30 days with a pair of SONOS Era 300

At the beginning of July, I was contemplating a new speaker arrangement for my study. As detailed in my blog post, I replaced (temporarily) my KEF LSX II with the SONOS Era 300.

Context and reasonings:

Reconsidering my music setup in my study

Music is the backbone of my WFH setup. I always have music playing in the background, LOFI, Jazz, movie soundtracks, instrumentals, etc. I feel uncomfortable in a completely quiet room, so I feel the need to fill it with music. Based on my past behaviour, I am never satisfied with

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Like most SONOS speakers, the setup process of the ERA 300 was straightforward. Within 20 minutes, I had both speakers set up in a stereo pair, completed auto tuning, and setup HEY SONOS. Setting up my stream deck on my MacBook took a little longer, but nothing overly concerning. 

For the next couple of weeks, I enjoyed all kinds of music on the ERA 300. I started off with Apple Music Spatial playlists to get the feel of Dolby ATMOS music. Honestly, I am not a fan. I appreciate what it is trying to do, and it’s better on the ERA 300 compared to my AirPods Max and AirPods Pro. However, to truly enjoy Spatial Audio, one needs multiple speakers strategically placed. The Era 300 attempts to virtually create a sound stage. Depending on the song, this experience is exceptional, but these exceptional moments are few and far in between. For example, it cannot replicate the sound coming from behind me and passing over my heard. However, a multiple speaker system will do just that. My 5.1 surround system does a better job at this because I am surrounded by multiple speakers.

In the third week, I actually had both the SONOS and the KEF speakers, so I can conduct side-by-side comparisons and decide for myself which one I prefer listening to. I waited a few weeks before doing this comparison because I wanted to give the SONOS a fair go without clouding my judgment based on what speaker I preferred to listen music on. I thought about doing a blind test, but then I realized I might be taking myself too seriously here 😝. In my humble opinion, my ears prefer the KEF over the SONOS, but only ever so slightly. 

What worked well?

• Having all my speakers in the SONOS ecosystem felt good and expands my use case to third party SONOS apps like Sonophone. There aren’t any third party KEF apps. KEF is widely supported because it supports Chromecast, unlike SONOS.
• The Stream deck plugin for SONOS is really nice and I setup different buttons to play different playlists. With a tap of a button, I could play different playlists from different streaming services and also play online radios. It’s cool to have so many playlists on my fingertips. In addition, to playlists, I could change audio, skip tracks and pause music. Really enjoyed this setup.
• The white Era 300 fit well on the Kanto speaker stands I was using with the KEF. However, I couldn’t screw in the speakers to the stand like I could with the KEF. This means that if the stand was bumped, the speakers could easily fall off. Thankfully, this did not happen and considering the weight of the Era 300, I wasn’t overly concerned. 
• HEY SONOS voice assistant was a pleasant surprise. Yes, it’s rather limited (like you cannot set timers or control your smart devices) but for what it can do, it does really well. Only recently, SONOS added Spotify support to their voice assistant. Noting, the KEF has no smart assistant support built in but works well with Google Home Mini.
• Ability to change the volume and pause music from the Era 300 was very much appreciated. It is the quickest way to pause music when I am on a call. 
  

What did not work well?

• Spatial music has its moments, but it was not as impressive as I thought it would be. It really depends on the music you listen to and most times, I prefer the non spatial version of the song. Actually, I am indifferent to which version I listen to unless it’s one of my favourite songs. Listening to spatial music is only limited to the SONOS app via Apple Music. There is no other way.
• Strangely, the lowest volume of the SONOS speakers is not low enough. When I am listening to focus music in the background, I prefer it on low volume. At its lowest of volume, the sound is still too loud. According to the SONOS forums, this is a known issue for some time. 
• I miss a physical remote. I took it for granted how often a used the KEF physical remote. 
• Era 300 speakers have a unique design, and I am not a fan. Visually, I prefer the KEF instead.
• The most recent SONOS app update has caused a significant decline in the overall user experience. In fact, the SONOS CEO felt compelled to issue a formal apology.
• On three separate occasions, the right Era 300 disconnected from the stereo pair. The only way to fix this was by rebooting both speakers.
• Disappointing SONOS Support experience: in the past, I have emailed SONOS Support at support@sonos.com with the diagnostic ID from my SONOS system. SONOS staff would review my diagnostic and guide me accordingly. However, this time around (contacting SONOS regarding the frequent stereo pair disconnects), I received an email advising that SONOS does not provide support via email anymore. Instead, I should reach SONOS Support via chat or by directly calling SONOS Support.

• I began chatting with SONOS, but my chat got disconnected. I tried multiple times, but couldn’t resume the conversation. Disappointingly so, no one from SONOS also reached out.
• I gave up on the SONOS chat and called the Australian SONOS Customer Support instead. However, I became frustrated when I was on hold for over 20 minutes. Eventually, I gave up on that too.
  

So what now?

Considering the state of the SONOS app, my frequent technical issues with the speaker itself and my disappointing experience with SONOS support, the Era 300s are on their way back to SONOS. Ultimately, the choice was between the frustrating SONOS experience vs the reliable KEF experience.

Admittedly, the returns process was super straight forward. Fill out an online form on the website and a postage paid return label will be emailed to you. This is the SONOS experience one expects.

It has been a couple of days and I am happy with my beautiful KEF speakers. How the tables have turned compared to the start of the month. I really enjoyed using the streamdeck to control my music. Therefore, after some research, I have figured out how to bring the SONOS ecosystem to my KEF speakers, enabling me to use my streamdeck. Looking forward to writing about it after I have spent more time with this SONOS powered KEF setup 🍭

Until then, please take care and stay well. Also, be curious.