How much do you listen to music? If you love having music playing in your environment, AND you have a somewhat large living or work space, AND you get tired of having to return to a particular room in your space to control your music, AND you otherwise were going to have to start drilling holes in walls and floors to run cable, then the Sonos Digital Music System is for you. It's the current state of the art for wirelessly controlling music in a large home or business where you need just the right music in the right room at the right time. And best of all, it's powered by GNU/Linux!
In a nutshell, the Sonos DMS is a series of Linux-powered wirelessly networked amplifiers on steroids (called Sonos ZP100 ZonePlayers) controlled by a Linux-powered hand-held device (called the Sonos CR100 Controller) that looks like an large iPod. A software package called the Sonos Desktop Controller sits on your Windows or Mac computer and helps the handheld Sonos CR100 Controller talk to the your Window or Mac box. Linux customers use their familiar GNOME or KDE tools to do the work that the Sonos Desktop Controller software would do on Windows or Mac. The idea behind the Sonos DMS is that you the consumer should be able to have one device that will allows you to play any music of your choice seamlessly in any room in your house, even if you are two floors and five rooms away from the room where you want to switch from the Rolling Stones to the Motown.
For the average person, the powerful functionality of the Sonos DMS is overkill. But for someone who really loves music, and loves to entertain large groups in multiple rooms, the Sonos DMS makes life lots easier and more interesting. The Sonos does a very impressive job of allowing you to “set and forget” the music themes for multiple different venues in one physical setting; and to remotely rearrange your music at the touch of a button. For people or businesses which need this kind of upscale detailed control, the Sonos DMS will make it lots easier to create different musical moods in different rooms. Same for families with diverse music tastes.
One other big advantage of the Sonos DMS that should be mentioned up front. Using the so-called analog loophole, the Sonos DMS lets you legally by-pass some of the DRM lock-down sweeping the music industry! Tux has just gained an impressive new ally in the battle for the couch. More on that later.
