Sonos - why do you need a router?

mattjax05

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I thought Sonoses use their own mesh network but I read everywhere that they need a router to assign IP addresses. Surely this is no different to say a Squeezebox network? Or once the IP addresses are assigned do they all talk to each other without the router as a middle man? In which case at this point you could remove the router from the network? I'm struggling here........
 

manicm

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As far as I understand, Sonos needs the router for updates, Internet radio etc. Its mesh network is for communication between the Zone players and their Zonebridges which extends its network for multiroom application.
 
There is no way to have the wireless of the ZonePlayer/ZoneBridge communicate with the wireless of your router, so there has to be a bridge of some sort, whether it is the ZoneBridge/ZonePlayer, a 3rd party bridge, or something like the Ethernet over Power devices.

If the Sonos doesn't communicate with your router's wi-fi, it cannot access the songs on your PC / NAS drive.
 

mattjax05

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But I read on here that each player is assigned an IP address from the router.

So are you saying no router is required for this system to work?
 

mattjax05

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bigboss:

There is no way to have the wireless of the ZonePlayer/ZoneBridge communicate with the wireless of your router, so there has to be a bridge of some sort, whether it is the ZoneBridge/ZonePlayer, a 3rd party bridge, or something like the Ethernet over Power devices.

If the Sonos doesn't communicate with your router's wi-fi, it cannot access the songs on your PC / NAS drive.

Ok so I now know you need the router for access to music - but how do the players make that initial link to each other and communicate from thereon, is it via the router?
 
Multiple ZonePlayers in a single household will connect to each other using SonosNet a proprietary peer-to-peer synchronous mesh network, using AES encryption. This network, known as SonosNet, allows music to be played simultaneously in separate zones. A single ZonePlayer or ZoneBridge must be wired to a network for access to music sources. SonosNet 2.0 integrate the both MIMO on 802.11N hardware, providing a more robust connection.
 

The_Lhc

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mattjax05:bigboss:There is no way to have the wireless of the ZonePlayer/ZoneBridge communicate with the wireless of your router, so there has to be a bridge of some sort, whether it is the ZoneBridge/ZonePlayer, a 3rd party bridge, or something like the Ethernet over Power devices.

If the Sonos doesn't communicate with your router's wi-fi, it cannot access the songs on your PC / NAS drive.

Ok so I now know you need the router for access to music - but how do the players make that initial link to each other and communicate from thereon, is it via the router?

Right, Sonos uses its own wireless mesh network for communication between Sonos devices, however they still need to access your own network to a) access the internet and b) as bigboss said, to access any stored music you have on your own network, therefore they must have IP addresses that relate to your home network. The usual setup is that one Sonos device must be wired to the router, this provides the physical connection to your network (it IS possible to do this wirelessly in fact, however it's not a configuration supported by Sonos so I've never tried it and may well lead to bandwidth issues), it is through this wired connection that the rest of your Sonos devices will acquire their own IP addresses and all data (ie music or firmware updates) will pass through this wired connection.

Each Sonos device acts as bridge or extension to your own network, any device you connect to the network ports on the Zoneplayers will be able to acquire an IP address from your router (Sonos devices do not have DHCP built in, hence the requirement to get IP addresses from the router), so you could connect your NAS to one of the Zoneplayers if it's more convenient. In fact it IS possible to do away with the router, if you have a PC that has DHCP running on it and can route connections to your external internet connection (if you had a mobile dongle or basic ADSL modem for example), you could connect one Sonos device directly to the PC and then the others could connect wirelessly and you could plug other devices (such as a NAS or even printer) into the Zoneplayers to allow them to access the PC. In reality all you've done here is swap a hardware router for a software one running on the PC.
 

mattjax05

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the_lhc:mattjax05:bigboss:There is no way to have the wireless of the ZonePlayer/ZoneBridge communicate with the wireless of your router, so there has to be a bridge of some sort, whether it is the ZoneBridge/ZonePlayer, a 3rd party bridge, or something like the Ethernet over Power devices.

If the Sonos doesn't communicate with your router's wi-fi, it cannot access the songs on your PC / NAS drive.

Ok so I now know you need the router for access to music - but how do the players make that initial link to each other and communicate from thereon, is it via the router?

Right, Sonos uses its own wireless mesh network for communication between Sonos devices, however they still need to access your own network to a) access the internet and b) as bigboss said, to access any stored music you have on your own network, therefore they must have IP addresses that relate to your home network. The usual setup is that one Sonos device must be wired to the router, this provides the physical connection to your network (it IS possible to do this wirelessly in fact, however it's not a configuration supported by Sonos so I've never tried it and may well lead to bandwidth issues), it is through this wired connection that the rest of your Sonos devices will acquire their own IP addresses and all data (ie music or firmware updates) will pass through this wired connection.

Each Sonos device acts as bridge or extension to your own network, any device you connect to the network ports on the Zoneplayers will be able to acquire an IP address from your router (Sonos devices do not have DHCP built in, hence the requirement to get IP addresses from the router), so you could connect your NAS to one of the Zoneplayers if it's more convenient. In fact it IS possible to do away with the router, if you have a PC that has DHCP running on it and can route connections to your external internet connection (if you had a mobile dongle or basic ADSL modem for example), you could connect one Sonos device directly to the PC and then the others could connect wirelessly and you could plug other devices (such as a NAS or even printer) into the Zoneplayers to allow them to access the PC. In reality all you've done here is swap a hardware router for a software one running on the PC.

I'm confused as to why Sonos uses its own mesh network but still requires a router for the mesh to work! Why can't you link all the Sonos gear together wirelessly without a router and add a NAS to one of the Sonos boxes and away you go. I can't see the difference between this system and say a Squeezebox setup - which also needs a router.
 

The_Lhc

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I told you, without a router you can't get from the Sonos devices to anything else, ie the internet, or your stored music.

It's NOT the same as squeezebox, that uses the router for EVERYTHING. Sonos uses its own mesh network for communication amongst the Sonos devices, you could disable the wireless network on your router and Sonos would still work because it ISN'T using the router's wireless network, that isn't the case for Squeezebox. That means your Squeezebox network is limited by the range of your own router. That doesn't happen with Sonos because every additional Zoneplayer extends the network further and further. Having its own mesh network also means you can run up to 32 Zoneplayers AND up to 32 controllers without suffering any breakdown in transmission, any normal home router will collapse under the strain of not many more than 4 Squeezeboxes.

The point of Sonos is that it just works, this is achieved by having the Sonos only doing what it needs to. If you wanted to run without a router you'd need something to hand out IP addresses, you couldn't have all the Sonos devices doing that because they'd clash, so you'd have to designate one to do it, that's additional setup malarkey that likely most users wouldn't understand, as things are now you pretty much just plug them in and they work. Additional requirements like this would also push the cost up further and there's plenty of people that think Sonos is quite expensive enough as it is.
 

mattjax05

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Thank you for your comments. So once the router dishes out IP addresses the music on the nas (or whatever HDD is connected to the existing network) then flows through the Sonos network, if this is the case I understand it now. Do the Sonos devices need IP addresses from the router for its own network or for the Sonos devices to access the music off the existing network or both?
 

The_Lhc

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mattjax05: Do the Sonos devices need IP addresses from the router for its own network or for the Sonos devices to access the music off the existing network or both?

Now you're asking! I believe it's both, the mesh network is simply the transport, I don't think Sonos have gone to the trouble of developing their own networking protocol as well, I can't see it would be worth the effort to be honest.
 

Zarn_Smith

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the_lhc:

That doesn't happen with Sonos because every additional Zoneplayer extends the network further and further. Having its own mesh network also means you can run up to 32 Zoneplayers AND up to 32 controllers without suffering any breakdown in transmission, any normal home router will collapse under the strain of not many more than 4 Squeezeboxes.

I think you meant something different... any home wireless network will collapse under the strain of not many more than 4 stacked wireless bridges...

4 squeezeboxes wouldn't do anything to a wireless N network, even if they were playing uncompressed WAVs.
 
A

Anonymous

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Have read this debate and I'm just wondering if there is there a major problem or something with you having to connect a Sonos BR100 zonebridge or a Sonos Zoneplayer to your router?. If the router is in a room where you want Sonos music then just ethernet cable the zoneplayer in that room be it a ZP90, ZP120 or S5. If it isnt then also buy the BR100 at £79. Sonos is a great investment in my opinion as Sonos release new software updates like Sonosnet v3.2 released globally 2 days ago and you get new Sonos system and music features for no extra cost!
 

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