8. Tests

I conducted distance tests, sound-quality tests and signal interference tests on the Sonos ZonePlayers, and, where applicable, my SqueezeBox Classic.

Distance Tests

I wanted to see if sound quality suffered when I moved the ZonePlayer further away from the ZoneBridge, and found that it remained clear and consistent in every setup I tried. First, at a distance of 30 feet and with three walls in between, the ZonePlayer 120 operated well between the office and the living room. In the kitchen, which added another wall and a few more feet, nothing changed. Finally, I moved the ZonePlayer 90 into the garage out back—the farthest possible distance on my property that has a power plug—and tried to see if it could access signal from the ZoneBridge about 55 feet away. No problem, even with the garage door shut. Its a bit dark and scary in there, but I was glad to know I could host a garage dance party without signal dropping out. From the garage, the 90 synced perfectly with the 120 in the living room more than 80 feet away, while both played the same music.

Signal Interference Tests

We conducted three interference tests that were designed to throw off the wireless network. None of these scenarios is likely to occur in your home, but we wanted to see just how much the SonosNet could handle. It turns out that it can handle quite a bit, and to be clear, I never experienced musical hiccupping or stuttering at any other time than during these tests.

Aluminum Foil

I wrapped a sheet of aluminum foil—a well-known wireless-range reducer—around the ZoneBridge to see if the sound quality of the 90 in the garage or 120 in the living room would be affected. I experienced no degradation in quality. At one point, after covering the bridge in foil, the Controller’s wireless signal appeared to drop from four solid green bars to one red bar, but then the bars rebounded back up to four bars after a few seconds. It appeared as though the ZoneBridge boosted its signal after sensing some interference.

Microwave

Next, the 90 was set up in the kitchen near the microwave oven, with the SoundBridge about 7 feet away from the 90. I played a track on the 90, and after 10 seconds I turned on the microwave; the track stuttered and then stopped completely. An error message appeared on the Controller that said it could no longer find the audio file. After two minutes, the zone recovered and the song needed to be replayed.

Next, I tried to find out if the microwave would affect the living room audio equipment. Keep in mind that the SoundBridge, as well as the wireless router that the SqueezeBox relies upon, are both relatively near to the microwave as well. Both living room devices (the 120 and the SqueezeBox) were affected by the kitchen microwave. Tracks stuttered, stopped briefly, and then recovered. SqueezeBox lasted longer before stuttering, but the Sonos recovered faster once the microwave was turned off.

Cell Phone

I placed one cell phone on top of the 120 in the living room, and one atop the SoundBridge in the office, then called one phone from the other. The wireless radios were right up against the Sonos devices, and weren’t able to take down the Sonos, though I did hear some stuttering in the track playing in the living room. We tried to reproduce these results on the SqueezeBox, but couldn’t get the phones to sit on top of the router or SqueezeBox, so the signal interference wasn’t as dramatic.

Sound Quality Tests

We conducted our sound quality tests in my living room, where I have a Panasonic Xr55 receiver and a set of Ascend Acoustics Sierra 1 stereo loudspeakers, which have impressive sound quality and extension down to 40hz. I compared the Sonos ZonePlayer 120’s amplifier to this Panasonic receiver, and the ZonePlayer 90’s digital and analog connections to the SqueezeBox’s digital and analog connections.

Amplifier Test

I listened for differences in sound quality on the same set of tracks when played via the 120’s amplifier and my Panasonic digital amplifier. I tried to note distinctions in imaging / soundstage representation, distortion, and range (highs, lows and midrange). The banana plugs on my 12-gauge speaker wires didn’t quite fit tightly into the binding posts on the Sonos, but once inserted, the sound quality from the Sonos was impressive. I noticed that the Panasonic amp could get a good deal louder than the Sonos amplifier in my living room, though I hadn’t noticed this in the office. This is also most noticeable on certain very subtle classical tracks not mastered as loud as most modern music. I was impressed by the near-identical sound quality the two amps produced over my speakers—they are both "Class D" amplifiers—and especially by the ability of the Sonos amp to power my speakers at full range (without a subwoofer). The Sonos amp managed to pump quite a bit of bass into the speakers.

Digital and Analog Test I played the same tracks over the ZonePlayer 90’s digital connection and the SqueezeBox’s digital connection, while both relied upon my Panasonic receiver, and could not tell the difference between the two—both were excellent. When I moved the two devices to analog connections to test the DAC (digital to analog converter) chips, I also could not discern a difference between the two. Both devices produce high-quality analog signals.