Which wireless audio system? Apple? Sonos? Bose? Amazon?
Discussion
I currently only have two bluetooth/wireless speakers, a Bose Soundlink Mini 2 and a Bose Homespeaker 300.
They have been great over the last few years, but I now want a ‘whole house’ wireless speaker system, and I am undecided as to which brand/system to buy into.
I want to be able to have the same music playing throughout the house, and I want it to work seamlessly from my Apple Music playlists.
I’m an Apple pervert, and I like the whole cliche of ‘it just works’, so I have been tempted by the £89 HomePod mini, and could install a few of them around the house, but annoyingly Apple have now discontinued the larger HomePod so there is now no Apple option for a bigger sound in larger rooms.
I don’t think the HomePod mini will offer the bass and big sound that I want in some rooms.
A lot of audiophiles hate Bose for ‘reasons’, but to my ears they have always sounded great, but from what I can see, their smart/wireless integration and app is woeful, so I guess Bose is out.
Don’t know anything about the range of Amazon Echo speakers.
I’ve heard a few Sonos systems and they sound excellent, but unsure as to how slick the integration is with Apple and Apple Music etc.
I’m not interested in shouting at Alexa or Siri, or turning my dishwasher on by yelling at a speaker. Sound quality and ease of use is more important to me.
I do want to be able to group speakers together on an app, and adjust the volume of them all individually (and as one) again using the app. I believe Sonos does this?
What system would you buy into if you were starting from zero?
They have been great over the last few years, but I now want a ‘whole house’ wireless speaker system, and I am undecided as to which brand/system to buy into.
I want to be able to have the same music playing throughout the house, and I want it to work seamlessly from my Apple Music playlists.
I’m an Apple pervert, and I like the whole cliche of ‘it just works’, so I have been tempted by the £89 HomePod mini, and could install a few of them around the house, but annoyingly Apple have now discontinued the larger HomePod so there is now no Apple option for a bigger sound in larger rooms.
I don’t think the HomePod mini will offer the bass and big sound that I want in some rooms.
A lot of audiophiles hate Bose for ‘reasons’, but to my ears they have always sounded great, but from what I can see, their smart/wireless integration and app is woeful, so I guess Bose is out.
Don’t know anything about the range of Amazon Echo speakers.
I’ve heard a few Sonos systems and they sound excellent, but unsure as to how slick the integration is with Apple and Apple Music etc.
I’m not interested in shouting at Alexa or Siri, or turning my dishwasher on by yelling at a speaker. Sound quality and ease of use is more important to me.
I do want to be able to group speakers together on an app, and adjust the volume of them all individually (and as one) again using the app. I believe Sonos does this?
What system would you buy into if you were starting from zero?
Edited by anonymous-user on Sunday 7th November 19:56
normalbloke said:
Well, haters are going to hate, but we have Sonos right through the house, inc linking it to the stand alone surround sound for full’whole of house’ party mode. Wouldn’t change it for a thing, nothing else comes close for ease of use. Good luck in what you decide.
Thanks.That’s pretty much what I want. To start playing an Apple playlist or radio station from my iPhone, and have it play throughout the whole house on all the speakers.
Don’t need it to be anymore complex than that really.
Lord Marylebone said:
REM2112 said:
Naim?
Far too expensive. £750-1200 per unit, against £199 for a Sonos One (for example).
I’m sure the Naim sounds amazing, but I’m probably going to buy 4 or 5 speakers of whatever brand I decide upon, for placing around the house, and I don’t fancy spending £4000.
The IKEA wireless speakers look and sound okay and I thought I read they were made by Sonos.
Lord Marylebone said:
normalbloke said:
Well, haters are going to hate, but we have Sonos right through the house, inc linking it to the stand alone surround sound for full’whole of house’ party mode. Wouldn’t change it for a thing, nothing else comes close for ease of use. Good luck in what you decide.
Thanks.That’s pretty much what I want. To start playing an Apple playlist or radio station from my iPhone, and have it play throughout the whole house on all the speakers.
Don’t need it to be anymore complex than that really.
rufmeister said:
Had Sonos for years, and now phasing it out with Apple.
Could never get Sonos working properly, always needing updates, connectivity issues, streaming issues, etc.
When you say phasing it out with Apple, what Apple products are you buying?Could never get Sonos working properly, always needing updates, connectivity issues, streaming issues, etc.
I would happily buy all Apple stuff, but they only sell the HomePod Mini now, and whilst it’s a great little speaker, I really don’t feel it has the size and bass to sound good in a larger room. I had a demo of it in the Apple store.
Apple discontinued the full size HomePod speaker, and I just read they have now scrapped plans to release a new version of it.
So yeah, I would love to buy into an Apple system, but it looks like they can’t be arsed making any more speakers unfortunately.
normalbloke said:
Well, haters are going to hate, but we have Sonos right through the house, inc linking it to the stand alone surround sound for full’whole of house’ party mode. Wouldn’t change it for a thing, nothing else comes close for ease of use. Good luck in what you decide.
Well i was a lover and now a hater.Ever since their 'we are turning off S1 tech' debacle i have had no end of issues with my home system and customers. It seems they have changed their comms architecture without telling or advising dealers to do it differently so no the way we were doing it is now way near as robust as the way they now do it and Its a fundamental change.
I have been playing with BlueSound for a couple of months now and really like it, the problem for home is that we have a house of Sonos and it is prohibitively expensive to change over.
I've always been a sonos fan, but lately I feel they have let me down a bit with them stopping supporting legacy devices.
The whole point in sonos has always been that they just work, and that they always just work and up to now have been great at supporting older kit.
Having two apps for my different devices kind of ruins it.
They do sound good though...
The whole point in sonos has always been that they just work, and that they always just work and up to now have been great at supporting older kit.
Having two apps for my different devices kind of ruins it.
They do sound good though...
I’m a recent convert to Bluesound, after many decades of SqueezeServer on a variety of lashed up devices. The overwhelming problem with all of these integrated systems is obsolescence, once your “thing” is no longer supported, then the clock is ticking as to its usability. That said, they are convenient.
The good thing about Bluesound is that you can have a combined system that integrates really good components with a really cheap speaker in the kitchen. Our “decent” system in the house is a NAD M10 with a pair of Kef Meta speakers. Sounds, really, really good, but if that is not good enough, then you could splash out for a NAD M33 and whatever speakers you want. At the same time, a £199 Pulse Flex bangs out the choons in my workshop - and they both have the same operating system, app, can be synchronised etc. The M10 has also allowed me to get my old REL sub from the attic, set a proper cut off in the app and have thundering bass for parties.
My problem with Sonos is that you have to like the sounds. As hifi, it sucks. Really it does. As a flexible player of music, it works well, if you subscribe to the Bose style “engineered” sound it makes. You want proper hifi with Sonos? Er, you can’t. You’ve got an amp and speakers that you want to control with a Sonos source - sorry, you’ve got to buy a device with an amp and speakers in it and then not use them.
The real trick with Bluesound is in the devices like the Node and Powernode. Say you have an existing system made of conventional speakers and an amp, plugged into “something”. Remove the “something”, plug in a Node (critically acclaimed streamer), then plug your “something” into the back of the Node. Suddenly you have all the streaming services, the ability to select your old CD player if you want to, and you’re reusing half your old system, so all the money has gone on making the streamer excellent. The only thing it lacks is a phono stage…
The good thing about Bluesound is that you can have a combined system that integrates really good components with a really cheap speaker in the kitchen. Our “decent” system in the house is a NAD M10 with a pair of Kef Meta speakers. Sounds, really, really good, but if that is not good enough, then you could splash out for a NAD M33 and whatever speakers you want. At the same time, a £199 Pulse Flex bangs out the choons in my workshop - and they both have the same operating system, app, can be synchronised etc. The M10 has also allowed me to get my old REL sub from the attic, set a proper cut off in the app and have thundering bass for parties.
My problem with Sonos is that you have to like the sounds. As hifi, it sucks. Really it does. As a flexible player of music, it works well, if you subscribe to the Bose style “engineered” sound it makes. You want proper hifi with Sonos? Er, you can’t. You’ve got an amp and speakers that you want to control with a Sonos source - sorry, you’ve got to buy a device with an amp and speakers in it and then not use them.
The real trick with Bluesound is in the devices like the Node and Powernode. Say you have an existing system made of conventional speakers and an amp, plugged into “something”. Remove the “something”, plug in a Node (critically acclaimed streamer), then plug your “something” into the back of the Node. Suddenly you have all the streaming services, the ability to select your old CD player if you want to, and you’re reusing half your old system, so all the money has gone on making the streamer excellent. The only thing it lacks is a phono stage…
Edited by rxe on Monday 8th November 12:59
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