the channels the sonos is using.

DarrenM

[Alexto]

My Sonos keeps dropping out as well.    Did you end up finding a solution?    Help would be very much appreciated.

[dleute]

Anything new on this? I purchased both at the same time. I had a few days of flawless Sonos on my airport extreme before swapping in orbi.

But I don't think it is limited to Sonos. At least one satellite is dropping all connectivity periodically while a sonos is wired to it. I haven't been able to reproduce the problem at will or without sonos wired as nothing else is "constant use" so if it goes down, I don't know unless I happen to be connecting to a device on that orbi that can't move to another one.

However, Sonos may be working better in purely wireless mode with nothing wired to any Orbi. I'm still experimenting.

No matter what, if Orbi can't deal with Sonos, it's going back to the store. Sonos products are probably the best wireless devices I've ever purchased. I will go through dozens of wifi products before giving up Sonos.

--Derrek

[adamfox]

My Sonos speakers were setup to use the WiFi instead of a Bridge/Boost. Switching the 2.4GHz channel on the Orbi from auto to 6 seemed to have helped things.

[dleute]

I already switched orbi to 1 and sonos to 11 to guarantee clean wifi signal. I don't know if sonosnet is used at all when nothing is wired.

I don't think it is wifi though. I think it is due to the fact that I tried wiring at least one sonos device. So far with everything on wireless it has been working (knock on wood. it's only been a few hours).

I'm wondering if orbi has issues with the STP protocol used by Sonos when wired.

There is still evidence that at least one orbi satellite is periodically dropping all connections for a couple minutes. My Apple TV dissappears as does a few other things connected to that orbi.

--Derrek

[adamfox]

Could be wrong but i believe I read somewhere that Netgear routers don't support STP.

[dleute]

I read that as well. But they don't need to support it, they just need to not interfere with it.

It's possible something about the Orbi star topology and MU-MIMO router links does cause problems. That would be unfortunate.

I imagine since the orbi actually has 3 physical "switches" with traffic moving through 802.11ac between those switches it is a distinct possibility that STP creates problems.

If all orbi issues go away when Sonos is wifi only, I likely have my answer. We'll see. Then I need to decide if I'm moving to eero or google wifi.

--Derrek

[Alexto]

I've tried changing channels on the Orbi, but to no avail...     The problem can't be the WIFI coverage because the coverage throughout the whole house with the Orbi is FAN-TASTIC; every inch is covered at top speed.     The Sonos doesn't just cut out, the sound sometimes completely stops all together.    The strange thing is that the day I installed the Orbi, Sonos worked flawlessly. Then the next day, without having changed anything, the cutouts started...     I am extremely disappointed.

[dleute]

Is any sonos speaker at all using wired ethernet?

[Alexto]

No, none of the speakers are wired, because none of them are close to the router.

[Alexto]

BTW, connectivity is so bad that half the time the Sonos app doesn't even 'see' half of the speakers.

[dleute]

And you tried controlling the channels on both devices? Putting one of them on 1 and the other on 11 should help with that.

Are you using sonos Boost or Bridge?

[Alexto]

No, I don't use a Boost, so I don't believe I can change the Sonos channel.

[dleute]

Yeah, the sonosnet channel option is missing when all my speakers are using Wifi. It is normally on iOS: Settings > Advanced Settings > SonosNet Channel

Ah well.

Are all orbi units on the latest firmware update? Do you have multiple satellites?

[Alexto]

I only have one sattelite.     The main router is using the latest firmware (1.4.0.16).     I don't know about the Satellite firmware though because when I go to the Settings, it lists its firmware as 1.1.0.16, but under Status it is always suck on "Please wait a moment".     I tried logging out and back in, accesing it from both a computer and the phone, and the status is always stuck there.    I've even unplugged and re-plugged the sattelite, but no avail.   Has anyone else had this issue with the inability of upgrade the satellite firmware?  

I have to pairs of Sonos stereo speakers (total of 4 speakers) and incidentally, the two speakers closest to the satellite are the ones that I'm having trouble with.

 I wonder if this old (is it?) satellite firmware partly is to blame for my issue with Sonos.  

[dleute]

Ah, yep. I had this issue when I got my orbi. Current manufactured shipping units are not shipping with the current firmware. Worse than that, auto updates don't work on satellites with earlier firmwares (that's something that is fixed in a later firmware. So this process below should only need to be done once.).

To fix this you have to download the latest satellite firmware from netgear manually. should be here: https://www.netgear.com/support/product/RBK50?cid=wmt_netgear_organic#RBS50%20(Orbi%20Satellite)%20F... . You need to extract the image file out of the zip you download.

Then you need to connect to the satellite ip directly. You can find that on your orbi router home page under "attached devices". It should be under connected satellites.

Go to that ip directly in the browser and it will ask for orbi username and password. Same as the main one.

You can then use "firmware update" from the menu and select the image file extracted from the zip. This took several tries on one of my satellites complaining the process timed out.

Once you do all of this and it (finally) succeeds, it should be up to date and working. I would not be surprised if Sonos starts working after that. (I would also unplug power, leave out for 10 seconds and plug everything back in on All Orbi and Sonos units.

On the sonos front, when I swapped to the new wifi network, I had to re-add those speakers by plugging them in via ethernet and re-add them / run the wifi setup wizard again. It was really frustrating. Then I had to unplug them, move them back to their original location and they joined the orbi network fine after that.

I have still not had any issues with Sonos all day with just wifi.

[Alexto]

Wow, that advice was super helpful, thank you.    I had no idea!      This is the price us early adopters always end up paying...

[dleute]

Indeed. I will say that eero does not suffer from this "it's not updated" nonsense precisely because their cloud controls the update rollout.

But performance of a working Orbi beats a working eero in nearly all cases (haven't had my own eero, but all reports put orbi well ahead here). The cost of power/performance is usually ease of use/maintenance. Eero is stupid simple. And when it doesn't work, not much you can do about it.

--Derrek

[dleute]

FYI: Sonos went down again for me and it was because the Orbi satellite was down again.

This time there was no Sonos wired to the orbi. So I don't think that has anything to do with it at this point. Everything on that Orbi becomes unavailable and stays gone for several minutes.

Oh well. Back to the drawing board.

I hope I was able to help you with your problem! I may be sending this back soon and trying eero.

--Derrek

[Alexto]

Sorry you have to go back to the drawing board.    But here is something I can share with you.    I purchased the Eero system last week.   A few days later, I returned it, and purchased the Orbi instead.     I placed the Orbi main unit and satellite in the exact same locations as I had my two Eeeros.     The speed in the main room was the same for both systems (Eero and Orbi), BUT the Internet speed in the bedroom, where I had the Orbi satellite/Eeero second unit, was much slower with the Eero than with the Orbi (120 vs. 75 or so).

I haven't been able to update the firmware of the Satellite unit because I left yesterday on a multi-week trip, so I won't have an answer for a while as to whether the firmware update solves the issue with the Sonos sound cutouts.