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The Sonos Play:5 is a dazzling bit of kit. When used in conjunction with a ZoneBridge and the iPhone app, it's impossible to not fall in love with it.
We liked:
Normally, tech products like the Sonos would be out of reach of non-techy types, mainly because most products are so fiddly to use and tough to set up.
The Sonos is so straight forward in this regard, we can even see even the most staunch technophobes getting to grips with it fairly easily.
The system is just as easy to use as it is to set up, and rather a lot like a lot of equipment that Apple makes, it 'just works'. It does exactly what you want it to do, and all the options are exactly where you expect them to be.
We disliked:
We'd love to see Sonos adding the ability to playback music on your PC via the desktop app, but presumably it won't because it would prefer you spent money on an extra player.
This leads us to the main – possibly only – drawback, which is the price.
A Sonos Play:5 costs £343 and the ZoneBridge costs £79.99. So even if you use the free iPhone app instead of buying the CR200 controller, a setup of two players and one bridge will set you back a back-breaking £766.
It's a massively expensive option, and for this reason we simply can't give it the five stars it probably would otherwise deserve.
There are cheaper – albeit far less complete – options out there, so it's a real shame that most of us will be priced out of buying such a system.
Verdict:
A brilliant wireless option, which will instantly seduce anyone who craves an inter-home music system, it's just a shame it's so crazy expensive.
