roon

[sheetmetalworker]

ive been running roon with tidal for about 6 months now. how has your experience been so far?

[Loop 7]

I'm 16 months in and, while I don't look forward to the renewal cost, I think I'm going to stick with it. Being able to search within a single place for local, NAS and TIDAL music is luxurious.

I realize with the myriad free and low cost applications available like iTunes, JRiver, Foobar and more, Roon seems really stupid to a lot of people but I find it extremely well designed and flexible. I've been working in software development for the last 12 years and realize a platform such as Roon is not cheap to build and support.

Of course my hope is that Roon's pricing decreases if adoption increases but I'm not holding my breath.

[mountain]

I'm considering roon.  I currently stream tidal from MacBook Pro to oppo 105 DAC via DAC.  I have iPad and iPhone that should also work with this setup.  I really miss easy access to album info, etc.  and am interested in the "surfable magazine".  How do u like it?  Does it work well identifying and streaming tidal, especially tidal mqa masters?  Suggestions appreciated?  Thanks.

[Casey Leedom]

I have a friend who loves Roon — the rich Meta Data is the main selling point for him. The available iOS Roon Controller works well enough on an iPhone and very well on the extra screen real estate available on iPads. Tidal is good as well.

Casey

[Loop 7]

Sept 27, 2017 16:18:47 GMT -5 mountain said:

I'm considering roon.  I currently stream tidal from MacBook Pro to oppo 105 DAC via DAC.  I have iPad and iPhone that should also work with this setup.  I really miss easy access to album info, etc.  and am interested in the "surfable magazine".  How do u like it?  Does it work well identifying and streaming tidal, especially tidal mqa masters?  Suggestions appreciated?  Thanks.

Roon 1.3 is the most recent version which has a lot of improvement so now is a decent time to do the trial.

Regarding MQA labeling when searching TIDAL (within Roon) icons to indicate TIDAL Masters (MQA) are NOT yet available. I believe it's one of the most requested features so I imagine it's coming soon. If this is a deal breaker, I would wait a month or two and then do the trail.

However, during playback, MQA is indicated as seen below.

[mountain]

I assume you can still just open tidal and see labeled masters to check on new releases.  Would  be happy doing that just once a week.

[sheetmetalworker]

I just renewed for a year of roon. I'm really enjoying the flexibility and quality of sound. I was a skeptic. But I'm now a believer in a computer based audio system. I'm 52 years old and learning every day....

[Loop 7]

Sept 27, 2017 16:57:32 GMT -5 mountain said:

I assume you can still just open tidal and see labeled masters to check on new releases.  Would  be happy doing that just once a week.

Correct, in the desktop app for both Mac and Windows, TIDAL masters are well identified.

[DYohn]

I’m a big Roon fan. Highly recommended.

[Loop 7]

I've been reading about Roon end points and this looks really interesting. It's another one of those solutions that essentially takes over a Rasberry Pi but appears to offer the simplest setup so far.


Link: RoPieee Roon Endpoint

[Casey Leedom]

Yep, the RoPieee solution is the simplest apparently. My friend struggled with a couple of distributions till I pointed him at RoPieee and he loved the simplicity. Though he was a bit embarrassed to be feeding his Teac NT-503 with a $35 Single Board Computer ... :-)

Casey

[Loop 7]

Nov 20, 2017 0:31:38 GMT -5 Casey Leedom said:

Yep, the RoPieee solution is the simplest apparently. My friend struggled with a couple of distributions till I pointed him at RoPieee and he loved the simplicity. Though he was a bit embarrassed to be feeding his Teac Nt-503 with a $35 Single Board Computer ... :-)

Casey

I like the inverted model of him using a thousand dollar DAC with such an inexpensive but effective end point.

[qdtjni]

Lifetime Roon subscriber since long and it seems like Stereophile likes it too.

Stereophile's Products of 2017 Accessory of the Year Read more at www.stereophile.com/content/stereophiles-products-2017-accessory-year#3wZjecSoyK6EKmZF.99


Stereophile's Products of 2017 Joint Budget Components of the Year Read more at www.stereophile.com/content/stereophiles-products-2017-joint-budget-components-year

RoPieee is is alos great with awesome support from Harry.

[wilburthegoose]

I, a cheap German, have a lifetime Roon subscription.

Yes, I love it that much.

I even built a Raspberry Pi Roon Endpoint for listing thru my old Denon AVR-4311 in my home office.    I could have used Air Play, but a wired ethernet connection sounds MUCH better.   Cost for the Raspberry PI + HiFi Berry sound card was about $60.

[DYohn]

People call me crazy or a victim of placebo effect, and those things might be true, but there is something about the way Roon handles data that makes it sound noticeably better to these ears than LMS did with all the same hardware. YMMV.

[sahmen]

Using Roon with lifetime subscription, together with several different endpoints in the same house: Sonore Ultrarendu and microrendu, Logitech Squeezebox Touch, Oppo UDP 203, and it rocks everywhere. I like how well it integrates Tidal with my own private CD rips and Hi-Rez downloads on my Synology NAS, and has them primed and ready to go with a couple of clicks at each endpoint. The music itself has never sounded this good to me in my lifetime, ever, and nor have I had any system of delivery that is this versatile and so easy to implement. True, between Roon itself, the network players, and various Linear Power Supplies, the system has often wreaked havoc on my poor little ole wallet.... Will I change anything, if I had to do it over? Heeelll No! The only thing I regret sometimes is not having started it all much earlier.... But "late" is still a hell of a lot better than never, in this case. A lot, lot, better.

[wilburthegoose]

Nov 20, 2017 9:37:37 GMT -5 DYohn said:

People call me crazy or a victim of placebo effect, and those things might be true, but there is something about the way Roon handles data that makes it sound noticeably better to these ears than LMS did with all the same hardware. YMMV.

Sounds better to me too.

[kybourbon]

Nov 20, 2017 10:08:24 GMT -5 sahmen said:

Using Roon with lifetime subscription, together with several different endpoints in the same house: Sonore Ultrarendu and microrendu, Logitech Squeezebox Touch, Oppo UDP 203, and it rocks everywhere. I like how well it integrates Tidal with my own private CD rips and Hi-Rez downloads on my Synology NAS, and has them primed and ready to go with a couple of clicks at each endpoint. The music itself has never sounded this good to me in my lifetime, ever, and nor have I had any system of delivery that is this versatile and so easy to implement. True, between Roon itself, the network players, and various Linear Power Supplies, the system has often wreaked havoc on my poor little ole wallet.... Will I change anything, if I had to do it over? Heeelll No! The only thing I regret sometimes is not having started it all much earlier.... But "late" is still a hell of a lot better than never, in this case. A lot, lot, better.

I had never heard of Roon. I have a Synology NAS as well with a hundreds of thousands of HD Audio files.

I am going to be getting Roon.

They should give everyone in this tread a bonus.

[wilburthegoose]

kybourbon -

10 years ago, I had 5 Sony CD changers running into my Denon, controlled by an ancient (but very futuristic) product called Slink-E (which let my PC control what track was playing). It was great fun, but eventually I ripped my 2,500 CD collection to MP3. I was happy until I got my XMC-1.

Then, I decided to take the plunge and re-rip all my CDs to FLAC. Now we're getting there! But JRiver was kludgy and my wife didn't like it.

I bumped into Roon somewhere on the internet. I installed with every intention of doing a trial and deleting it. I had been using JRiver, and was doing fine. But Roon is a new paradigm. It blew me away.

Today, I have Roon music playing thru my XMC-1 via my Oppo UDP-203 (Oppo is a Roon endpoint). My home office is using a Raspberry Pi endpoint that gets FLAC-quality audio to my old Denon. And even in the bedroom, I have it set up to play through an old Apple TV to my TV speakers. All controlled with my iPhone, iPad, or a Samsung Android tablet.

[kybourbon]

Nov 20, 2017 13:44:05 GMT -5 wilburthegoose said:

kybourbon -

10 years ago, I had 5 Sony CD changers running into my Denon, controlled by an ancient (but very futuristic) product called Slink-E (which let my PC control what track was playing). It was great fun, but eventually I ripped my 2,500 CD collection to MP3. I was happy until I got my XMC-1.

Then, I decided to take the plunge and re-rip all my CDs to FLAC. Now we're getting there! But JRiver was kludgy and my wife didn't like it.

I bumped into Roon somewhere on the internet. I installed with every intention of doing a trial and deleting it. I had been using JRiver, and was doing fine. But Roon is a new paradigm. It blew me away.

Today, I have Roon music playing thru my XMC-1 via my Oppo UDP-203 (Oppo is a Roon endpoint). My home office is using a Raspberry Pi endpoint that gets FLAC-quality audio to my old Denon. And even in the bedroom, I have it set up to play through an old Apple TV to my TV speakers. All controlled with my iPhone, iPad, or a Samsung Android tablet.

Excellent. Right now I have a custom built HTPC attached over the network to my Synology NAS. I have a bunch of FLAC and Super Audio CD rips on the Synology. I am using J River as well for my front end but haven't always been 100% please with it as I think it struggles with huge libraries and albums that aren't tagged just perfectly.

My audio only system consists of the Synology --> HTPC --> Marantz AV7005 preamp --> Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 1 --> Ascend Acoustics Sierra 2 and dual 15" sealed Rythmik subwoofers.

I have been contemplating upgrading to the XMC-1 if I can find a gently used one at a great price.