I think you are not correct on this point. You can't imagine the number of high end multiroom systems where Sonos is used for audio. It's an smart choice, as it's really flexible (you can connect directly a pair of Beolab to a Sonos Zone player and get a wonderful audio quality, Sonos DAC are not bad), and it's based on ethernet, so it allows huge installation where cheap competitors sells the dream of having only a wireless audio network (wireless Sonos is not a wonderful performer too, as is Beolink Wireless).

As the Sonos Protocol is based on a simple ethernet language, there are even companies who have developped gateways between home automation and Sonos (it should remember you something...)

BUT Beosound 5 Encore has some other refinements, like the ability to play HD tracks (it has to be proven, but if it's not the case it would be a huge mistake), or MOTS, which is a really clever solution for huge music libraries. What Sonos has and Beosound 5 Encore won't have (never, I think) is Deezer, Last.fm and Spotify. Later, I hope that the Beosound 5 (Encore) will get the same kind of iPad interface as Sonos. Why? Just because it's good to benefit of the two kinds of interfaces : linear interface for the Beosound 5 (allowing to browse the library like a stream of music), and "object oriented" interface, with a search field for the ipad app, allowing to create a specific party playlist, for instance.
To make a long story short : Beosound 5 interface is ideal when you don't know what you want to listen to, Sonos iPad interface (or Kaeidescape, if you're tempted to spend high) is perfect when you know what you want to listen to. Having both would just be perfect. I hope B&O has understood that. I don't want a Beosound 5 interface "copy" on their iPad app.

Of course, there will always be a kind of customers that will never take a look at Sonos, just because "it's too cheap to be good". But the comparison really makes sense, it's clearly not a Ferrari vs Fiat comparison. If you think of cars, see it as a Tesla Roadster (the new competitor from the silicon valley with no image but a great product) vs Porsche GT3 (the good old classic which has a high image value but is challenged in innovations...). Both can go from 0 to 100km/h in 3,7s 😐

mbee wrote:

I think you are not correct on this point. You can't imagine the number of high end multiroom systems where Sonos is used for audio. It's an smart choice, as it's really flexible (you can connect directly a pair of Beolab to a Sonos Zone player and get a wonderful audio quality, Sonos DAC are not bad), and it's based on ethernet, so it allows huge installation where cheap competitors sells the dream of having only a wireless audio network (wireless Sonos is not a wonderful performer too, as is Beolink Wireless).

As the Sonos Protocol is based on a simple ethernet language, there are even companies who have developped gateways between home automation and Sonos (it should remember you something...)

BUT Beosound 5 Encore has some other refinements, like the ability to play HD tracks (it has to be proven, but if it's not the case it would be a huge mistake), or MOTS, which is a really clever solution for huge music libraries. What Sonos has and Beosound 5 Encore won't have (never, I think) is Deezer, Last.fm and Spotify. Later, I hope that the Beosound 5 (Encore) will get the same kind of iPad interface as Sonos. Why? Just because it's good to benefit of the two kinds of interfaces : linear interface for the Beosound 5 (allowing to browse the library like a stream of music), and "object oriented" interface, with a search field for the ipad app, allowing to create a specific party playlist, for instance.
To make a long story short : Beosound 5 interface is ideal when you don't know what you want to listen to, Sonos iPad interface (or Kaeidescape, if you're tempted to spend high) is perfect when you know what you want to listen to. Having both would just be perfect. I hope B&O has understood that. I don't want a Beosound 5 interface "copy" on their iPad app.

Of course, there will always be a kind of customers that will never take a look at Sonos, just because "it's too cheap to be good". But the comparison really makes sense, it's clearly not a Ferrari vs Fiat comparison. If you think of cars, see it as a Tesla Roadster (the new competitor from the silicon valley with no image but a great product) vs Porsche GT3 (the good old classic which has a high image value but is challenged in innovations...). Both can go from 0 to 100km/h in 3,7s 😐

I respect your opinion. Since you mention Kaleidoscope I agree for me the Apple TV is way cheaper and almost better than Kaleidoscope.

With the Sonos VS. Encore the thing is not that easy. The sonos is probably a few steps ahead in terms of technology and more affordable but it is awfully plasticky and its design is not going to win any contest for sure (honestly I find it just plain horrible). In the other hand with the BS5/Encore you can see the quality of the materials, no plastic here just stainless steel and glass, the interface is superb and MOTS is awesome. In terms of price is not affordable but is not that terribly expensive.

Let's hope B&O catchs up a little in the technology department, specially in the iTunes integration and in my opinion the Encore is a winner.

You're correct about the materials and finish of B&O... As long as there is no dust behind the Beosound 5 glass 🙂 (just kidding)

But the "ugly plasticky Sonos" is another philosophy : you just hide it on your cupboard. I NEVER see my Sonos. No problem with remote as it's only controlled over network (wifi). The ONLY thing that I see in my Sonos-ed house is a Beovision in the living room with some beautiful Beolabs, and a Wonderful pair of Beolab 8000 in my bedroom. That's it, nothing more. Plastic box? Never seen any! (you can say that the Sonos interface on iPad is not really beautiful, I would have to agree, but I'm not a big fan of the Beosound 5 "blue circle and laser" interface too).
We would see which philosophy will be the long-term winner, but to my mind (and although I'm a big fan of hifi objects like Beosounds, I've made the jump), the hifi as an object is dead. Music is dematerialised, you only see speakers (beautiful beolabs, or invisible Beovox) in your house, no source.

The source is anywhere, or everywhere : it can be a NAS, it can be a blu-ray, it can be the iPhone in my pocket, or the iPhone of one of my friend during a party, it can be music that I don't own on Spotify/Deezer/Whatever, I don't care, I don't care about materials, there is no material anymore. I just want to listen to something I like (here is the genius of MOTS!), with the most natural interface.

My hifi doesn't exist anymore, music is naturally flowing in my house!

I do not like any of the Ipod/Ipad remote solutions I have seen so far.

I think the BS5 has a lot of potential, I do spend a lot of attention to how I can select my music. Mots and Genius are just a piece of the puzzle.

What good does cover art if it loads sluggish on a remote? I would but into the concept of using the BS5 for music selection but it has to be much better what I can do through a crappy 2 way remote.

Also, the player needs to integrate into Itunes and it needs to behave just like any other MP3 player. No gaps in the middle of life recordings.

Sometimes I think the Danish product designers and testes are too polite, they should just tell the engineers to eff off, give them a run for their money just like they did when the BS9000 was envisioned.

mbee wrote:

You're correct about the materials and finish of B&O... As long as there is no dust behind the Beosound 5 glass 🙂 (just kidding)

But the "ugly plasticky Sonos" is another philosophy : you just hide it on your cupboard. I NEVER see my Sonos. No problem with remote as it's only controlled over network (wifi). The ONLY thing that I see in my Sonos-ed house is a Beovision in the living room with some beautiful Beolabs, and a Wonderful pair of Beolab 8000 in my bedroom. That's it, nothing more. Plastic box? Never seen any! (you can say that the Sonos interface on iPad is not really beautiful, I would have to agree, but I'm not a big fan of the Beosound 5 "blue circle and laser" interface too).
We would see which philosophy will be the long-term winner, but to my mind (and although I'm a big fan of hifi objects like Beosounds, I've made the jump), the hifi as an object is dead. Music is dematerialised, you only see speakers (beautiful beolabs, or invisible Beovox) in your house, no source.

The source is anywhere, or everywhere : it can be a NAS, it can be a blu-ray, it can be the iPhone in my pocket, or the iPhone of one of my friend during a party, it can be music that I don't own on Spotify/Deezer/Whatever, I don't care, I don't care about materials, there is no material anymore. I just want to listen to something I like (here is the genius of MOTS!), with the most natural interface.

My hifi doesn't exist anymore, music is naturally flowing in my house!

mbee,

that is something I have been thinking about this quite a lot, much as i think BS5 is very good looking hi fi, i have sonos, ipad, iphone and is very good at controlling music to flow (as you say), it makes B+O hi-fi almost redundant. would be more cost effective to buy loudspeakers!

I am glad that I am not the only one to think like this.

regards

Vince

vlohjr1 wrote:

it makes B+O hi-fi almost redundant. would be more cost effective to buy loudspeakers

that is exactly the conversation we had at home today !

can you tell the difference between a 3,000 and a 6,000 HiFi ? by how much ?

can you tell the difference between a 3,000 and a 6,000 speaker ? by how much ?

so spending the money on a speaker seems to be better price performance !

A question for those using Sonos: how do you get around the poor sound quality? I'm a Sonos dealer, but have wound up taking several systems back because people aren't satisfied with the sound. It seems fine for low volume background music, but it's unacceptable as hi-fi. Perhaps users of Sonos don't do much active listening?

elephant wrote:

so spending the money on a speaker seems to be better price performance !

but if you have excellent speakers with a poor system, you will end with poor sound quality.  Good speakers can't improve poor sound input! They reproduce the sound the best they can

That's quite After a blind test (active listening at different volume, from "normal" to high) between Sonos and CD (Beosound 2300), nobody has been able to tell the difference. I've tested that with Sonos (ZP90) directly connected (via line in) to Beolabs, and via Sonos connected to a Beosound and then to the Beolabs, again, no difference. Test speakers were Beolab 8000 and Beolab 3. Testers were me and my girlfriend, and a bunch of "audiophile fanatics" : NAIM, NAD, MERIDIAN, B&W and LINN customers (the kind of people that should never have listen to my system... But There has been some parties hosted in my living room where Beolab 3s proved that they were far better than expected by this kind of customers).

Maybe the sound quality of a Sonos system can be deteriorated by a bad mains (that's an obvious reason, Sonos doesn't have the kind of super-continuous power adaptor with huge capacities that we find on true-hifi gear, so the mains has to be of a good quality). Or it's just the "plasticky box" look of the Sonos that makes people want to change it because "the sound is horrible".

Or maybe it's just because your customers thought that giving poor 128kbit/s mp3.ru files would sound good on a Sonos. Sonos is not magic. My blind test was done only with lossless files.

Now for those who don't like the iPad-only interface (iPhone interface is far worse) of Sonos, I have to agree that for volume control and standard commands, I would like to be able to control the "full Sonos" room more directly. Note that on the Sonos controller for Android, the volume buttons of your Android phone controls directly the Sonos : better. And I'm hoping that with the Beo6 I will be able to programm wifi commands to directly control the Sonos. B&O should just release a new CT Tool that allows to program wifi HTTP commands... Wait & see. But for MOTS and HD Tracks support, B&O still has the lead.