Hi Jim,
Sonos has it’s own library so I couldn’t care less about iTunes. In any case, in my case I could even stream iTunes to it in 2 ways: first, I have a Sonos Connect in my office at home where I usually keep my laptop plugged in. I don’t have a Bridge because I just have that Connect player connected to my router. The Connect also has RCA line in so I could simply plug my computer into the Sonos and this way I would get anything that plays via the computer soundcard including Jaws on the Sonos system. This way I can just take my wireless Logitech keyboard and put my computer onto any speaker in my house. The second way I could play iTunes is via Airplay since I do have an Airport Express hooked up to the Line In of my Sonos Connect Amp in the kitchen. As I said before, this way I Airplay to the Airport Express which is connected to the Sonos system. Now, one of the main reasons why I got my Sonos system is because of it’s versatility, flexibility and upgradability. When I bought my first Sonos players in 2009 they only had the ZP100 and ZP120, these are essentially the same players as the Connect and Connect:Amp. There was no Play:5 or Play:3 at the time, the Play:5 came out first a year or 2 later, then the Play:3, then they released the subwover, then the Playbar or whatever they call it and I think their latest is the little Play:1. I already had speakers built into my bedroom and bathroom ceiling and my kitchen wall between the counter top and the underside of the kitchen cabinets. I put those in back in 1997 when I bought this house and at the time had an Onkyo receiver which had 1 second zone capability and I ran that into a 4-port speaker splitter and used it for 12 years. Of course it was much more limited than what the Sonos system can do. When I upgraded to the Sonos system (I have a total of 3 Connect:Amp in the bedroom, bathroom and kitchen to drive the existing speakers there) and then I also have 3 Connect which are connected to a set of powered speakers in my Office, my Sony surround sound receiver in the living room and to my high-end Sonic Frontiers tube amp system downstairs. I also have 1 Play:5 which I take wherever I happen to want it, either my woodworking shop or the deck or wherever. The Connect:Amp has a 2 times 55 Watt Class D amplifier built in and hooked up to good speakers it sounds extremely good. The Connect only delivers the signal to whatever existing amplifier or receiver you hook it up to, but it has both Coax Digital and Optical outputs so if you have a modern receiver with digital inputs you also get a very clean signal. I ripped all my CD’s originally in the lossless format called FLAC and put the files on an external, network attached hard drive. The Sonos system can access files on network attached storage so the Sonos library uses these high quality files and since it’s on an external drive I don’t even have to have a computer on to play music on the Sonos system. Of course especially on my high-end system you can also hear the difference between playing MP3 or AAC/M4A files which of course are a lossy format. I only use and maintain my iTunes library so I can sync music to my iPhone, everything else I do with Sonos. Regards, Sieghard From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jibber Jabber Sent: Saturday, March 29, 2014 4:00 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Questions Regarding Airplay Speakers Hi Sieghard, Very informative, thank you. May I ask you, why you chose the Sonos over the others? Even with the addition of the Sonos Bridge, you can’t stream iTunes on your pc directly to the speaker? Jim. From: Sieghard <mailto:[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, March 29, 2014 9:06 PM To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Cc: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: Questions Regarding Airplay Speakers Hi Jim, I can't tell you anything about other than Sonos, but I highly recommend Sonos especially since they are actively working on accessibility right now. The Sonos iOS app has always been accessible, but it has some unlabeled buttons and some things I found are certainly not as intuitive as they could be. I can't comment on details since I am an official Beta Tester, but I can say that they are working on significant improvements and overall Sonos is awesome and has lots of great features. While the Play 1, Play 3 and Play 5 are basically stand-alone boombox type players, they are also more in that you can expand the system later on with additional players and all of their stuff of course is compatible. Having said that, I should mention that at this point the Sonos players are not actually Airplay enabled. You can play content from whatever music you have on your iPhone as the Sonos app can access the music on your phone. You should think of the iPhone with the Sonos app as a remote or controller for the Sonos multi-room music system which is capable of playing music from it's own library, from most of the major services like Spotify, Slacker, Sirius (subscription is required for that) and depending on which ZonePlayer you have you can also hook up an external source like a CD player and play from it. Of course since your Sonos player is also connected to the internet you can also play any of the thousands or maybe tens of thousands of free internet radio stations which are out there. If, however, you want true Airplay functionality you currently have to use something like an Airport Express which has to be physically connected to a Zoneplayer with component input so essentially you are sending your stream to the Airport Express via Airplay and it gets fed into your Sonos system that way. Good luck, Sieghard On Saturday, March 29, 2014 12:11:05 PM UTC-7, Jibber Jabber wrote: Hi Guys, I’m in the market for an airplay speaker. I’ve researched various brands and models, read reviews, and wanted to know, if anyone here has used any of the below speakers. How easy, or difficult they were to set up without sighted asisstance, ease of control with either the IOS app for iPhone, iPad and iPod, or whether it is only accessible with the remote control. What is the audio quality like, both at low and high volumes? Was it difficult to sort out streaming from iTunes on the pc? The speakers I have in mind are: Bose SoundTouch 30. Bowers & Wilkins A7. Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin. Sonos Play 5. Sonos Play 3. Loewe AirSpeaker. I would really appreciate any thought on the speakers listed, either if you have one, have had one, or looked at one, and decided against it, here onlist, or off list at [email protected] <javascript:> . Many thanks. Jim. -- The following information is important for all members of the viphone list. All new members to the this list are moderated by default. If you have any questions or concerns about the running of this list, or if you feel that a member's post is inappropriate, please contact the owners or moderators directly rather than posting on the list itself. The archives for this list can be searched at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> . To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. 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