After all, why pungle up a buck-short-of-$400 when, for $229, you could control your Sonos system with an iPod touch that just happens to also be an iPod touch? But the hardware controller is not dead to Sonos, as evidenced by the recently released $349 Controller 200 (CR200). The existence of that app basically torpedoed the CR100. (The CR100 uses a scroll-wheel/button arrangement, which makes entering text a little clumsy.) This application not only duplicated the functionality of Sonos’ $399 CR100 hardware controller, but was actually easier to use than the CR100 thanks to the iPhone app’s touchscreen interface and built-in virtual keyboard. The company chose to create the free Sonos Controller iPhone application. Sonos, makers of the Sonos Multi-Room Music System ( ), made an interesting decision several months ago.
