Sonos causing router problem when using two wires

[Thomaz]

Hi
I have the latest Merlin fw (378.56_2) on my Asus RT68U. When I have two Sonos speakers connected simultaniously with ethernet to the router (only one ethernet works fine) the router gets a "broadcast storm" due to the Sonos using STP. The router lags, restarts, throws errors on the log etc. This is the same with or without STP enabled.

According to Sonos this is an ASUS bug thats supposed to have been corrected in the latest firmware.
https://sonos.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/42/kw/unsupported hardware/

I don't see this mentioned at all in the Asus official firmware. I would not like to leave Merlin for the official firmware.
So the question is: Has this been fixed in the latest Merlin release, or is it something that's coming?

 

[RMerlin]

Hi
I have the latest Merlin fw (378.56_2) on my Asus RT68U. When I have two Sonos speakers connected simultaniously with ethernet to the router (only one ethernet works fine) the router gets a "broadcast storm" due to the Sonos using STP. The router lags, restarts, throws errors on the log etc. This is the same with or without STP enabled.

According to Sonos this is an ASUS bug thats supposed to have been corrected in the latest firmware.
https://sonos.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/42/kw/unsupported hardware/

I don't see this mentioned at all in the Asus official firmware. I would not like to leave Merlin for the official firmware.
So the question is: Has this been fixed in the latest Merlin release, or is it something that's coming?

They will need to be more specific than "the latest firmware".

Any fix that Asus has made up to 378_9177 is included in 378.56_2. Anything newer will have to wait until I release a new version based on it.

 

[Thomaz]

Wow. Thats a quick reply

Thanks for the version info. That means there is a possibility its been fixed in the very latest firmware still pending for Merlin implementation. I will wait for next Merlin release and verify then.
If I get any version info from Sonos on which one they are referring to I will update it here.

 

[RMerlin]

You could try these test builds, which are based on 380_858:

http://www.snbforums.com/threads/preview-380-57-alpha-test-builds-for-all-models.28426/

 

[Thomaz]

Thanks. Tried the test build. A quick check on things: It seems more stable. With STP enabled the log is flooding, although playback is stable. With STP disabled the log is normal and playback still stable. Will check a bit more the coming days.

/Thomas


LOG WITH STP ENABLED:
Dec 2 18:56:16 kernel: br0: topology change detected, propagating
Dec 2 18:56:17 kernel: br0: port 1(vlan1) neighbor 8000.00:1d:7e:27:f5:15 lost
Dec 2 18:56:17 kernel: br0: topology change detected, propagating
Dec 2 18:56:18 kernel: br0: port 1(vlan1) neighbor 8000.00:1d:7e:27:f5:15 lost
.....(continously)

LOG WITH STP DISABLED:
Normal log output

 

[joegreat]

Reminds me to problems with older version of Asus firmware:

• There you need to turn off (unplug) all Sonos devices before the firmware update,
  
• do the firmware install,
  
• reboot the rooter fully (check that the router is functional),
  
• then re-connect the Sonos devices one by one with 5 minutes wait between each other...

I did not need to do this for a long time, but with the latest downgrade of the UPNP version, I get signs that I should do this procedure again...

 

[Authority]

Thanks. Tried the test build. A quick check on things: It seems more stable. With STP enabled the log is flooding, although playback is stable. With STP disabled the log is normal and playback still stable. Will check a bit more the coming days.

/Thomas

Curious - I have a bunch of Sonos too. Why are you enabling STP anyway?

 

[Thomaz]

Hi again,
@joegreat - Thats an interesting thought. I did not try the one-by-one-five-minute procedure. For now I just simply chose to go with one wired connection.

@Authority - Well, I dont se any use for STP in a regular home network. However, Sonos is using STP in the Sonos mesh network. And hence if you connect two wires the router as well has to handle STP. A bit more info in the link in my first post.

In order not to heavily load the Asus router, I connect Sonos with one wire. I have put my Sonos Bridge in the middle of the house and just let it wirelessly connect all the more remote speakers (internet is connected to one of the remote speakers)

 

[Authority]

In order not to heavily load the Asus router, I connect Sonos with one wire. I have put my Sonos Bridge in the middle of the house and just let it wirelessly connect all the more remote speakers (internet is connected to one of the remote speakers)

By "STP Enabled" you just meant "two plugged in"? Because I don't see that option to enable or disable it.

Slightly off topic, but were you aware Sonos no longer requires you to have ANY wired devices or a "Bridge"? You can go ALL wireless. The reason you might want to do that, is the antennas in your Asus are probably better than the Sonos Bridge anyway... and certainly better than any individual Sonos player.

It works great for me and I have multiple rooms with a Sound Bar and a couple Sonos subs.

 

[Thomaz]

@Authority . In the ASUS router you will find Spanning Tree Protocol under LAN - Switch Control.

Yes, I read about Sonos and connecting only wireless. There are pros and cons, of course. I chose to save my wifi bandwith for surfing and my chromecast. As of now at least

 

[Authority]

You'd probably be better off to run Ethernet to the Chromecast than the Sonos, as they'll use Wifi one way or the other. AFAIK it's not possible to turn wifi off completely on Sonos.

https://store.google.com/product/ethernet_adapter_for_chromecast

 

[coxhaus]

I found the following on the Cisco small business switch forums:

What we found was that you need to configure the 'main switch' to use the older 802.1d spanning tree and change the bridge priority to be 4096 to ensure it becomes the root for the topology. We also needed to change the STP port costs of all Sonos connected ports to be 10.

I don't know if you have port costs or which version of spanning tree you are using and whether this will help. I thought I would let you pick through it.

 

[Authority]

I found the following on the Cisco small business switch forums:

What we found was that you need to configure the 'main switch' to use the older 802.1d spanning tree and change the bridge priority to be 4096 to ensure it becomes the root for the topology. We also needed to change the STP port costs of all Sonos connected ports to be 10.

I don't know if you have port costs or which version of spanning tree you are using and whether this will help. I thought I would let you pick through it.

Is this supposed to be a router specific issue?

I'm using Asus Merlin with a dozen Sonos devices all wireless and have had no issues.

 

[Authority]

I chose to save my wifi bandwith for surfing and my chromecast. As of now at least :)

Seen this? I don't have one, I just bought the new 5GHz Chromecast instead. But to reduce wireless traffic it seems pretty cool.

https://store.google.com/product/ethernet_adapter_for_chromecast[/user]

 

[coxhaus]

I noticed Sonos hardware support seems to be old hardware. I think their network code like spanning tree is out dated. They don't seem to be keeping up with changing hardware.

PS
Actually now that I think about this, Sonos should probably change to trust the hardware network info structure which it is plugged into rather than try to control network spanning tree. Why even have the code in their system just trust the already running network. This way they are future proofed. Switches and routers change and Sonos doesn't even care as it will run on what ever you supply it.

 

[Authority]

I noticed Sonos hardware support seems to be old hardware. I think their network code like spanning tree is out dated. They don't seem to be keeping up with changing hardware.

PS
Actually now that I think about this, Sonos should probably change to trust the hardware network info structure which it is plugged into rather than try to control network spanning tree. Why even have the code in their system just trust the already running network. This way they are future proofed. Switches and routers change and Sonos doesn't even care as it will run on what ever you supply it.

If you think about how Sonos evolved it makes more sense. The idea of time syncing audio was pretty new and the way they did it was by requiring one device be connected by Ethernet and then creating their own Vlan and wifi environment even where one existed. That's slowly shifted to working on the users home wifi today.

As I understand it, only a relatively small percentage of Sonos users have their gear connected by Ethernet; in fact that was their value proposition anyway (wireless).