Sonos vs Bose

[mickylall]

Sorry to hijack your thread OP but coincidentally my old Bose soundDock died today so I need to find a replacement and am considering Sonos.

However, I've never used a wireless system before - my Bose was simply an iPod dock. I'd appreciate any advice guys.

You put the Sonos app on your phone or tablet, my music is stored on a WDMycloud hard drive, no music on my phone. The app works great allowing you to create instant playlists plus I think there are about 120,000 radio stations on the app you just type in what music you like - 80's, 90's etc and it picks out the stations that suit you
I started with a three which is fine and fills a room no problem but then I got a five and that's a large step up in sound quality.I've also got 2 ones upstairs that sound fantastic when you pair them
I looked at all the alternatives but I'm glad I chose Sonos purely because the app is so great

[Rocket Man]

You put the Sonos app on your phone or tablet, my music is stored on a WDMycloud hard drive, no music on my phone. The app works great allowing you to create instant playlists plus I think there are about 120,000 radio stations on the app you just type in what music you like - 80's, 90's etc and it picks out the stations that suit you
I started with a three which is fine and fills a room no problem but then I got a five and that's a large step up in sound quality.I've also got 2 ones upstairs that sound fantastic when you pair them
I looked at all the alternatives but I'm glad I chose Sonos purely because the app is so great

Thanks, very helpful.

Sorry if these are stupid questions but do I just need to buy the Sonos speaker or do I also need a boost/bridge?

Also, I'm assuming that I'd be able to access the iTunes library on my windows 10 laptop?

As I am a technophobe this all sounds like wizardry to me at the moment!

[mickylall]

Yup, you need a bridge to plug into your router.I'm a complete techno buffoon but had it all up and running in about 10 minutes.I've never used itunes with Sonos so can't help there but before I bought the seperate hard drive it was running through an old Windows laptop no problem

[Phil Lee]

Yup, you need a bridge to plug into your router.I'm a complete techno buffoon but had it all up and running in about 10 minutes.I've never used itunes with Sonos so can't help there but before I bought the seperate hard drive it was running through an old Windows laptop no problem

You don't need the bridge anymore. You can set the Sonos up to connect directly to the WiFi network. The Bridge can help if WiFi is poor where your Sonos is.

[mickylall]

You don't need the bridge anymore. You can set the Sonos up to connect directly to the WiFi network. The Bridge can help if WiFi is poor where your Sonos is.

Never knew that, cheers

[dougair]

Thanks, very helpful.

Sorry if these are stupid questions but do I just need to buy the Sonos speaker or do I also need a boost/bridge?

Also, I'm assuming that I'd be able to access the iTunes library on my windows 10 laptop?

As I am a technophobe this all sounds like wizardry to me at the moment!

You just need the speaker. I use the iTunes on my phone along with Apple Music via the Sonos app so not sure about the laptop question.

[Fords]

I use a bose solo 15 seriesII linked to my main tv it dose the job very well, tv and movies sound great as well as the tv's digital radio + Bluetooth for the iPhones no messy wires looks neat as well, fills our lounge with sound nicely.

[dandanthewatchman]

Consider pushing boat out budget wise and look at Naim Muso. Sound and ease of use amazing. I use with Spotify connect

[paw3001]

Consider pushing boat out budget wise and look at Naim Muso. Sound and ease of use amazing. I use with Spotify connect

I would agree with this or if you have less space then maybe the Muso-QB.

Sound quality is the best I have heard in this field especially when using hi def audio from Tidal. It also has all the connection options you need, optical, aux, Bluetooth, wifi etc and the QB is not much more than a Sonos Play 5.

Personally Sonos are great if you wish to network but a little lacking in my opinion as a stand alone speaker set up.

[MB2]

Personally Sonos are great if you wish to network but a little lacking in my opinion as a stand alone speaker set up.

That make sense - I do like my Sonos system as I have the same music in the bedroom, kitchen and bathroom and can move the speakers about at will or when having a party can bring in the others too and have the same sound throughout the house.

I can easily see other systems providing more in function and it can be a nuisance to have to have the WiFi up but for a wireless whole house sound system you can add on to as and when the Sonos takes some beating.

[Rocket Man]

Thank you gentlemen for all the helpful posts, and to the OP for starting this thread.

I now have a Sonos Play:5 and am really happy with the sound quality.

Setting it up was easy, I just need to update my iTunes library so that I could access my playlists.

I'm a convert.

[walkerwek1958]

I've been totally left behind in recent years, I don't own a smartphone and I've never got my head around the downloading music thing. However, I have 3 good quality hi-fi systems in the house, a large collection of CDs, and I place a high priority on sound quality.

The problem I'd like to solve is being unable to play the same music all around the house. I could do this by running miles of wires everywhere but that's not really practical. Clearly, the Sonos thing would tick some boxes, but surely the sound quality ( compared to what I have ) would nosedive? Everyone seems obsessed with playlists/itunes/wifi etc but surely this is putting the emphasis on convenience at the expense of sound quality.

I don't need to change anything yet, but there will come a time for a complete rethink at some stage, possibly if/when I move house. Unlike most of the population I don't carry a mobile phone around me 24/7 like a kid with a teddybear or a baby with a dummy; if I needed to do so I'd struggle, I'd put the damned thing down and forget where I'd left it.

Paul

[Captain Morgan]

Paul

No real need for the quality to drop, you'd need to bare in mind that if you use sonos for this that its not a cheap solution.

Assuming your plan is to keep the existing you'd need a play:connect unit to connect to each of your existing hifi's at around £250 each.
Then again assuming you don't want to leave your computer on 24/7 you need a nas drive at £100 ish and a usb drive of the same size for backups.

You then copy the cd's to your computer and convert them to a lossless format, this reduces the size but not the quality of the recordings, then you copy the converted files to the nas and the USB backup.

As you know music is subjective so while using a lossless format means you haven't lost you still might not like the sound the sonos:play provides in the same way you might have a preference for one cd manufacture over another.

If you wanted to test before hand I'd suggest downloading iTunes and encoding a few favourite cd's as apple lossless, buy a sonos:connect from a company with a good return policy, set up and do a compare and contrast between it and your existing cd.

[Rod]

Paul

No real need for the quality to drop, you'd need to bare in mind that if you use sonos for this that its not a cheap solution.

Assuming your plan is to keep the existing you'd need a play:connect unit to connect to each of your existing hifi's at around £250 each.
Then again assuming you don't want to leave your computer on 24/7 you need a nas drive at £100 ish and a usb drive of the same size for backups.

Yep that's all you need, a Sonos Connect, I have one connected to my Marantz PM17KI and KEF LS50, stream my music from my NAS drive in FLAC quality.
You could, as a cheaper solution, buy Chromecast Audio x3 and stream Tune in Radio, or other music servers still a great way to listen to music.