How to Setup SONOS with CasaTunes

CasaTunes provides 2-way integration with SONOS. CasaTunes allows you to listen to your SONOS music on your CasaTunes speakers, and (optionally) listen to your CasaTunes music on your SONOS speakers.

Steps to setup SONOS Port/Connect devices and SONOS Speakers with CasaTunes

Setup your SONOS Port/Connect device(s) and speakers

To add one or more SONOS streams to a CasaTunes multi-room audio system (matrix), and to play your CasaTunes music or other matrix connected sources on your SONOS speakers, soundbars and devices, you must add a SONOS Port or Connect device. This devices acts as a bridge, allowing CasaTunes access to SONOS audio via an input source on the matrix, and allowing SONOS devices access to CasaTunes music via a preamp output on the matrix that is connected to a SONOS Line In.

Figure 1: Adding a SONOS Port/Connect device as a 2-way bridge

To listen to your SONOS music on your CasaTunes speakers, simply add a SONOS Port/Connect device, and physically connect the audio output from the SONOS Port/Connect device to an available input source on your matrix. Depending on the type of input source connection available on your matrix use either the analog L/R, digital optical, or digital coaxial output.

To listen to your CasaTunes music and other sources connected to your matrix on your SONOS speakers, soundbars and devices, you must also connect the preamp output of an available matrix zone to the SONOS LINE IN on the SONOS Port/Connect device.

After you have configured all your SONOS Port/Connect devices, add any additional SONOS speakers to the household and follow the SONOS instructions for configuring these.

CasaTunes works with all SONOS speakers (that support the SONOS Control API), including SONOS Era 100, Era 300, One, Five, Arc, Ray, Beam, Playbar, Port and Amp.

CasaTunes discovers all your SONOS speakers and automatically configures these speakers as additional rooms in CasaTunes.

Adding more than one SONOS Port/Connect devices

To listen to more than one SONOS stream at a time on your CasaTunes speakers, or to listen to more than one CasaTunes source on SONOS speakers at the same time, you will need to add multiple SONOS Port/Connect devices.

The number of SONOS Port/Connect devices you can add to your matrix depends on the number of input sources available on your matrix. For example, on a CasaTunes CT6X6 matrix amplifier, you could add up to six SONOS Port or Connect devices (or streams). However, in practice, you probably need only one, or perhaps two at the most, SONOS Port or Connect devices.

Depending on the number of SONOS Port/Connect devices you are using, we recommend 2 different SONOS device naming strategies for these devices. If you are using a single SONOS Port/Connect device, we recommend you set the name of your SONOS Port/Connect device to SONOS. If you are using multiple SONOS Port/Connect devices, we recommend you configure the name of each SONOS Port/Connect device based on the name of the primary user of the device, for example, "David's SONOS" or "Jodi's SONOS". Assigning a user's name to each device, makes it clear to users whose SONOS device is selected, and helps prevent users from interfering with each others listening.

This completes configuring your SONOS devices, as well as the wiring of your SONOS Port/Connect bridge devices. The next step is to configure the CasaTunes software.

Setup CasaTunes using CasaTunesX

The next step is to configure the SONOS Port/Connect devices as CasaTunes Sources using the CasaTunesX App, and configuring the preamp output to use to allow the SONOS devices access to the CasaTunes music.

Use the CasaTunesX App to configure and Control CasaTunes. The CasaTunesX App is available for Amazon, Android and Apple networked devices, as well as anyHTML5 browser. To start the browser based version of the CasaTunesX App, open your browser and type in the following URL:

Now, select  Menu > Settings > System Setup > Sources  option (see below) in the CasaTunesX App.

Figure 2: Configuring Sources using the CasaTunesX App

For each SONOS Port/Connect device you want to configure as a CasaTunes source, follow these steps:

Figure 3: Setting up a SONOS source using the CasaTunesX App

Note: CasaTunes automatically configures your SONOS Port/Connect devices to use a fixed volume output.

Next, we need to configure the matrix preamp output you previously connected to the SONOS Port/Connect Line In. This is used to play CasaTunes music and other matrix sources on the SONOS speakers and soundbars

Note: CasaTunes automatically hide these outputs, and configure them to use a fixed volume output.

How to control SONOS using the CasaTunes Apps

CasaTunes uses SONOS Port/Connect devices connected to your multi-room audio system as a 2-way bridge, bridging the SONOS and CasaTunes systems together.  The SONOS Port/Connect devices connected to your multi-room audio system appear as sources, while the SONOS speakers appear as rooms.

With CasaTunes you can listen to music playing on any SONOS Port/Connect device or SONOS speaker in any combination of rooms, regardless of whether they are CasaTunes multi-room audio powered speakers or SONOS speakers.

Listening to SONOS audio

To listen to SONOS music in a room, follow these steps:

  • Open the CasaTunes App
  • Select the room to use
  • If the room is not a SONOS speaker, then power on the room and select the SONOS source to use
  • Tap on the tune button to reveal the select music options
  • Options include Open SONOS (launch the SONOS App), select from a list of SONOS favorites (organized by music service), or select a SONOS playlist
  • To browse and/or search for SONOS music to play, select the Open SONOS option to launch your SONOS App, make sure the SONOS source or SONOS room is selected, then select your music. Once you have completed selecting your music you can return to the CasaTunes App by tapping the option to return to CasaTunes App located at the top left portion of the screen (< CasaTunes) on iOS devices, and selecting the back button on Android devices
  • Depending on the source selected, you can also select TV Audio1 (on SONOS soundbars) or a music source connected to a SONOS LINE IN (for example, a vinyl player), if the SONOS device supports it
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To open the SONOS App from the Now Playing screen, simply tap the Now Playing artwork (album cover or station logo)
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We recommend creating a robust list of favorites and/or playlists for your users. This way users can quickly select the music they want to listen to without having to open the SONOS App

Listening to CasaTunes sources on SONOS

Similarly, you can listen to any CasaTunes source on any of your SONOS speakers and soundbars in any combination of rooms, regardless of whether they are CasaTunes multi-room audio powered speakers or SONOS speakers.

  • Open the CasaTunesX App
  • Select the room to use
  • If the room is not a SONOS speaker, then power on the room
  • Select the CasaTunes source for the room
  • If this is a CasaTunes media player source, then tap on the tune button to select your music

Listening to your SONOS TV Audio or Line In sources on CasaTunes

Depending on your SONOS devices, you can select to listen to your TV Audio1 (on SONOS soundbars), or a music source connected to a SONOS LINE IN (for example, a vinyl player), anywhere in your home.

To listen to your TV Audio or Line In source in one or more rooms:

  • Open the CasaTunesX App
  • Select the room for your SONOS soundbar or SONOS Line In device
  • If the room is not currently switched to playing your TV audio or Line In source, then Pick Music or select the tune button, scroll down to the Line-In Devices section and select the TV Audio or Line In source option. Return back to the Now Playing screen
  • Note: When you select a TV Audio source, CasaTunes will turn on the TV
  • If you want to listen to your TV Audio or Line In source in other rooms, then select Menu > Group Rooms with <room name>
  • Select the rooms where you want to listen to your TV audio or Line In source

1Note: When you group a SONOS soundbar with other SONOS speakers, SONOS injects an audio delay, anywhere from 75 ms ~ 2 second, on the audio played on the grouped speakers. You can configure the amount of latency using the Group Audio Delay setting in the SONOS App. To avoid listening issues caused by this latency, do not group a SONOS soundbar with other speakers in the same room.

Grouping CasaTunes and SONOS speakers

When you want to listen to your music in various rooms in your home, pick the Group Rooms menu option, as illustrated below:

Step 1: Select the MENU option in the header. Step 2: Select Group Rooms ... from the menu. Step 3: Select the rooms to group with the Office. These can be any CasaTunes or SONOS speakers

Changing the volume for grouped CasaTunes and SONOS speakers

When a room is grouped together with other rooms, you can change the volume for the group of rooms, or each individual room.

In this example, the Office, Family Room and WIC are all grouped together. To change the volume for the group use the Master volume controls. To change the volume for an individual room use the specific room volume controls