Sonos today announced that the latest version of their home music devices now support streaming music from Rhapsody. We have previously written about Sonos and a couple of weeks ago we spent some time with the two founders of the company talking about the future direction of the company, what their plans are and getting insight into this latest release. As we previously mentioned, Sonos is one of the easiest and best hardware devices we have seen that mix digital music, net connectivity and good quality sound.
The new integration with Rhapsody (which is a product of Real Networks) gives users the ability to stream any of the 2 million+ songs and 100+ ad-free radio stations right onto their Sonos device. Traditionally, Sonos would crawl all your local network shares and index your music - but now with Rhapsody you can just pick any song and play it without the need for local storage. In terms of pricing, every Sonos 2.0 user will be able to try out the service free for 30 days, after which they must pay 9.99 for the unlimited service from Rhapsody.
Since being founded in early 2002 and launching in January of 2005, Sonos has been growing from strenght-to-strength. The product currently sells in over 25 countries and they have offices in the Netherlands and Boston. They currently have 500 retail locations in the US. The UK is their second largest market.
Other features from the new Sonos include:
- Mac, Linux and PC users can now enjoy Rhapsody in every room.
- Discover new music with Rhapsody’s Artist Radio.
- Built-in music charts.
- Create an instant music library.
“Mac, Linux and PC users can now enjoy Rhapsody in every room.”
Inexpensive, user driven and platform friendly are core elements of Web 2.0.
*sigh* awesome application. Wonder when they are going to start shipping this puppy to Australia?
When they do - let us know!
Australian distributors
It is available in Australia - in Harvey Norman of all places! $2000 AUD IIRC
I liked the review so much that I clicked to their site to buy one but the price of their player bundle put me off. I think they are priced high.
But as I started to think about it, I wondered why do I even need to buy their player! I should be able to subscribe to Rhapsody Unlimited service directly and using my PC be able to set up whatever sonos claims to do. Ofcourse, my set-up might not have a sleek controller but it would save me a 1000 bucks.
Why not try Slim Devices Squeezebox, which does everything Sonos boxes can do and costs a fraction of the price. Not only that, but it is based on open source software!
can i suggest that techcrunch contributors differentiate their own comment from copy and paste from corporate PR/website…the following is clearly written by Sonos, it has its legitimate place in the article, I have no problem with that, but should be marked as from Sonos, not Techcrunch (”industry-first features”?):
The new Sonos plug-and-play experience with Rhapsody offers music lovers a variety of industry-first features, including:
Mac, Linux and PC users can now enjoy Rhapsody in every room. With Sonos 2.0, Mac, Linux and PC users alike will be able to access the world-class Rhapsody experience anywhere in the home.
Discover new music with Rhapsody’s Artist Radio. Just pick your favorite artist and Rhapsody creates a radio station with music from that artist as well as similar artists—to play all over the house.
Built-in music charts. Sonos 2.0 provides access to Rhapsody’s charts of the top 100 songs, artists and albums in hundreds of music genres, making it faster and easier to find and play great music—from the bedroom to the backyard.
Create an instant music library. When you hear a song that you like in the Rhapsody Music Guide or on Rhapsody Radio, you can instantly add the song or entire album to your music library— right from the palm of your hand.
Very cool.
Will the next offering be video, i.e., broadcast programs from your Tivo box to any room in your house… I wish.4
Nik,
Ok - let me know when its in Australia - and doesn’t cost an ‘arm and leg’ to actually purchase it.
At these prices, and for early adopters, these guys are up against bootstrapped approaches like our “MyPCTV” (see here) approach.
Not saying these guys are in the silly prices league, but they really do need to break into an early mass market in my opinion, its just too easy to hook a few $300 networked PCs into a music system and off you go……all you need is decent broadband
(I set MyPCTV up as a semi serious “Web 2.0″ style riposte to all the high ticket gear - IPTV etc - people seem to want me to buy to do what is really a fairly simple thing, and I have been surprised what is possible with a bit of tweaking).
I can imagine there may be an issue with my approach when contention rises as more people take in big bandwidth media, but that will impact antone who is trying to do real time feed rather than trickle n’ store
I have had the Sonos gear installed in my home now for over a year. The Media Room, the living room, bedrooms, patio and of course at the pool.
These units are by far the best thing since sliced cheese. Sonos support has been fanastic and the controllers are the envy of all the neighbors!
I have the sonos system installed in 3 houses. This new integration takes it from “really cool” to a true breakthrough system. In the past you could not access the entire sonos library from the controller - you could only access content that you had “added” to your “library” on your account. This has all changed and it’s really pleasing to use the system.
Many of the previous posts seem to miss the point that this is a wireless system with multiple nodes. You can control any number of rooms from one controller, without wires. This is an incredibly flexible system and the price point is a tiny fraction of wired systems that offer the same level of control…. without access to a music library like rhapsody.
This delivers on the promise that I think we all first saw with napster - but it’s legal and almost as cheap - 10 bucks a month for all you can eat. Incredible. And you don’t have download, rip, burn or anything else.
Let me join the chorus of happy users. You have to see this product in action to appreciate why it is more than just a distributed MP3 streamer. There is nothing more family-friendly than Sonos’ wireless controller with a color display (nice for cover art) and iPod-like controls, positioned conveniently on your wall in its charging cradle. Without booting up a PC, you can build playlists on the fly right on the controller. You can send different playlists, radio stations, and external line input sources to zones across your home, or you can distribute one perfectly synchronized stream throughout.
The Sonos/Rhapsody package is way too expensive. You can get the same thing — with just as good sound — from SlimDevices’ SqueezeBox with Pandora. And since SqueezeBox is open-source, there are thousands of free plugins for it.
Looks fantastic but is so overpriced I can’t see this ever surviving long term. There are other options out there at a fraction of the cost that stand a better chance.
Nik, I don’t think copying and pasting PR text into posts is a very good idea… the change from where you stopped writing and the PR stuff began is all too noticeable.
Can you not write your own copy - and be sound less breathless/be more critical than the marketing folks?
____
Further to other folks have said, what can a Sonos device do that a Squeezebox can’t?
Speaking as a former SlimDevices Squeezebox user that converted six months ago to all Sonos, I can say that Sonos is in a completely different league than Slim. The biggest differences are in the user interface and in the speed of the overall system. The Slim has no user interface to speak of unless you run it on a PC and when you get over 20,000 songs it slows to a crawl. Sonos has the remote control which is a marvel and is extremely responsive even with my 35,000 tracks. I liked the Slim system but it doesn’t hold a candle to Sonos.
The Rhapsody intergation is nice but it really doesn’t set Sonos apart like the other aspects. All the other media players have similar types of integration already.
@ Mark S
re Napster…in my opinion YouTube is becoming the video equivalent of Napster in its heyday - iffy quality but incredible range of Long Tail content.
I think the other difference is sonos also supports playing the same music on all boxes in your house at once properly syncronized so there is no echo effect. Not sure if anyone else has implemented that yet and actually has it working. It is expensive but each sonos box is a small pc essentiall with a wireless network built in, a four port switch, and a small amplifier to run the speakers. The fact that you can plug additional music sources into the back of one box (for example digital cable sound output or your conventional cd player) and listen to it on another box in another room is also a cool feature.
That is my two cents…
As Larry mentioned, it’s apples and oranges when comparing the Sonos and Squeezebox. Yes, the Squeebox does the job, it just doesn’t do it in such a unbelievably cool manner like the Sonos.
All I can is remote, remote, remote. It is what you are paying the high cost for. I have had a Sonos for over a year and it is definitely worth it.
The remote gets passed around parties with people adding tracks to the play list.
I second what Jay says: It’s all about the remote.
I also found that, with the addition of Rhapsody, I’m liberated from having to own and maintain a music library. I mean, I have 100 gigs of music for the Sonos, and I know that some day, the NAS will die. So of course I have to back it up. That process–ripping music, copying it to a drive, and backing up the drive–is onerous. For $10 a month, I have access to way more than I could ever own. Add in all the meta data Rhapsody delivers, and it’s no contest: This works.
I only wish Real, which owns Rhapsody, would merge/buyout Sirius or XM. I want this service in my car…
it’s funny though, it does read like a press release.
If you think Sonos/ Rhapsody is too pricey for you, check out the Pandora/ Squeezebox combo. Pandora lets you also stream your own radio channels which you create on basis of one song or artist. They pick music that fits that genre then thru what they call the Music Genome Project. Slimdevices’ Squeezebox lets you wirelessly stream Pandora stations as well as all your music on your computer to stereo near you. They start at $249 and while Pandora is free (ad supported) if you wnat to use with Squeezebox you have to subscribe ($36 p.a.).
This is still too much? Then be as cheap as I am: I use Pandora’s free service on my Powerbook and connect to my stereo via Airport Express. Total one time investment: $99 for a refurbished Airport E. and $29 for Airfoil, the software that streams audio from any app to your Airport E. (as Apple only supports iTunes). Works great and you can connect to as many rooms as you want, just need more Airport Express boxes.
I truly desire the Sonos system, but currently it doesn’t have a 5.1 solution does it? One poster mentioned that he uses it in a home theater situation, but if I’m really going to unify my music system shouldn’t some dvd-alicious 5.1 sound be able to be pumped into any room I want, and in 5.1 in whatever room has the speakers?