My house which I recently bought has speakers built into every room and everywhere outside. It is a house built for entertaining. Per the original owner, when he built the house it utilized "Nuvo" system. When I bought the house, it was on Sonos system. It has 4 zones on Sonos, and each zone controls probably 3-4 smaller areas, and some of those areas are still controlled by either volume knobs or by old Nuvo pads. I have worked with a local AV company to help me get the system to at least be somewhat functional, but it still leaves a lot to be desired. I know next to nothing about this stuff, so I present the following issues for your consideration:
Any advice is appreciated.
- 1. The single biggest desire I have is that I can simply/efficiently use my phone (iPhone) for operating the entire system. (Currently not possible due to the intermingling of Sonos app, Nuvo pads, and knobs.) I am NOT stuck on the Sonos system/app if there are better options.
- 2. I want to be able to control each area individually on my phone. By control, i only mean playing music / volume in a given area. Not playing DIFFERENT music concurrently in more than one area. As i mentioned above, there are four zones w/3-4 areas each, so there are a total of around 12-16 areas. (I haven't counted them)
- 3. If possible, I would like to be able to "program" pre-set groupings in which certain areas are already set to be on with the touch of one button. For example, an option for "outdoor entertaining" might turn on areas 5, 6, 10, and 12.
- 4. I mostly use Apple Music, and it is my strong preference to use it for home audio. But the Sonos app does a terrible job with Apple Music. Constant error messages, freezing/skipping songs, extreme lags, and sometimes it won't play at all. It seems buying individual sonos boxes might address the issues 1-3 above, but i don't want to spend another $5,000 doing that only to have an app that won't function well enough to accomplish my goal and be tied in with sonos equipment.
- 5. To the extent possible, I want to future-proof any further investment i make, so that the system doesn't become obsolete like the Nuvo system did for the original owner.
Any advice is appreciated.