Automated home veteran Paul Gordon is mourning the decision by Sonos to end support for his much loved CR100 controllers.
Sonos have heard the reaction of their users and issued up to £100 to customers to help ease the pain. Here’s Pauls views on the iPort xPress keypads…
Here’s an update on the iPort express keypads. sure enough all 3 of them were a devil to initially setup – in every case they continuously refused to join my WiFi network, then continuously refused to find any players once on the network, and then continuously refused to see my Sonos Favourites.
Each of them took about an hour to setup, 55 minutes of which was with my iphone on the desk continuously stabbing the “retry” button a dozen or a lot more times for each of the 4-5 steps required in the setup process.
Eventually, I finally got them all configured and deployed, and considering that then, there have been zero issues with any of them talking to their associated players, so there really is nothing wrong with my WiFi.
In use they are a little slower to respond to a lot of commands than a CR100 – I have mounted my 3 iPort keypads ideal next to my 3 CR100’s in an endeavour to maybe over time be able to wean myself off the CR100’s.
The slower action is a lot of obvious when stopping playback – the music stops quickly when I hit the play/pause on the CR100 – before I even have time to lift my finger off the button, whereas there’s a guaranteed and obvious delay when I pause the same stream from the iPort. starting the stream doesn’t give the same obvious difference, likely because there’s an inbuilt delay that either device has to bear, in actually making the connection over the Internet and starting the stream – you can see this clearly when starting it from the CR100, when the display briefly says “connecting…” and/or “starting…”
Volume adjustment is also subject to a minor delay on the iPorts, I suspect they need to go into a low power mode – they are after all purely running on battery, with no constant charge connection like the CR100’s have. When pressing a button on the iPorts, there’s a short (maybe 1 second) delay until the white LED on them flashes a couple of times, which I presume is it waking up and reconnecting to the WiFi. once you’re used to it, the delay isn’t unbearable, although it can be a little disconcerting at times, especially when one is used to the immediate action one gets from the CR100s
I find I do rather like the favourites functionality, and that is something I’d typically thought would have been a great to have on the CR100’s, although the lack of any kind of feedback about what particular much-loved is selected by means of the keypad isn’t the best end user experience in the world, and makes it impractical to have a lot more than a few favourites assigned to the keypad (I’ve stopped at 3 favourites per pad). alternating through them kinda indicates I have to stop, wait for the stream to start, listen for a few seconds, and then I can figure out which particular much-loved has just been selected, and whether it’s the one I want or not.
There are 2 mounting options in the box – one is specifically created to be used with a decora faceplate, and considering that I don’t have decora faceplates in my house (I have CBUS light switches everywhere), I don’t use that mounting option considering that it wouldn’t look all that terrific (exposed screw holes etc.) The other option is just a small rectangle of plastic with a magnet on one side and double-sided tape on the other to stick it to the wall. This is the mounting option I’ve used. In use, I’m finding this a less than entirely satisfactory experience; the magnet isn’t very strong, and doesn’t hold the keypad firmly in place. I haven’t found myself knocking it absolutely off the wall yet (and considering that 2 of 3 CR100s are next to shower room hand basins that could be rather destructive). I don’t think it would take much to knock them off though. I have however found that when pressing buttons on them, the whole keypad has a tendency to step (swivel) on its magnet, so they end up being misaligned, and to someone as OCD as I am, not being in best portrait orientation jars. I think the decora option would be better in this regard, as there’s actually an indentation that the entire keypad sits within – and presumably a proper faceplate over the top would also help too, so maybe I can try to source a few of them and contrive a better mounting arrangement.
So all in all a somewhat mixed set of experiences and reactions so far, but it is early days yet. I am however thankful that for the time being at least, I do still have my trusty and ever reputable CR100s to hand.
Available from Amazon
142 ReviewsiPort Xpress Audio Keypad for SONOS
control your Sonos music quickly with the push of a button
Magnetically mount anywhere, easy to get hold of and go
Set up in minutes using the iPort app for Apple IOS devices only
get on Amazon
iportproducts.com/xpress
Reproduced from original forum post by kind authorization of Paul Gordon.
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Last update on 2021-10-04 / affiliate links / images from Amazon product advertising API
Automated home veteran Paul Gordon is mourning the decision by Sonos to end support for his much loved CR100 controllers.
Sonos have heard the reaction of their users and issued up to £100 to customers to help ease the pain. Here’s Pauls views on the iPort xPress keypads…
Here’s an update on the iPort express keypads. sure enough all 3 of them were a devil to initially setup – in every case they continuously refused to join my WiFi network, then continuously refused to find any players once on the network, and then continuously refused to see my Sonos Favourites.
Each of them took about an hour to setup, 55 minutes of which was with my iphone on the desk continuously stabbing the “retry” button a dozen or a lot more times for each of the 4-5 steps required in the setup process.
Eventually, I finally got them all configured and deployed, and considering that then, there have been zero issues with any of them talking to their associated players, so there really is nothing wrong with my WiFi.
In use they are a little slower to respond to a lot of commands than a CR100 – I have mounted my 3 iPort keypads ideal next to my 3 CR100’s in an endeavour to maybe over time be able to wean myself off the CR100’s.
The slower action is a lot of obvious when stopping playback – the music stops quickly when I hit the play/pause on the CR100 – before I even have time to lift my finger off the button, whereas there’s a guaranteed and obvious delay when I pause the same stream from the iPort. starting the stream doesn’t give the same obvious difference, likely because there’s an inbuilt delay that either device has to bear, in actually making the connection over the Internet and starting the stream – you can see this clearly when starting it from the CR100, when the display briefly says “connecting…” and/or “starting…”
Volume adjustment is also subject to a minor delay on the iPorts, I suspect they need to go into a low power mode – they are after all purely running on battery, with no constant charge connection like the CR100’s have. When pressing a button on the iPorts, there’s a short (maybe 1 second) delay until the white LED on them flashes a couple of times, which I presume is it waking up and reconnecting to the WiFi. once you’re used to it, the delay isn’t unbearable, although it can be a little disconcerting at times, especially when one is used to the immediate action one gets from the CR100s
I find I do rather like the favourites functionality, and that is something I’d typically thought would have been a great to have on the CR100’s, although the lack of any kind of feedback about what particular much-loved is selected by means of the keypad isn’t the best end user experience in the world, and makes it impractical to have a lot more than a few favourites assigned to the keypad (I’ve stopped at 3 favourites per pad). alternating through them kinda indicates I have to stop, wait for the stream to start, listen for a few seconds, and then I can figure out which particular much-loved has just been selected, and whether it’s the one I want or not.
There are 2 mounting options in the box – one is specifically created to be used with a decora faceplate, and considering that I don’t have decora faceplates in my house (I have CBUS light switches everywhere), I don’t use that mounting option considering that it wouldn’t look all that terrific (exposed screw holes etc.) The other option is just a small rectangle of plastic with a magnet on one side and double-sided tape on the other to stick it to the wall. This is the mounting option I’ve used. In use, I’m finding this a less than entirely satisfactory experience; the magnet isn’t very strong, and doesn’t hold the keypad firmly in place. I haven’t found myself knocking it absolutely off the wall yet (and considering that 2 of 3 CR100s are next to shower room hand basins that could be rather destructive). I don’t think it would take much to knock them off though. I have however found that when pressing buttons on them, the whole keypad has a tendency to step (swivel) on its magnet, so they end up being misaligned, and to someone as OCD as I am, not being in best portrait orientation jars. I think the decora option would be better in this regard, as there’s actually an indentation that the entire keypad sits within – and presumably a proper faceplate over the top would also help too, so maybe I can try to source a few of them and contrive a better mounting arrangement.
So all in all a somewhat mixed set of experiences and reactions so far, but it is early days yet. I am however thankful that for the time being at least, I do still have my trusty and ever reputable CR100s to hand.
Available from Amazon
142 ReviewsiPort Xpress Audio Keypad for SONOS
control your Sonos music quickly with the push of a button
Magnetically mount anywhere, easy to get hold of and go
Set up in minutes using the iPort app for Apple IOS devices only
get on Amazon
iportproducts.com/xpress
Reproduced from original forum post by kind authorization of Paul Gordon.
Share this:
Facebook
Twitter
Reddit
LinkedIn
Pinterest1
Email
More
WhatsApp
Print
Skype
Tumblr
Telegram
Pocket
Last update on 2021-10-04 / affiliate links / images from Amazon product advertising API
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