These days people are seeking a lot from their gadgets, they are looking for integrated home entertainment gadgets including multi room sound systems. The goal is simple: have a system that can seamlessly deliver music from a variety of sources in multiple rooms around your home. Sounds very futuristic but is actually very achievable.
There are a number of manufactures that provide multi room systems and these include Sonos who have a range of products available for every room in the house. We have been testing the Sonos 250 bundle which includes the zp90 zone player, the zp120 zone player and controller.
These three products when combined with the Sonos zone bridge will connect to your wireless network to create a Sonos network around your house. The ZP90 is an unamplified unit that will connect to your existing home theatre; the Zp120 is an amplified unit that provides an output of 55w per channel so you can add a set of hefty speakers to it.
All of the equipment is robust, well designed and very pleasing on the eye. Sonos have gone with the classic white with all their products meaning it will fit in any modern home with ease. We love that the zone players all look similar, they even look cool when you are not using them.
The sound quality from both units was very clear and worked well at quiet and loud levels. We played around a lot with the remote and toggled music on and off in each room, we tried playing from different sources in each room and also ran them in sync. In all examples the system worked really well.
Setting up the system is very simple and can all be controlled from the supplied Sonos coloured controller. This thing is a real beauty and will provoke envy from any visitor to your home as it sits in its recharging cradle, more importantly it is extremely easy to use. You can easily search and select music independently for each room. Sonos include options to listen to internet radio stations including last.fm and Sirius and you can even use paid subscription services like Napster.
Another cool feature is that your player can automatically update your twitter account with what you are listening too. New features like this are being added all the time and you will be sure to get them because your Sonos system automatically updates meaning you will have an up to date system forever.
If you have the cash to spare we would highly recommend Sonos, alternatives include Logitech’s Squeeze box range.
We have also reviewed the Sonos iphone APP and Sonos S5, both of which are great products (the app is a free version of the Sonos controller featured in this review).
