Disappointed with roon license structure

[VladDracule]

I had a simple need.

 

I wanted to be able to use whatever music software i purchased at both work and at home. I didnt want every pc i have to steam, i wanted to be able to use micro sd cards and external hard drives to prevent my main PC from always being on.

 

Apparently, with roons license structure, this isnt possible.

 

Roons installation, literally, does not allow you to plug in an external hard drive, and play music. You know, the basic function of music playing software.

 

That means i cant even play music using roon, on say my surface pro 4 in the living room/kitchen without my gaming rig being on to stream from.

 

I also cant just keep my music on an external hard drive and use roon at work to PLAY music.

I havent tested the android app but i daresay it would be the same story. I dont have a network drive, i dont want to spend the 600+ to get a good NAS, i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive.

 

because of this limitation, i VERY much regret my purchase, and am hoping the company is willing to give a refund

[miguelito]

I had a simple need.

 

I wanted to be able to use whatever music software i purchased at both work and at home. I didnt want every pc i have to steam, i wanted to be able to use micro sd cards and external hard drives to prevent my main PC from always being on.

 

Apparently, with roons license structure, this isnt possible.

That's just not how it works. I suppose if you had some different technology solution you could make that work but this might imply other shortcomings.

 

Roons installation, literally, does not allow you to plug in an external hard drive, and play music. You know, the basic function of music playing software

Room allows you to add music sources, a hard drive would be such.

 

Roon is NOT a music player software per-se, it is an ecosystem with metadata, seamless integration of library & streaming sources, and music distribution logic, with very lightweight clients as renderers. A whole lot more than a music player.

 

That means i cant even play music using roon, on say my surface pro 4 in the living room/kitchen without my gaming rig being on to stream from.

Or some other device serving as the core. You need such a device b/c Roon needs to be connected to the internet permanently (or at least often) to update metadata and such.

 

I also cant just keep my music on an external hard drive and use roon at work to PLAY music.

I havent tested the android app but i daresay it would be the same story. I dont have a network drive, i dont want to spend the 600+ to get a good NAS, i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive.

Roon is not meant to allow you "offline play" of your main library files as you wonder about...

 

because of this limitation, i VERY much regret my purchase, and am hoping the company is willing to give a refund

You should probably have done the trial period, and if not sure, go with the subscription model.

 

FWIW, Roon is perfect for me. I am amazed how much it's made me enjoy music, and frankly forget my rig a bit and listen instead... YMMV...

 

To achieve what you want, I would use Audirvana.

[VladDracule]

That's just not how it works. I suppose if you had some different technology solution you could make that work but this might imply other shortcomings.

 

 

Room allows you to add music sources, a hard drive would be such.

 

Roon is NOT a music player software per-se, it is an ecosystem with metadata, seamless integration of library & streaming sources, and music distribution logic, with very lightweight clients as renderers. A whole lot more than a music player.

 

 

Or some other device serving as the core. You need such a device b/c Roon needs to be connected to the internet permanently (or at least often) to update metadata and such.

 

 

Roon is not meant to allow you "offline play" of your main library files as you wonder about...

 

 

You should probably have done the trial period, and if not sure, go with the subscription model.

 

FWIW, Roon is perfect for me. I am amazed how much it's made me enjoy music, and frankly forget my rig a bit and listen instead... YMMV...

 

To achieve what you want, I would use Audirvana.

 

Most of what you posted, is irrelevant.

 

1) Separate installations of roon do not allow their own audio sources. I cannot install roon on my work PC if my library pc is on a different network and just plug in an external hard drive as a source. It literally, does not allow it.

2) having to be connected to the internet for metadata is in no way a valid reason to not allow using an external harddrive on multiple individual installations of roon, it can in fact, do that no matter what PC it is used on so long as it has internet access whether or not your "library" pc is powered on.

[17629]

Most of what you posted, is irrelevant.

 

1) Separate installations of roon do not allow their own audio sources. I cannot install roon on my work PC if my library pc is on a different network and just plug in an external hard drive as a source. It literally, does not allow it.

2) having to be connected to the internet for metadata is in no way a valid reason to not allow using an external harddrive on multiple individual installations of roon, it can in fact, do that no matter what PC it is used on so long as it has internet access whether or not your "library" pc is powered on.

 

 

His post is not irrelevant.

 

"I dont have a network drive, i dont want to spend the 600+ to get a good NAS, i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive."

 

If that's what you wanted, then that's what you should have bought. There's plenty of excellent free music players to pick from, and you can get a 2TB hard drive for about $100. Essentially, what you did is buy the internet equivalent of a radio, and are upset because the music doesn't come on CD's. If you want music on a HD, or any other drive for that matter, you need to buy it.

[davidbeinct]

Most of what you posted, is irrelevant.

 

1) Separate installations of roon do not allow their own audio sources. I cannot install roon on my work PC if my library pc is on a different network and just plug in an external hard drive as a source. It literally, does not allow it.

2) having to be connected to the internet for metadata is in no way a valid reason to not allow using an external harddrive on multiple individual installations of roon, it can in fact, do that no matter what PC it is used on so long as it has internet access whether or not your "library" pc is powered on.

 

I'm missing something. You can install roon on your work PC and plug in an external drive as a source.

[VladDracule]

His post is not irrelevant.

 

"I dont have a network drive, i dont want to spend the 600+ to get a good NAS, i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive."

 

If that's what you wanted, then that's what you should have bought. There's plenty of excellent free music players to pick from, and you can get a 2TB hard drive for about $100. Essentially, what you did is buy the internet equivalent of a radio, and are upset because the music doesn't come on CD's. If you want music on a HD, or any other drive for that matter, you need to buy it.

 

Tell me how buying a hard drive solves the fact that i cannot use the license at work, and plug in a hard drive to play music because my library manage computer is at home. Again, irrelevant information

[orgel]

This is the Roon deal at this point: One local area network per license. I'm surprised you didn't notice this was the case during your trial, but fortunately for you, I think that if you get in touch with Roon customer support, they'll give you some kind of refund.

 

On the Roon forums, the Roon team have talked about wanting to allow some kind of offline capability for mobile devices eventually, but that's really all I've noticed that's at all pertinent to your needs, and it's clearly not what you're looking for.

 

On the plus side, the one-license-per-LAN deal works out well for some people, since you can have multiple Roon Remotes and/or Roon Bridges, which makes it pretty easy to have synchronized (or completely different) music at various points throughout the home. I'd agree that it doesn't work in the home vs. off-site office situation. In my office I use what @Miguelito recommended — Audirvana — but note that it's Mac only.

 

—David

[17629]

Tell me how buying a hard drive solves the fact that i cannot use the license at work, and plug in a hard drive to play music because my library manage computer is at home. Again, irrelevant information

 

 

Maybe you should lose the attitude and pay more attention to the answers people are giving you. You're the one that doesn't know what you're doing, not us. I never said that buying a HD will solve your licensing problem, but you did ask about it.

 

"I also cant just keep my music on an external hard drive and use roon at work to PLAY music."

"i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive."

 

Those are your words that I'm responding to genius. Now, if you would have taken the time to read the rest of my post, I gave you a solution to your problem.

 

"Essentially, what you did is buy the internet equivalent of a radio, and are upset because the music doesn't come on CD's. If you want music on a HD, or any other drive for that matter, you need to buy it."

 

There's no other way to legally get music stored on a drive. If that's what you want, do what everyone else does, and buy some music and stop acting like a little crybaby.

[miguelito]

Most of what you posted, is irrelevant.

 

1) Separate installations of roon do not allow their own audio sources. I cannot install roon on my work PC if my library pc is on a different network and just plug in an external hard drive as a source. It literally, does not allow it.

2) having to be connected to the internet for metadata is in no way a valid reason to not allow using an external harddrive on multiple individual installations of roon, it can in fact, do that no matter what PC it is used on so long as it has internet access whether or not your "library" pc is powered on.

Roon doesn't follow the drive. I'm not sure what made you believe this...

[miguelito]

I'm missing something. You can install roon on your work PC and plug in an external drive as a source.

The complain is he needs to buy another license to play Roon at work. The one obvious solution is to put Roon core on a laptop that you bring to work!

[VladDracule]

Maybe you should lose the attitude and pay more attention to the answers people are giving you. You're the one that doesn't know what you're doing, not us. I never said that buying a HD will solve your licensing problem, but you did ask about it.

 

"I also cant just keep my music on an external hard drive and use roon at work to PLAY music."

"i just wanted a simple music player that allowed me to play music from a drive."

 

Those are your words that I'm responding to genius. Now, if you would have taken the time to read the rest of my post, I gave you a solution to your problem.

 

"Essentially, what you did is buy the internet equivalent of a radio, and are upset because the music doesn't come on CD's. If you want music on a HD, or any other drive for that matter, you need to buy it."

 

There's no other way to legally get music stored on a drive. If that's what you want, do what everyone else does, and buy some music and stop acting like a little crybaby.

 

This has nothing to do with attitude. I stated EXPLICITLY that i have external hard drives, i know my original installation of roon could use it as a source, so that was never the problem and i never stated it to be a problem, the only thing i stated was an issue, was the licensing, not the owning of external HDD's. I have close to 500 CD's i own and have ripped, me owning the music was also, NOT the problem. Dont tell me there is an attitude issue when that has absolutely nothing to do with it, and the original post was in fact, 100% irrelevant information.

 

That being said this issue is solved by roons support. They are 100% ok with passing a license back and fourth between PC's and allow unlimited deactivation of licenses and activation on machines so you can "pass" the license between pc's without any issue, which is the information i was missing

[Dr Tone]

You have one option to make it work right now as was mentioned above, install Roon Core on your laptop and take your HD with you to work.

 

Eventually they plan on having an option to sync a subset of your music library on your remotes to take with you. I'm hoping it comes with Roon 1.3

[Solstice380]

You have a licensed copy of Windows on your home computer, correct? You also have to have a licensed copy of Windows on your office PC, correct? You paid for both. No difference here.

[Cormorant]

That being said this issue is solved by roons support. They are 100% ok with passing a license back and fourth between PC's and allow unlimited deactivation of licenses and activation on machines so you can "pass" the license between pc's without any issue, which is the information i was missing

 

Ok then, problem solved for ya, crisis averted. I tried this deactivation and then reactivation process a few days ago when I set up RoonReady on my living room PC and moved RoonServer to my office PC. I was prompted by Roon to deactivate Roon on the living room PC and reactivate on the office PC. It was a straightforward process. That will be helpful for some people to know, that there are unlimited activations and deactivations. The key, it seems, is that there can only be one music network working at a time.

 

Miguelito also had a clever idea that might work well for some.

[Sal1950]

This has nothing to do with attitude. I stated EXPLICITLY that i have external hard drives, i know my original installation of roon could use it as a source, so that was never the problem and i never stated it to be a problem, the only thing i stated was an issue, was the licensing, not the owning of external HDD's. I have close to 500 CD's i own and have ripped, me owning the music was also, NOT the problem. Dont tell me there is an attitude issue when that has absolutely nothing to do with it, and the original post was in fact, 100% irrelevant information.

 

That being said this issue is solved by roons support. They are 100% ok with passing a license back and fourth between PC's and allow unlimited deactivation of licenses and activation on machines so you can "pass" the license between pc's without any issue, which is the information i was missing

 

Sounds like an enormous PITA to me.

Download the free and open source Clementine media player for your OS and give it a try on one of your boxes. You can point it at any sources you have and just enjoy. Live in the freedom and security of a GPL program.

[davidbeinct]

The complain is he needs to buy another license to play Roon at work. The one obvious solution is to put Roon core on a laptop that you bring to work!

 

I knew that, I was being deliberately obtuse. I come from the time when pretty much all PC software was one license, one machine. Roon does what it does so well yet there are always people out there who want them to give it away.

[VladDracule]

I knew that, I was being deliberately obtuse. I come from the time when pretty much all PC software was one license, one machine. Roon does what it does so well yet there are always people out there who want them to give it away.

 

Except it has virtually NEVER been that way with anything except OS's. Even microsoft office with its license system you could still install and view/edit documents/power points even if it wasn't officially activated on that machine. $1000 photoshop licenses can be used on multiple pc's under the same account name. The entire reason companies started the account system for use with their software, was for people who have multiple machines and want/need that software accessible and usable on all of those machines. The old single use license system is outdated and other companies have solved the issue using the account system, there's no reason roon couldnt follow the same model. Even 'passing' a license around like they have implemented is a bit of an archaic design.

[jhwalker]

Except it has virtually NEVER been that way with anything except OS's. Even microsoft office with its license system you could still install and view/edit documents/power points even if it wasn't officially activated on that machine. $1000 photoshop licenses can be used on multiple pc's under the same account name. The entire reason companies started the account system for use with their software, was for people who have multiple machines and want/need that software accessible and usable on all of those machines. The old single use license system is outdated and other companies have solved the issue using the account system, there's no reason roon couldnt follow the same model. Even 'passing' a license around like they have implemented is a bit of an archaic design.

 

"Virtually never" is an awfully strong statement. It was *always* that way (i.e., one machine, one license) in the early days (read: 1980s - early 2000s). It's only in the last 10 years or so that ubiquitous licensing has come along.

 

You young whippersnappers don't know how good you've got it!

[VladDracule]

one license one machine with virtually no authentication meaning that same license number could be entered on multiple PC's with virtually no restriction. Which is why companies back then didnt allow returns of PC games.

[davidbeinct]

I doubt the Roon team are getting truly rich on their software. Making a very comfortable upper-middle class income, sure. If I start seeing them driving around in Bentleys or Ferraris maybe I'll change my tune. So long as we keep the crazy money in the hands of people who do important things like run really fast and catch balls I'm okay. No crazy money for people who simply design the best software for music listening I've every personally used.

[Doak]

I'm missing something. You can install roon on your work PC and plug in an external drive as a source.

From what I read the OP "doesn't want to keep the PC on" for some reason.

Sounds, to me, like he bought the wrong tool for the job he wants to do.

[miguelito]

Except it has virtually NEVER been that way with anything except OS's. Even microsoft office with its license system you could still install and view/edit documents/power points even if it wasn't officially activated on that machine. $1000 photoshop licenses can be used on multiple pc's under the same account name. The entire reason companies started the account system for use with their software, was for people who have multiple machines and want/need that software accessible and usable on all of those machines. The old single use license system is outdated and other companies have solved the issue using the account system, there's no reason roon couldnt follow the same model. Even 'passing' a license around like they have implemented is a bit of an archaic design.

Roon is one core license. You can use as many clients as you wish. It is really amazing and versatile. If you want to take Roon with you, you will need a laptop to do so. Simple.

[17629]

This has nothing to do with attitude. I stated EXPLICITLY that i have external hard drives, i know my original installation of roon could use it as a source, so that was never the problem and i never stated it to be a problem, the only thing i stated was an issue, was the licensing, not the owning of external HDD's. I have close to 500 CD's i own and have ripped, me owning the music was also, NOT the problem. Dont tell me there is an attitude issue when that has absolutely nothing to do with it, and the original post was in fact, 100% irrelevant information.

 

That being said this issue is solved by roons support. They are 100% ok with passing a license back and fourth between PC's and allow unlimited deactivation of licenses and activation on machines so you can "pass" the license between pc's without any issue, which is the information i was missing

 

 

Lets have one last look. This was in your OP.

 

"Roons installation, literally, does not allow you to plug in an external hard drive, and play music. You know, the basic function of music playing software."

 

"I also cant just keep my music on an external hard drive and use roon at work to PLAY music."

 

"because of this limitation, i VERY much regret my purchase, and am hoping the company is willing to give a refund"

 

You're stating the above as fact. At this point it doesn’t matter if this is a license issue, or something else. What advice would you have? You're telling us that Roon definitely doesn’t do what you want it to do, and you're looking to get a refund. If that's the case, we can only assume that you are looking for different alternatives. People were just trying to help you, so like I said before, lost the attitude. It was you that didn't clearly state your problem. Now we find out that you finally called Roon in an attempt to address your issue. Had you done that in the first place, none of this would have been necessary. Less attitude and more thinking. Remember that for next time.

[Zakus]

one license one machine with virtually no authentication meaning that same license number could be entered on multiple PC's with virtually no restriction.

 

Wrong, where did you get that idea from, pirated software? Most software has a restriction of installing on 2 pc's or mac's. Read the licence agreements for Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft Word, even Audrivana +. None of these allow unlimited installation on multiple computers, just 2. HQplayer 1 only. ROON allows 1 PC/MAC with music stored wherever eg HDD and then how many you like end points albeit from same HDD on the same network. But it can play different tracks on multiple computers from the one HDD. I don't understand your complaint.

 

Edit. Oh by the way when you buy applications from Apple App Store how may computers can you LEGALLY install it on? let me guess unlimited? 20? maybe 10 actually limited to 5 machines. Not as many as you want, that's the licence.

[miguelito]

Roon is one core license. You can use as many clients as you wish. It is really amazing and versatile. If you want to take Roon with you, you will need a laptop to do so. Simple.

Looks like you can flip around the license easily back and forth (but obviously not use it at the same time in both LANs):

 

https://community.roonlabs.com/t/can-i-move-roon-core-to-a-new-computer-if-i-dont-have-access-to-the-old/9875