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posted by martyb on Monday February 12 2018, @11:55AM   Printer-friendly
from the planned^Wscheduled-obsolescence dept.

Sonos, the consumer electronics company known for audio streaming and "smart" speakers, has decided that the music controller device, the "CR100", has reached end of life. By which they mean they will be pushing a software upgrade that will kill it.

... the next Sonos update in early April will turn off the CR100 connection -- unless you decide you don't want any updates at all. (Make sure you set that up in advance -- if you accept the update, you can't undo it and go back to using the old controller.)

That means if you want to keep on using a device you're happy with, you have to give up all the new features on all your Sonos speakers.

The company says its primary concern is the age of the lithium ion batteries in the controllers; although in that case an official device recall would be better than an update that stops them working - and a battery replacement scheme would handle the problem just as well.

Although the controller is old (Sonos stopped selling the CR100 in 2009) it is still perfectly functional for many users. However, according to a forum posting explaining the options these users will have to choose between the CR100 and the functionality of the rest of their system:

... opting not to update means you will not receive any new features or future security patches for your entire system – not just the CR100. For example, being on an unsupported version means that you might lose connectivity to music services, as is already the case for Google Play Music on the CR100. It is necessary to configure your system in advance to avoid future updates. Any update applied to the firmware and/or to the app, even unintentionally, is irreversible.

Originally spotted on The EEV Blog Youtube channel.


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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by iwoloschin on Monday February 12 2018, @12:54PM (4 children)

    by iwoloschin (3863) on Monday February 12 2018, @12:54PM (#636665)

    How hard would it have been to just freeze the code? You could even put up a disclaimer saying there's no more patches, even for security, so it's truly a "use at your own risk" device.

    I've got a couple of embedded projects at work that are in a "mature" state. The code is not really being actively maintained, but we're still building new devices because the code doesn't really need to be touched unless we find a bug. Even then, the few bugs we've found were related to EOL'd minor components (for instance, it's hard to get a 2GB µSD Card these days...) so they only needed to be applied to new devices, not backported to all existing devices. If someone really finds a major bug I can go back and pull up all of the code and fix it (after taking a few days to figure out what idiot wrote the code...and remember it was me...), but otherwise these projects are just coasting along until we either find a better solution or a major component becomes EOL'd and we're forced to find a better solution.

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday February 12 2018, @01:04PM (3 children)

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday February 12 2018, @01:04PM (#636667) Homepage Journal

    We're talking a "smart" appliance here. Google or some other external API you use a lot would update and break compatibility and everything that uses it would need updated. This is precisely why I hate syndicating our headlines to Twitter.

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by sjames on Monday February 12 2018, @10:08PM

      by sjames (2882) on Monday February 12 2018, @10:08PM (#636850) Journal

      But since this is just the remote control, they have 100% control over the API between it and the speaker. There's no reason they shouldn't be able to freeze the code for the controller.

      More concerning is the whole battery thing Sonos threw into the discussion. Either it's pure FUD to frighten people into throwing the controller away OR they made a device that turns out to be a firebomb and they should be on the hook to replace the controller with one using a safer battery formulation (there are a number of those that are interchangeable with the old Li-ION batteries).

    • (Score: 1) by dwilson on Tuesday February 13 2018, @05:45AM (1 child)

      by dwilson (2599) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 13 2018, @05:45AM (#637005) Journal

      This is precisely why I hate syndicating our headlines to Twitter.

      So... stop? Twitter is evil, Twitter is a Bad Thing, Twitter usage should not be encouraged... then stop enabling Twitter.

      I've seen enough of your posting to know you've got an inner BOFH. Channel that shit! If you find a Twitter-loving user, tell him to get stuffed.

      --
      - D
      • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday February 13 2018, @05:58AM

        by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday February 13 2018, @05:58AM (#637011) Homepage Journal

        We've currently got about three hundred of them but I'd keep supporting it if we only had a couple dozen. Every person who Rs TFA is someone I might get to argue about TFA with. Which is why I do all this in the first place.

        Honestly though, the Twitter syndicating code is much, much less insanity inducing than the RSS/ATOM code. The only bad part about it is Twitter is absolutely going to change the API and break it again sooner or later.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.