Help with Apple v sonos compatibility.
Discussion
Hi. I've got some probs with both my ageing laptop and my nas drive. I have a seagate which has let me down in the past ( lost all data) and has now stopped working wifi. Very temperamental wired connection. I thinks it's basically about to die again. It's still in warranty but I don't want another. It's plainly not good enough.
My laptop is also on its last legs. Often fails in random ways and I've been thinking about a MacBook Pro for quite some time. Bit put off by the price but tonight is almost sending me over the edge. PC won't talk to nas. Sonos will start to play song from nas, and then declare that the encoding is not right and fail. Amazon tv can't find nas and phone won't until I connect to it with PC via cable.
What I want to do. Money no object:
Buy a MacBook Pro and a time capsule. Install the Ms office software. Backup my music and photos etc to the time capsule so that I can view pictures on the Amazon Fire to via xbmc. And access my music library stored on the tc with sonos.
Other than the price, the thing which is holding me back at the mo is word on the net that an Apple tc is not compatible with sonos. Is this still true ( posts I've seen are quite dated)
I'm with EE for Internet. They supplied a router as per usual. Does a tc replace this? If so Is it compatible with EE? I k ow in the past sky subscribers had issues using anything other than a sky router.
And will I be able to route the Amazon tc to it as a nas to view pics?
Any advice as always gratefully received. I have googled but am coming up with mainly complaints followed by jargon I don't understand. Or just numpties. Like me I suppose. Would be good to hear from someone in the same boat as me perhaps.
My laptop is also on its last legs. Often fails in random ways and I've been thinking about a MacBook Pro for quite some time. Bit put off by the price but tonight is almost sending me over the edge. PC won't talk to nas. Sonos will start to play song from nas, and then declare that the encoding is not right and fail. Amazon tv can't find nas and phone won't until I connect to it with PC via cable.
What I want to do. Money no object:
Buy a MacBook Pro and a time capsule. Install the Ms office software. Backup my music and photos etc to the time capsule so that I can view pictures on the Amazon Fire to via xbmc. And access my music library stored on the tc with sonos.
Other than the price, the thing which is holding me back at the mo is word on the net that an Apple tc is not compatible with sonos. Is this still true ( posts I've seen are quite dated)
I'm with EE for Internet. They supplied a router as per usual. Does a tc replace this? If so Is it compatible with EE? I k ow in the past sky subscribers had issues using anything other than a sky router.
And will I be able to route the Amazon tc to it as a nas to view pics?
Any advice as always gratefully received. I have googled but am coming up with mainly complaints followed by jargon I don't understand. Or just numpties. Like me I suppose. Would be good to hear from someone in the same boat as me perhaps.
Have been running a Macbook Pro, Time Capsule on PlusNet for years; am a SONOS beta tester & stream via TvMobili to a Panasonic LED; no idea about NAS.
Only problem was when the TC died after 18m - reseller used the European Law and managed the process to get me a replacement with Apple EU in Ireland.
The EE router is NOT replaced by TC - you get the native router wi-fi, the 5Ghz & regular TC signals.
- the TV and MacBook need to be on the same (TC 5Ghz in my case) wifi network to stream
- the SONOS creates it's own VPN and works seamlessly with MacBook, iPhone, iPad (& Samsung Android) phone.
Hope that helps.
Only problem was when the TC died after 18m - reseller used the European Law and managed the process to get me a replacement with Apple EU in Ireland.
The EE router is NOT replaced by TC - you get the native router wi-fi, the 5Ghz & regular TC signals.
- the TV and MacBook need to be on the same (TC 5Ghz in my case) wifi network to stream
- the SONOS creates it's own VPN and works seamlessly with MacBook, iPhone, iPad (& Samsung Android) phone.
Hope that helps.
Think the stumbling block is that the Time Capsile can't be configured as a DLNA server (unless it's changed in the last few months), which means the Sonos can't simply connect to the time capsule and stream your music directly from there. You have to set up a shared folder on the Mac instead for the Sonos to access - which means you MacBook has to be on to steam your music collection. I guess the folder could exist on the time capsule, but you'd still need the Mac to be on to 'present' it to the Sonos.
For me the streaming directly from the NAS was one of the main benefits of Sonos, so I went with a synology NAS instead - it can do both time machine backups and present media via DLNA to pretty much any compatible device. Doesn't do wireless though so still using a TC for that aspect.
For me the streaming directly from the NAS was one of the main benefits of Sonos, so I went with a synology NAS instead - it can do both time machine backups and present media via DLNA to pretty much any compatible device. Doesn't do wireless though so still using a TC for that aspect.
Yeah this is what I have gathered. Spoke to Apple and they pretty much said a tc is incompatible with sonos. And anything else other than a Mac. I also need to be able to stream pictures and video to my tv via an Amazon Fire tv. Which doesn't seem possible with Apple stuff. So I have gone and ordered a stupid amount of monies worth of MacBook. Now I need to find a reliable nas which will work with it + Sonos + fire tv. I keep seeing synology so I assume this is the go to. Any possible issues with this setup?
I know my WD Mycloud allows Mac backups and streams happily to my Sonos system throughout the house.
A Segate drive I bought a year ago died after only being used a few times. Wouldn't touch them again with a barge pole.
Synology get very good write ups as well which is probably what I'll switch to when my WD is full.
A Segate drive I bought a year ago died after only being used a few times. Wouldn't touch them again with a barge pole.
Synology get very good write ups as well which is probably what I'll switch to when my WD is full.
My Synology NAS has been running without issue for 3.5 years now. The only downsides compared to a TC are the lack of wireless and the fact that it's not quite as seamless to set it up as a time machine target.
If your existing router is fine and has a spare network port you should be fine - just bear in mind that the TC (and many other wifi routers) has gigabit networking ports, whereas your broadband supplied one may not.
One thing I did like about the Synology over and above the TC is that you can buy a 2-bay model. This allows you to have 2 hard drives in a 'mirrored' configuration so all data is written to both. Cost more in terms of disks, but if one fails you'll still have all your data, that said ideally you'll have a backup of everything on the Synology as well.
Oh and as far as I'm aware, all apple stuff has a 14 day returns policy, so if you don't like the MacBook you can always return it.
If your existing router is fine and has a spare network port you should be fine - just bear in mind that the TC (and many other wifi routers) has gigabit networking ports, whereas your broadband supplied one may not.
One thing I did like about the Synology over and above the TC is that you can buy a 2-bay model. This allows you to have 2 hard drives in a 'mirrored' configuration so all data is written to both. Cost more in terms of disks, but if one fails you'll still have all your data, that said ideally you'll have a backup of everything on the Synology as well.
Oh and as far as I'm aware, all apple stuff has a 14 day returns policy, so if you don't like the MacBook you can always return it.
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