Tag: Sonos

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos Sub Mini subwoofer filed with the FCC may signal a release is close

Sonos is teeing up for the launch of its new Ray soundbar, though its rumoured Sub Mini is catching attention. Having recently revealed its lineup of new products and systems, its upcoming Sub Mini subwoofer was discovered to be filed through the FCC.

The filing was discovered by Reddit user kz00. Protocol’s Janko Roettgers also noticed the filing surface online. As rumours and reports further pile on, there’s a notion that the Sub Mini exists and Sonos is testing it.

Last month, the first details of the entry-level wireless subwoofer came to the surface. Reports indicate that it holds the name ‘Sub Mini’ and it features a cylindrical design and a pill-shaped cutout in the middle.

As seen in the FFC filings, the cylindrical design appears to be true. The filings also seemingly confirm Sonos is testing the device in a setup with a “master device” that is the Sonos Beam speaker.

While the FFC filing seemingly confirms the existence of the Sub Mini, the big question regarding price remains. The Ray soundbar is just around the corner. The soundbar has an entry-level price point for those dipping their toes in home entertainment. Sonos may position the Sub Mini as a supplemental piece in that setup. As Sonos currently offers its Sub (Gen 3) for a premium $949 price, this could make the Sub Mini an attractive alternative.

Image credit: FCC

Via: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos launches Voice Control support for select speakers, voiced by Giancarlo Esposito

Sonos is finally launching its own Voice Control assistant. As previously reported, Sonos Voice Control is making its way to select speakers available under the Sonos banner. Those previously-released speakers that include a built-in microphone will receive support for the assistant via a software update.

At launch, Sonos Voice Control is available in U.S. English. However, Canadian users can access the personal assistant without much hassle. As with other Sonos devices, its setup is done through the Sonos app on iOS and Android. Here, Canadian users must set their language to U.S. English. A French version is in development for the end of the year. Though, there’s no word on the development of Canadian French support.

Once set up, the personal assistant can control music playback from a number of services. At launch, Sonos Voice Control supports Sonos Radio, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Pandora, and Deezer. There’s no current update on when or if support for Spotify, YouTube Music, etc. is on its way.

Using Sonos Voice Control is as simple as saying “Hey Sonos” to activate the feature. From there, users can ask the assistant to play artists, songs, and playlists. Pause and skip functionality is available as well as volume controls. The best part of all is that famed actor Giancarlo Esposito is the first to lend their voice to the assistant program. Best known for his work on Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, and Far Cry 6, Esposito’s voice responds to some commands. However, keep in mind that it has limits to its scope and responses.

Although the voice assistant requires a speaker with a built-in mic, the feature can control all speakers on your Sonos system. You can use the feature to start playing music in one room and transition to another as you walk through your home. Alternatively, you can raise the volume in the living room while lowering it in the kitchen.

Sonos makes it clear that privacy is at the forefront of Sonos Voice Control. Sonos states that no voice recordings are sent to the cloud or to the company. However, Sonos is running an optional beta program where users can have their requests uploaded in order better help with the optimization.

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos’ new affordable Sub Mini leaks ahead of official reveal

The new Sonos Sub Mini has leaked ahead of an official reveal from the company. This news comes off the heels of Sonos launching its new Ray soundbar, dedicated to home entertainment.

The first details of a Sonos-made entry-level wireless subwoofer come from a leak from The Verge, seen by 9to5Mac. Named the “Sub Mini,” the subwoofer supposedly features a cylindrical design and a pill-shaped cutout in the middle. The Verge created a render based on a picture seen by the outlet.

The dimensions of the Sonos Sub Mini are not yet known. However, given the “Mini” name, Sonos may be looking at developing a smaller, more compact device. On top of that, The Verge cannot nail down a possible price point for the Sub Mini either.

Last week, Sonos launched the Ray soundbar. Hitting the market, it’s the company’s most affordable soundbar and opts to provide solutions to those purchasing their very first soundbar. The Ray soundbar hit Canadian markets for a reasonable $349 with several interesting features. It is also compatible with Sonos rear surround speakers and subwoofers.

Sonos has a clear goal of catering to those building a home entertainment centre. Adding a subwoofer that doesn’t break the bank only deepens that narrative. The combination of a Sonos Ray and Sonos Sub Mini could be tantalizing for anymore moving away from using their TV speakers.

Currently, Sonos offers its Sub (Gen 3) for $949. It’s positioned as a premium subsystem and offers low frequencies. The Sonos Sub Mini will be offered at a much more affordable price upon launch.

Image credit: The Verge

Source: The Verge, Via: 9to5Mac

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos’ Roam speaker is now available in three new colours

Alongside the launch of its new Ray soundbar and the digital voice control assistant, Sonos also revealed new Sonos Roam colours.

This year it comes in Sunset (burnt orange), Olive (green) and Wave (a soft blue). All three colours match the Sonos branding really well to my eyes and they’re pretty exciting to see, since they, hopefully, represent more colourful Sonos speakers to come.

Back in 2018, the audio company released a limited run of colourful Sonos Play One speakers in collaboration with the design firm HAY. These looked awesome but since then Sonos products have been limited to simple black and whites.

The speaker starts at $229. The full review is available here.

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos officially steps into the digital voice assistant game

Sonos is always trying to cater to its users, and its new Sonos Voice Control seems to be the latest way the company aims to cement them in its smart speaker ecosystem.

Sonos’ Voice Control works as you’d expect. You can say “Hey Sonos” to a speaker and it allows you to control playback, volume and what rooms your audio is playing in. On Wi-Fi only, you can also ask the assistant to play specific tracks or playlists.

The feature that Sonos put the most hype behind at a recent press event in New York is the privacy-minded focus of its new voice control system. Each request is processed on the device, and Sonos says that your voice will never be recorded or sent away to be analyzed unless you opt-in to its Sonos Voice Control beta program.

Since the chip on the speaker does all the work, this means you can even use voice controls on Sonos’ Bluetooth-equipped speakers, including the Roam and Move. When on Bluetooth, users are limited to only being able to adjust volume, playback and skipping tracks, but it’s still nice to have the option.

It’s also important to note that processing the audio locally unlocks the ability to stack requests without using the “Hey Sonos” wake word. The company said that it listens longer for follow-ups than competitors since it’s not sending its audio recording to the cloud.

In an interesting twist, the speaker is voiced by Giancarlo Esposito of Breaking Bad, Do the right thing and, more recently, Far Cry 6 fame. His voice suits the “laid back record-loving vibe” that Sonos has aligned itself with better than I expected, but it’s only a small part of the story behind the new assistant.

Sonos has developed this new tech with the help of the Snips.ai — a french voice assistant startup that the audio company acquired back in 2019. During my time at the event, Sonos Voice Control worked well and responded quickly. A representative from the company told me that it should run smoothly on all Sonos devices with microphones that have been released since 2017. However, I was unable to test the voice-activated assistant out myself, so I’ll need to wait until it launches on June 1st to put it through its paces.

The assistant is only launching in U.S. English, so anyone wanting to try it out will need to set their language to that. A French version is releasing by the end of the year since Snips is a Parisian company. Sonos has no information regarding Canadian French language support.

The most significant issue with Sonos Voice Control is that it doesn’t support Spotify or YouTube Music at launch. Hopefully, these features will release soon, but Sonos had no dates to share at the event.

When I take a step back and survey this new assistant, I’m still a little skeptical. Sure, it’s great that it’s private and no one is listening to me yell awkwardly at an inanimate speaker, but only time will tell how many people actually go out of their way to use it. Sonos says that when it surveyed its users, privacy concerns were the number one thing stopping people from using voice assistants on their speakers. Ideally, this new assistant will solve that problem for those people.

An interesting decision regarding Voice Control is that it’s not on by default. Users will need to enter the Sonos app’s setting to enable it. Since this has to be done manually, I’m not sure people will care enough to turn it on.

In a sense, it seems like Sonos is just setting the stage with Sonos Voice Controls, and that more cooler features are coming in the future. It would also be great to see the company add different voice types to its assistant down the line.

Test phrases

Below are some phrases Sonos shared that work to control the new voice control assistant:

  • Hey Sonos, play Brittany Howard very quietly.
  • Hey Sonos, stop playing in the kitchen and play in the living room instead.
  • Hey Sonos, volume up in the bedroom only.
  • Hey Sonos, play something I like.
  • Hey Sonos, play SolarSystem on Sonos Radio.
  • Hey Sonos, what’s playing?
  • Hey Sonos, louder…louder.
  • Hey Sonos, play a little quieter.
  • Hey Sonos, skip.
  • Hey Sonos Play…volume up.
  • Hey Sonos, group the living room and family room.
  • Hey Sonos, what’s my battery level (Roam and Move only).
  • Hey Sonos, play here instead.
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Mobile Syrup

Sonos Ray is the company’s new $350 Soundbar

The new Sonos Ray is set to be a massive success for Sonos.

Sonos director, Casey Clemens told MobileSyrup that around half of listening on Sonos products is done while watching content on a TV. This statistic shows just how vital the home theatre business has become for the company.

Now that the Ray is releasing with a price point low enough to appeal to a wider market ($350 CAD), it will be exciting to see if it takes off as Sonos predicts and brings more people into the company’s smart speaker ecosystem.

The Ray is a three-channel soundbar designed to be someone’s first Sonos product or a way for existing Sonos users to outfit a second TV with a soundbar that’s cheaper than the Beam Gen 2 ($560 CAD). During my hands-on time with the device, it sounded powerful enough and offered that classic richness you get from Sonos speakers. That said, it didn’t sound  as detailed as the Sonos Beam to me.

To help make the soundbar as immersive as possible, Sonos uses new split waveguides to help direct sound equally out from the TV in a wide swath. In my brief tests, the Ray seemed to offer better stereo separation than expected, but the balance of the sound weighs vocals slightly higher than bass and other noises. This will likely be pleasing to people watching content at night, but it didn’t seem to offer the crisp balance you get from more expensive Sonos speakers. All that being said, I didn’t get to spend much time testing, so this could all change when I test it on my own.

Fun features

As with all Sonos speakers, the Ray works with ‘Trueplay,’ so you can tune it to fit whatever room it’s in as cleanly as possible. Other sound-based software found in Sonos soundbars is offered with the Ray too. This includes ‘Night sound,’ which balances all the sounds so loud noises don’t wake anyone else up in your home and ‘Speech enhancement.’

One interesting thing to note is that since the Ray isn’t Atmos-equipped, it can be placed into a TV stand since there are no upward-firing speakers. It’s also relatively small, so most people shouldn’t have a problem integrating it into their home theatre setup. The Ray will be available in the standard Sonos ‘Black’ and ‘White’ colours.

The speaker will hit the global market on June 7th for $350.

Specs

  • Four Class-D digital amplifiers
  • Two tweeters with split waveguides
  • Two full-range mid woofers
  • Bass reflex system
  • Adjustable EQ in the Sonos app
  • Works with Sonos rear surround speakers/subwoofer
  • Optical audio only
  • Ethernet jack
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Mobile Syrup

Sonos reportedly plans to reveal its own voice assistant soon

It looks like Sonos could reveal its long-rumoured voice assistant in the coming weeks. This assistant will reportedly be called Sonos Voice and will offer voice control for music playback across several of the company’s smart speakers.

According to The Verge, Sonos Voice will roll out in the U.S. on June 1st as part of a software update. The feature will reportedly arrive in other countries later.

Sonos’ smart speakers and soundbars that support its S2 platform will gain the voice assistant, including the rumoured Sonos Ray soundbar.

The Verge indicates that Sonos Voice will work with Apple Music, Amazon Music, Pandora, Deezer and Sonos’s own Radio app. Spotify and Google’s YouTube Music will not be available at launch, according to the report.

Further, the report says that Sonos will not record user audio commands or relay them to the cloud. “Hey Sonos” will be the wake word for Sonos Voice Control, and the company claims that its assistant will work quicker than competitors like Alexa and Google Assistant.

It’s important to note that several of Sonos’ current speakers, including the popular Sonos One, support both Google Assistant and Alexa.

It makes sense that Google’s YouTube Music won’t be available considering the company sued Google for patent infringement back in 2020.

Source: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos drops mic from Roam speaker and $30 from price

Sonos has released a new version of its ultra-portable Roam speaker called the Roam SL. This version drops the microphone and has a lower price.

In Canada, the Roam SL starts at $199, which is $30 less than the fully equipped Roam.

This is a decent deal, but after spending more time with the regular Roam, it stopped working randomly one day. I also found the single multi-use button on the back of the device confusing and struggled every time I needed to go from Wi-Fi to Bluetooth.

I still find myself using my Sonos Move way more than the Roam since taking the Roam out to use as a speaker on a hike or something was always a test in frustration. My older and cheaper UE Wonderboom 2 has been a much more reliable device, even if the Roam does sound a bit better.

If you are really interested in getting a Sonos Roam SL, you can pre-order it today from Sonos’ website for $200 and it will ship on March 15th.

Image credit: Sonos

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Mobile Syrup

How Android 12 blocks group speaker volume control for Pixels, but not Android

Earlier this year, the International Trade Commission (ITC) handed down a ruling in the patent dispute between Sonos and Google. The ITC sided with Sonos, leading Google to make several changes to Nest and Home speakers.

One such change involved removing the ability for people to adjust the volume of a group of Google speakers using the physical volume buttons or rocker on their smartphone. An in-depth analysis of the code behind this change from Esper’s Senior Technical Editor Mishaal Rahman showcases how Google made the adjustment and, interestingly, how the impacts will be worse for Pixel users.

The post is well worth the read, but it is also quite technical. I’ll do my best to simplify below, but if you want to full details, check out the blog post here.

Changing the logic behind volume adjustments

To start, Google began changing how the volume rocker on your smartphone interacts with its smart home speakers when developing Android 12 — developers first discovered the change in September with the release of Android 12 Beta 5. Before the change, Android would check whether media playback was local (on-device) or remote (happening on an external device, such as a Cast-enabled speaker). Depending on the result of that check, Android would automatically adjust volume accordingly when users pressed the buttons on their phone.

Android 12 broke that check, effectively disabling the ability to adjust media volume for remote devices. Shortly after the Beta 5 release, a Google developer hinted that the change was related to an unspecified “legal issue.” Although it wasn’t clarified, that likely referred to the Sonos patent dispute.

According to Rahman, Android 12 release 26 (a.k.a. the January 2022 patch that started hitting Pixel devices this month) introduced new logic to handle local/remote volume control. Devices on this version of Android will check three conditions to decide whether to allow volume adjustments for remote settings:

  1. Whether the active media session uses local playback.
  2. If the flag ‘ config_volumeAdjustmentForRemoteGroupSessions’ is set to true.
  3. If the list of routing sessions for the app contains a single route (apart from the system routing session).

The way it’s set up, if the first or second condition is met, then Android doesn’t check condition three. If both of those conditions fail, then Android checks condition three. This is where things get really interesting.

Android can still change group speaker volume — Pixels can’t

Rahman found that the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) defines the second condition as true. (AOSP, for those not familiar, is the open-source foundation of the mobile OS — most Android smartphones use AOSP plus an assortment of other software like Google Play Services and changes from manufacturers to deliver the user experience you’re used to.) That means Android allows users to adjust the volume of remote media session on a group of speakers by default.

However, Pixel phones with the latest Android update still don’t let users adjust the volume of speaker groups using the physical volume keys. Rahman discovered that on Pixel phones, that second condition is set to false, effectively blocking volume control for remote sessions on groups of speakers. Plus, that means other Android phone makers could allow group speaker management if they want to:

“While the first patch appears to have been more of a “band aid,” the second patch seems tailored to allow Google to ship Pixel phones without the ability to control the volume of remote speaker group sessions. But it also leaves an easy way for OEMs to ship their own devices with the feature enabled.”

Finally, Rahman notes that the new volume behaviour is also present in the Android 12L beta. He outlines a way for users to override that setting, manually enabling group speaker volume control on Pixel phones, but it’s a technical process that requires superuser access.

Despite the complexity of the code, it seems like a simple way for Google to side-step legal ramifications by disabling group speaker volume control for Pixel phones while simultaneously keeping the feature available for Android manufacturers. That said, it sucks for Pixel users who, for now, won’t be able to change the volume on groups of speakers using their smartphone’s volume rocker.

Source: Esper Via: Android Police

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Mobile Syrup

Sonos + Ikea Symfonisk gets minor second-gen refresh

The Sonos + Ikea Symfonisk bookshelf speaker got a small second-generation update with faster processing, reduced standby power draw and more.

As reported by The Verge, tech website Tweakers spotted the refreshed speaker on sale in the Netherlands. The new speaker will presumably become available in other markets as well, although at the time of writing Ikea still had the first-gen Symfonisk on its website.

As for what’s actually different? Well, not a lot.

The second-gen Symfonisk sports a nearly identical design, compatibility with Sonos’ speaker network, and support for Apple AirPlay 2. Most of what’s new is internal: a faster processor, more memory and as mentioned up top, reduced power consumption when in standby mode.

As an aside, Sonos recently detailed plans to make future products more efficient and repairable, part of a larger effort to make itself more sustainable. One of the company’s goals was to reduce the power consumed by its speakers in standby mode. It’s not clear if the change to the Symfonisk speaker is part of that goal — regardless, reducing energy consumption is always welcome.

Left: Second-gen Symfonisk buttons | Right: original Symfonisk buttons

Externally, Ikea made a few changes too. There’s a longer power cord now, which should help people who want to use the speaker in a place that’s far from an outlet. The speaker also has slightly different button placement on the front, going from ‘volume down/play/volume up’ on the first-gen to ‘volume down / volume up / play’ on the second-gen.

Beyond that, there don’t appear to be any other differences. It makes sense that Ikea and Sonos aren’t messing with the formula — the original Symfonisk speaker was a fairly great option with decent value. The second-gen speaker on the Dutch Ikea website still comes in black or white and is priced at €99.95 (about $143.60 CAD), so it should cost about the same as the current Symfonisk (which goes for $139.99 in Canada right now).

Those interested can learn more about the original Symfonisk speaker here.

Images credit: Ikea

Source: Ikea Via: Tweakers, The Verge