Configuring Netonix to work with Sonos
Posted: Sat Feb 13, 2016 2:52 pm
I have a decent sized collection of Sonos speakers [8 Play1s, 1 Play5, 4 Sonos Connects (these connect to traditional amps that were already in place with in-ceiling speakers), 1 Playbar, and 1 Sub] , which I absolutely love. For the most part the system has been fairly solid though sometimes certain speakers seem to drop out for brief periods.
In an attempt to improve this along with finalizing my home network for other uses, I finally was able to get more cabling run. The majority of the cabling terminates down in the basement to a WS-24-400A (way overkill, but is a spare that can be stolen in a moment if a tower switch goes down). Because of lack of space in conduit and other options for cabling paths, I have two WS-6-MINIs on the network as well that are powered by the basement WS-24-400A. One in on the opposite side of the house in the garage and the other is on the second floor. Before adding the Netonix switches, I had one Sonos Connect wired into the network and all of the other Sonos speakers connected back to it and each other with the Sonos Wireless mesh network. Again, this worked pretty well, but now I would like to leverage the cabling and connect a few of the other Sonos speakers that have a drop nearby. Presently, I would like to add a Sonos Connect to the WS-6-MINI upstairs and a Sonos Connect to the WS-6-MINI in the garage (this is the Sonos speaker that is furthest away and has the most issue with drops) to eliminate the need for wireless connections to those devices. I would also like to add the Play 5 to the basement WS-24-400A that is currently part of the Sonos wireless mesh and once I run a couple more drops, will probably be able to include three more Play 1s. In the end, my understanding is that the Sonos speakers can intelligently decide which connection to utilize using STP and prefer a wired connection over the wireless option.
However, the guidance on configuring this from Sonos is fairly limited and references a Cisco switch. My attempts to replicate the recommended configuration settings on the Netonix switches have not been met with success. For example, when trying to enter the recommended value of 10 in the path cost section for the ports connected to wired Sonos players of the Netonix web interface, the interface doesn't let me and won't accept a value less than 16 (even though the hovering tooltip indicates a value all the way down to 1 is acceptable). I also don't see anything related to some of the other settings like BPDU handling and Path Cost default values. I've attached a screenshot of the STP settings on one of the Minis. All switches are running the latest stable firmware and the basement switch is configured as the root.
I don't understand Spanning Tree particularly well and may be missing something, but thought I would reference the post and have some of you experts help me out. Hopefully there is an answer to this as I think this could be yet another example where the Netonix equipment really shines. It doesn't get much better than the WS-6-MINI to address issues where a network connection needs to go to a place in a house that doesn't have power or the appropriate number of drops. I know there are quite a few Home Theater install guys around here that are always looking for solutions like this.
Here are the relevant posts from the Sonos forums:
https://en.community.sonos.com/wireless ... ed-5710456
https://sonos.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2129
https://en.community.sonos.com/troubles ... tion-30413
In an attempt to improve this along with finalizing my home network for other uses, I finally was able to get more cabling run. The majority of the cabling terminates down in the basement to a WS-24-400A (way overkill, but is a spare that can be stolen in a moment if a tower switch goes down). Because of lack of space in conduit and other options for cabling paths, I have two WS-6-MINIs on the network as well that are powered by the basement WS-24-400A. One in on the opposite side of the house in the garage and the other is on the second floor. Before adding the Netonix switches, I had one Sonos Connect wired into the network and all of the other Sonos speakers connected back to it and each other with the Sonos Wireless mesh network. Again, this worked pretty well, but now I would like to leverage the cabling and connect a few of the other Sonos speakers that have a drop nearby. Presently, I would like to add a Sonos Connect to the WS-6-MINI upstairs and a Sonos Connect to the WS-6-MINI in the garage (this is the Sonos speaker that is furthest away and has the most issue with drops) to eliminate the need for wireless connections to those devices. I would also like to add the Play 5 to the basement WS-24-400A that is currently part of the Sonos wireless mesh and once I run a couple more drops, will probably be able to include three more Play 1s. In the end, my understanding is that the Sonos speakers can intelligently decide which connection to utilize using STP and prefer a wired connection over the wireless option.
However, the guidance on configuring this from Sonos is fairly limited and references a Cisco switch. My attempts to replicate the recommended configuration settings on the Netonix switches have not been met with success. For example, when trying to enter the recommended value of 10 in the path cost section for the ports connected to wired Sonos players of the Netonix web interface, the interface doesn't let me and won't accept a value less than 16 (even though the hovering tooltip indicates a value all the way down to 1 is acceptable). I also don't see anything related to some of the other settings like BPDU handling and Path Cost default values. I've attached a screenshot of the STP settings on one of the Minis. All switches are running the latest stable firmware and the basement switch is configured as the root.
I don't understand Spanning Tree particularly well and may be missing something, but thought I would reference the post and have some of you experts help me out. Hopefully there is an answer to this as I think this could be yet another example where the Netonix equipment really shines. It doesn't get much better than the WS-6-MINI to address issues where a network connection needs to go to a place in a house that doesn't have power or the appropriate number of drops. I know there are quite a few Home Theater install guys around here that are always looking for solutions like this.
Here are the relevant posts from the Sonos forums:
https://en.community.sonos.com/wireless ... ed-5710456
https://sonos.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2129
https://en.community.sonos.com/troubles ... tion-30413