Spotify stops playing through HEOS speakers during second song

[CK1991]

New Problem after many moons of no trouble: First song plays well on HEOS, part way in to second song, the song continues to progress in the app but no longer a sound on HEOS speakers. Other HEOS music servers (Pandora, Amazon) play without incident from same phone via HEOS app. Have reset, reinstalled, restarted, and retried (from same and different devices) with no success.

[Ilonavp]

I have this problem for about 2 years now. Everything is always up 2 date. For me it happened after a HEOS update 2 years ago and sometimes there is a good day but most times it is very troublesome. one song goes well then 2 or 3 songs with stops, scraping sounds and so on.

[juicer]

I give up. Yesterday there was a firmware update (2.47.350) to all my seven HEOS units. Unfortunately this didn't help a bit, things are just as bad and unstable as before. I have a rock solid network from UniFi so that isn't the problem. The problem is that Denon cannot create working software. Anybody wants to buy a complete HEOS setup? 🙂

[Ilonavp]

After the update of yesterday it is even worse. My soundbar is working great though. My heos 1 sadly not.

[76ow6v-f_s0ov]

Following. AMP HS1 connected with ethernet and HEOS1 HS2 connected with WiFi on Ubiquiti network. Spotify drops connection on random moments. Combining both on Spotify will instantly kill the music…and will remove speakers from HEOS app.

[rudelm]

Hi, I've witnessed the same behaviour yesterday on a second gen HomeCinema Bar and the first gen Heos 1. I was unable to pair them and if I play separately to the speakers playback was stuttering and almost impossible.

I've downgraded the Heos 1 to its factory firmware 1.298.55(r65104) and its working fine. With the latest update to 2.47.350 everything is slow and looses connections. Looks like its a broken firmware update.

Unfortunately the Heos App doesn't allow me to group the speakers with the old version installed, so no win here.

[CK1991]

I am now running 2.47.350 on my HEOS1s, HEOS3, and HEOS5 and am experiencing good performance.  I can group my speakers, play music for an extended time, switch between playlists, change volume, etc... all without trouble. I am on a 2.4 network and running at Quality = Normal.  Performance definitely improved after I switched to Normal and power cycled each of the speakers per Denon's instruction in a thread I have going with them.  Worth trying if you haven't already!

[Ronny_Axelsson]

I've noticed that some of you mention having a UniFi/Ubiquiti WiFi (mesh) network, just like me.
Could that be the common denominator or are there other setups here too?

[juicer]

@Ronny_Axelsson It might be something with the UniFi network although I am not convinced about it. HEOS wasn't very stable even before I switched to UniFi. I have already tried disabling wireless uplink for all APs as I read this might help. I use wired backhaul but this is obviously not an option for everyone. At first, I thought it did help to discover speakers that were missing but my playback still stutters and stops when grouping speakers. I have a mix of WiFi and ethernet connections and today I will try to lock each WiFi connected speaker to a specific AP and see if that helps (someone in the UniFI forum suggested that). I might try to set them to only use 2.4 GHz also by create a new WiFi network only for HEOS but this seems like an awkward solution.

[rudelm]

I'm using both speakers with a LAN connection, but a Wifi Mesh in between. Switching to normal may be a workaround I could try. But honestly this should be fixed by Denon. The experience I have with Spotify and the original firmware is so much better than anything else they added afterwards. Changing the volume feels almost instant as well as skipping tracks. Newer firmware takes several seconds to react.

[shdreamer]

I tried now really everything (only 2,4 GHz, Power cycle, quality normal, Reset speakers, try only one speakers etc). Nothing helped I can use Amazon Music without problems but Spotify ist horrible. Radio (Tune In) also works perfect. I really can't understand why Denon ist not able to fix this problem. 

[juicer]

Today I got a response on the support ticket I logged with Denon a week ago:

"We can confirm a number of issues have been reported since the new firmware update we released back on the 13th April 2022 especially when playing Spotify through HEOS. These issues are currently being looked into by the engineering team and they will be resolved with a future firmware update."

So the good news is that Denon has acknowledged the problem and have their engineers working on finding a solution. There seems to be light in the tunnel 🙂

[Ronny_Axelsson]

That is very good news juicer, thank you. 👍
Now let's hope they can fix it once and for all, and also the issues that were reported before the update.
I have almost lost interest listening to music via Spotify. 😞

[Danfin]

I have been in contacy with HEOS support (00800-43674357) and there is a known problem for HEOS generation 1 when running Spotify connect. I have a small speaker generation 2 which are working good, home cinema system generation 1 is not working together with Spotify. TuneIN and Tidal is working goood on each system. They are working on the problem (I doubt...) and says is might be solved in three month!

So my conclusion is that it is time to start looking on other systems!

[NielsWa]

Same issue here, just replying to get notifications 😉 

[Jayweazy]

I’m sorry to say that I’m actually a bit happy that everybody here is having these issues just to know I’m not alone in this. Exactly the same problem here. I’ve spent quite a fortune (according to my standards) on 14 Heos speakers ranging from 1 to 7, not even including amp, link and Heos-compatible AVR. I’ve been using Spotify Connect via mesh wi-fi and it has been working great for years until all this started a couple of month ago making my setup completely unusable. Really hope Denon comes with a speedy fix to this. My patience is really wearing out.

[rudelm]

Great, this sounds like Denon will announce soon that the first generation devices aren't capable of being used with Spotify, because the processing power isn't sufficient... similar to what they did when AirPlay 2 was only available for second generation devices.

Well, at least we can still use them with the original firmware, although we cannot configure anything inside the Heos App then. Not cool Denon, not cool...

[MaartenC]

Same here, since in updated to 2.47.350 my Heos 1s 3s and Amp and Link all crash after a minute. 

[radar1965]

Hello team.

Do you know how to roll back the speaker firmware?

[radar1965]

Did yo roll bag the firmware?  I am running 2.47.350 and it is horrible.  If so, how did you roll back the version?

[Ronny_Axelsson]

FWIW, I decided to disconnect both my HEOS 3 and reset to factory defaults, in hope that I should be able to use the original firmware version.
No way. As soon as the speaker gets connected to WiFi, the HEOS app won't let me use it until the firmware has been upgraded.
I know there are settings in the app to disable firmware upgrade but I can not reach the settings until the firmware has been upgraded. 🤔
If anyone knows how to work around this, I'd be glad to know.

And, by the way, the speakers do not work any better now than before reset, in case anyone would think they should.
And I don't even use them in pair right now. What a joke. 🤣