Using Ipad for music storage and running Sonos

[Sword86]

I currently use my MacBook as storage for my music, but now want all my music on an Ipad and have Sonos look to the Ipad for my collection. (it's a pain booting up the MB every time to listen to music)
Now I'm even wondering if this can be done. Isn't the Ipad just another drive? Can I not point Sonos to look for the Ipad instead of the MB? What would the path be?

 

[ozaz]

Old thread, but I'll answer in case OP's still interested....

The Sonos app on your iPad will play music stored locally on the iPad (in the default music location). But this means that you would have to maintain a live connection between your iPad and the Sonos system to play your music, which removes one of the big benefits of the Sonos system.

A better solution would be to store your music in a free cloud locker (e.g. Google Music) or an always-on local network drive (e.g. a drive attached to your router) and point the Sonos system to this. You would then only use your phone or tablet to control the Sonos system (rather than stream directly to it) which means the phone/tablet could be switched off or leave the network and you could still have music playing on the Sonos system.

 

[Sword86]

Old thread, but I'll answer in case OP's still interested....

The Sonos app on your iPad will play music stored locally on the iPad (in the default music location). But this means that you would have to maintain a live connection between your iPad and the Sonos system to play your music, which removes one of the big benefits of the Sonos system.

A better solution would be to store your music in a free cloud locker (e.g. Google Music) or an always-on local network drive (e.g. a drive attached to your router) and point the Sonos system to this. You would then only use your phone or tablet to control the Sonos system (rather than stream directly to it) which means the phone/tablet could be switched off or leave the network and you could still have music playing on the Sonos system.

Thanks for the reply. I’ve determined your solutions are the way to go. I was just wanting to run the Ipad as the primary storage, switching it from my Mac, so I wouldn’t need to fire the Mac up. I just came to live with keeping my entire library up to date on the IPad and playing it from there. Same thing, but if there are tunes on the Mac that aren’t on the Ipad the Mac would have to be up so sonos could access them. I find there are a few pains using Sonos without it being able to find my Macbook. I ignore them now.

 

[MacInTO]

I've just moved my music collection to my iPad from my Mac also. I travel a lot and don't like traveling with a computer.

At my primary residence, I play the music from the iPad through airplay to my Apple TV which is connected to my stereo/TV/speakers. I have an second residence that has airplay speakers. The music on my iPad also give me access to music when I'm on a plane, etc.

The source of my music starts on my Mac because I still buy CDs and need a way to rip them into iTunes. I tried Google Play Music for a bit, but did not like the sound quality when played through my stereo and speakers at home.

I considered Sonos for my second residence, but thought they were a bit pricey. I ended up getting a B&W Airplay speaker instead. B&W is generally a speaker company first so I like that.

How does the Sonos system work? What are the advantages?

 

[Sword86]

I've just moved my music collection to my iPad from my Mac also. I travel a lot and don't like traveling with a computer.

At my primary residence, I play the music from the iPad through airplay to my Apple TV which is connected to my stereo/TV/speakers. I have an second residence that has airplay speakers. The music on my iPad also give me access to music when I'm on a plane, etc.

The source of my music starts on my Mac because I still buy CDs and need a way to rip them into iTunes. I tried Google Play Music for a bit, but did not like the sound quality when played through my stereo and speakers at home.

I considered Sonos for my second residence, but thought they were a bit pricey. I ended up getting a B&W Airplay speaker instead. B&W is generally a speaker company first so I like that.

How does the Sonos system work? What are the advantages?

[doublepost=1509825047][/doublepost]It’s OK but the interface on my the Mac is way better than the app on the Ipad or Iphone. I don’t use it near enough to come with any real advantages for having it. What does annoy me is it doesn’t seem to include any Apple Music tracks in my library but if they are in a playlist I can play them, but it’s not the same thing as having them show in my library. I’m way past the age of wanting to do a bunch of research to solve things. I just want stuff to work. That’s why I ended up with Apple devices. I got real tired of having to be a relative expert to keep Windows machines functioning. Just don’t want to devote the time to it anymore. I just want to jump on, do what I want to do and get off. I’m not a power user and just having to sit in front of an MS machine at work annoys me.

86

 

[ozaz]

How does the Sonos system work? What are the advantages?

Like Airplay, Sonos is wifi-based. However, there are some advantages.
Here are what I consider to be the two main ones:

1. Unlike Airplay speakers, Sonos speakers are able to directly connect to cloud and NAS-based music sources. So if you are streaming from something like Spotify or a radio station, or a music folder on a NAS device, Sonos speakers connect directly to them, and the Sonos app on your phone just acts as a controller (rather than a middle-man in the streaming path). With Airplay, the source first gets streamed to your phone or computer (which is acting as a middle-man) and then onto the Airplay speaker. Removal of the middle-man device theoretically at least improves reliability and also means that your phone/computer does not need to stay switched on or remain in your network for the speakers to continue streaming. Perhaps worth noting that Google Chromecast devices operate similarly to Sonos in this regard. It's a more elegant approach then Airplay in my opinion. But if you never stream from internet sources or from network-attached-storage, the benefit here is moot.

2. Wireless linking and mesh networking
Sonos speakers shine when you have more than one of them. They can be wirelessly linked together to form stereo pairs, home theatre setups, and room and floor zones and are kept in perfect synchrony (which is apprarently very hard to do wirelessly). Reliability is also enhanced by the formation of a mesh network for speaker-to-speaker communication which operates on its own wifi channel separately from the home wifi netork. I have difficulties with my home wifi network, but I never have reliability issues with my Sonos speakers and I attribute this to the dedicated mesh network they create.
[doublepost=1509828134][/doublepost]

It’s OK but the interface on my the Mac is way better than the app on the Ipad or Iphone. I don’t use it near enough to come with any real advantages for having it. What does annoy me is it doesn’t seem to include any Apple Music tracks in my library but if they are in a playlist I can play them, but it’s not the same thing as having them show in my library.

I don't use Apple Music so not sure what the issue is here, but there must be a simple solution.

I use Google Music to store my personal music and all I do is link Sonos to my Google Music account and my whole library is available to me from the Sonos app.

 

[MacInTO]

[doublepost=1509825047][/doublepost]It’s OK but the interface on my the Mac is way better than the app on the Ipad or Iphone. I don’t use it near enough to come with any real advantages for having it. What does annoy me is it doesn’t seem to include any Apple Music tracks in my library but if they are in a playlist I can play them, but it’s not the same thing as having them show in my library. I’m way past the age of wanting to do a bunch of research to solve things. I just want stuff to work. That’s why I ended up with Apple devices. I got real tired of having to be a relative expert to keep Windows machines functioning. Just don’t want to devote the time to it anymore. I just want to jump on, do what I want to do and get off. I’m not a power user and just having to sit in front of an MS machine at work annoys me.

86

Ha ha agreed about ha wanting it to work! I used to work for IBM. When I worked from home, I would do the work on my Mac and then transfer it to my work Thinkpad when I was done.
[doublepost=1509910672][/doublepost]

Like Airplay, Sonos is wifi-based. However, there are some advantages.
Here are what I consider to be the two main ones:

1. Unlike Airplay speakers, Sonos speakers are able to directly connect to cloud and NAS-based music sources. So if you are streaming from something like Spotify or a radio station, or a music folder on a NAS device, Sonos speakers connect directly to them, and the Sonos app on your phone just acts as a controller (rather than a middle-man in the streaming path). With Airplay, the source first gets streamed to your phone or computer (which is acting as a middle-man) and then onto the Airplay speaker. Removal of the middle-man device theoretically at least improves reliability and also means that your phone/computer does not need to stay switched on or remain in your network for the speakers to continue streaming. Perhaps worth noting that Google Chromecast devices operate similarly to Sonos in this regard. It's a more elegant approach then Airplay in my opinion. But if you never stream from internet sources or from network-attached-storage, the benefit here is moot.

2. Wireless linking and mesh networking
Sonos speakers shine when you have more than one of them. They can be wirelessly linked together to form stereo pairs, home theatre setups, and room and floor zones and are kept in perfect synchrony (which is apprarently very hard to do wirelessly). Reliability is also enhanced by the formation of a mesh network for speaker-to-speaker communication which operates on its own wifi channel separately from the home wifi netork. I have difficulties with my home wifi network, but I never have reliability issues with my Sonos speakers and I attribute this to the dedicated mesh network they create.
[doublepost=1509828134][/doublepost]

I don't use Apple Music so not sure what the issue is here, but there must be a simple solution.

I use Google Music to store my personal music and all I do is link Sonos to my Google Music account and my whole library is available to me from the Sonos app.

Thanks, this is an excellent explanation! One that the salesperson in Best Buy never provided. I might have purchased it if I had heard this initially.

I never stream music from the internet or a NAS as all my music resides on my Mac and iPad. What annoys me most about airplay is when I'm playing music through airplay and use Siri it will play through the airplay speaker and usually really LOUD! I wish it could do airplay and, at the same time, Siri could go through the iPad speakers. Can Sonos do this?

 

[ozaz]

I never stream music from the internet or a NAS as all my music resides on my Mac and iPad. What annoys me most about airplay is when I'm playing music through airplay and use Siri it will play through the airplay speaker and usually really LOUD! I wish it could do airplay and, at the same time, Siri could go through the iPad speakers. Can Sonos do this?

With Sonos, the audio out channel on the iPhone/iPad is completely uncoupled from the audio being streamed to the Sonos speakers (regardless of whether the streamed audio is coming from the internet or from local storage on the iPhone/iPad). So you can have music playing on Sonos speakers and something completely different playing out from the iPhone/iPad speaker (e.g. Siri, Facetime, or audio from any app on the iPhone/IPad). Google Chromecast operates similarly.

In case you're not aware, Apple is releasing a new version of Airplay soon (Airplay 2). I haven't been following all the features this brings, but I'd be very surprised if the limitation you are experiencing doesn't get addressed in Airplay 2.

 

[MacInTO]

With Sonos, the audio out channel on the iPhone/iPad is completely uncoupled from the audio being streamed to the Sonos speakers (regardless of whether the streamed audio is coming from the internet or from local storage on the iPhone/iPad). So you can have music playing on Sonos speakers and something completely different playing out from the iPhone/iPad speaker (e.g. Siri, Facetime, or audio from any app on the iPhone/IPad). Google Chromecast operates similarly.

In case you're not aware, Apple is releasing a new version of Airplay soon (Airplay 2). I haven't been following all the features this brings, but I'd be very surprised if the limitation you are experiencing doesn't get addressed in Airplay 2.

Apparently Airplay 2 is included with iOS 11. Doesn't look like it happened this release.

I may have to open a ticket with Apple about this. I'm afraid I'm going to forget and blow my airplay speaker.

Edit/Update, it took 45 minutes for the support rep to tell me there are reported issues.

While on the support chat, I figured out that while using airplay, alert sounds do go through the iPad speakers.