Why Roon?

[Joebah]

I have a massive collection of high resolution music on external hard drives. I typically just drag and drop what I want to listen to into Audirvana or sometimes HQPlayer. I am happy with this arrangement and certainly the sound quality (your can see me office listening setup in my signature).

 

I signed up for a trial Roon run, but immediately ran into problems (couldn't create a "core", no internet connection, blah, blah, blah....). After writing to Roon support and not receiving any timely response, I cancelled my free trial.

 

Why would anybody want this service? What advantages does it provide to someone like me that listens primarily to hires files from external hard drives? I have more music than I could listen to in the rest of my life on those drives. When I have some interest in more information, I Google it, or look at other sources like All Music Guide, Pitchfork, etc. 

 

Who is Roon for?

 

Please advise. I am still willing to be convinced, but dont' see the value yet.

[R1200CL]

32 minutes ago, Joebah said:

I signed up for a trial Roon run, but immediately ran into problems

 

Where did you install the Roon core ?

 

 

 

Alao I couldn’t find your posts on Roon forum. What’s your username ?

[davide256]

Roon = streaming. I'd suggest you have more pressing things to do if you use a Mac with Audirvana... like replace the Vlink with an Eitr. Streaming is great but the learning

curve is "fiddly"

[R1200CL]

8 minutes ago, davide256 said:

Roon = streaming.

 

Others would totally disagree ?

 

Actally one of Roon strongest features, is how it deal with your library.

 

You should try to convince this guy:

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/topic/46565-streamer-for-tidal-to-go-with-the-gungnir-no-computer/?do=findComment&comment=851900

[ShawnC]

Roon is great for Tidal integration, with that said Roon will help you discover a lot of material you have forgotten about.  You can dig really deep into the credits of Artist and find connections with other music in your collection.  The Genres get subdivided and I guarantee that you'll find stuff that you forgot you had.  Like all Software there's a massive learning curve, I didn't like it at first but it's grown on me since and it's all I use except for streaming away from the house with JRiver.  I bought the lifetime membership hoping they would grow as a company and they proven this with every update.  

[[email protected]]

I have Roon core on my Win7 PC, and Roon remote on my iPad.  I have a large collection of FLAC files on my network drive, and I stream from Tidal.

 

I like that both sources of my music are integrated in Roon.

 

I like the metadata that Roon provides, including lyrics for many tracks.

 

I like the Roon radio playlists based on music that I have just played.

 

I like the Parametric EQ that Roon offers, but when listening to MQA masters, one has to turn off all DSP processing in Roon.

 

I could go back to Foobar2000 and Tidal, but I like the convienence of Roon, and for those with large homes, multiple endpoints is a big feature.

[Joebah]

1 hour ago, R1200CL said:

One of my main points is that I could not install a core. I kept getting error messages that I was not connected to the internet, which were obviously wrong. And I do not have any firewalls or other things that might lead to that error message. I did not register on the forum. After sending a message directly to Roon support and not receiving any reply, I terminated my trial.

 

Where did you install the Roon core ?

 

 

 

Alao I couldn’t find your posts on Roon forum. What’s your username ?

 

[duxservit]

I also have a large collection of FLACs, ALACs and DSFs. Been using JRiver MC and Audirvana. Started using Roon a year ago. All music files are on an external drive. 

 

No no issues with installing Roon core on my main Mac. Roon took a couple of hours to “index” my music, but no glitches. Been running there almost 18 months. 

 

I’m now experimenting using an old MacBookPro as the Roon Bridge that connects to my DAC. Works beautifully. 

[[email protected]]

I had no problem installing Roon core on my Windows 7 PC

[arglebargle]

To the OP: quick, how many albums in your collection are on the Verve label? Roon knows that. Just one example of leveraging the available metadata. How many albums that Ahmad Jamal played on? Were produced by Rick Rubin? etc etc 

[R1200CL]

@Joebah Your answer is empty. Please write one more time. 

[audio.bill]

I have no experience with Roon but am curious about how well it would allow you to access your music files if many of them have incomplete metadata. Does it allow you to access your files in a folder view so that you can find your music by folder even if their organization and/or tags are incomplete? I realize that the artwork may be missing with incomplete tags, but am more concerned with still being able to access all files. I know that JRiver has this functionality but wasn't sure about Roon. TIA!

[Kal Rubinson]

11 minutes ago, audio.bill said:

I have no experience with Roon but am curious about how well it would allow you to access your music files if many of them have incomplete metadata. Does it allow you to access your files in a folder view so that you can find your music by folder even if their organization and/or tags are incomplete?

AFAIK, it does not.

[firedog]

15 minutes ago, audio.bill said:

I have no experience with Roon but am curious about how well it would allow you to access your music files if many of them have incomplete metadata. Does it allow you to access your files in a folder view so that you can find your music by folder even if their organization and/or tags are incomplete? I realize that the artwork may be missing with incomplete tags, but am more concerned with still being able to access all files. I know that JRiver has this functionality but wasn't sure about Roon. TIA!

Roon does not have folder view. If your albums aren't tagged it will tag them itself from it's database (unless you turn that feature off). It will also display album art. You can edit this information within Roon. 

[R1200CL]

1 hour ago, audio.bill said:

Does it allow you to access your files in a folder view so that you can find your music by folder 

 

Yes, it is possible but a bit tricky. You need to add folder by folder, then tag, and bookmark that as an folder. 

Files you later add to that folder will not automatically be shown under that bookmark unless you tell Roon. 

 

You will probably find out that folderview is not needed. 

 

If you need more than 14 days trail, you may be lucky and get more time before you decide. 

 

Here is my bookmarks as an example. 

 

H

 

Also note this option

 

 

[Uni]

I didn’t know why until I installed Roon Core on NAS and use iPad as Roon Bridge to my USB DAC.

 

WOW great improvement of SQ over my previous Audirance plus on iMac with SSD only. 

[Allan F]

On 7/29/2018 at 3:33 PM, Joebah said:

I have a massive collection of high resolution music on external hard drives. I typically just drag and drop what I want to listen to into Audirvana or sometimes HQPlayer. I am happy with this arrangement and certainly the sound quality (your can see me office listening setup in my signature).

 

Who is Roon for?

 

Please advise. I am still willing to be convinced, but dont' see the value yet.

 

IMO if you are using HQPlayer for upsampling and, like me don't subscribe to a streaming service, Roon is an expensive luxury that I can live very well without. The only drawback to HQPlayer is its very basic interface. That is by design, as Jussi prefers to apply his considerable skills to those aspects that make HQPlayer produce such great sound.

 

Ales Prochazka has developed a free Android app, HQPDcontrol, to remotely control HQPlayer. It provides a simple but effective interface that allows music selection by Artist, Album, or Genre. While I initially downloaded the trial version of Roon and, after some challenges, got it to work with HQPlayer, I could not justify its high cost after installing HQPDcontrol. I am more than satisfied with it, and I actually prefer its Album view to that of Roon. In addition, unlike Roon, it consumes virtually none of your music server's resources because it resides on your tablet or phone: HQPDcontrol

[diecaster]

I love Roon. I use it with HQPlayer to my 2 channel system and have multiple zones in my home and will be adding more. I would use Roon even if I did not subscribe to Tidal. I gave up on Audirvana because of the spotty support and horrific user interface.

 

Is Roon perfect? No, of course not. But it allows me to access my music easily and lets me explore new music in way I could never do with Tidal on its own or with Audirvana. I bought a lifetime subscription and 1.5 years in. It may be the best $449 I ever spent on audio.  

[asdf1000]

I'm loving Roon.

 

By the end of next year I'll have passed the milestone 4.2 year mark (USD499/USD119), after which Roon will be 'free' for me 😁

 

[paul30d]

12 minutes ago, Em2016 said:

By the end of next year I'll have passed the milestone 4.2 year mark (USD499/USD119), after which Roon will be 'free' for me 😁

 

 

My milestone is 3.8 (USD449/USD119) due to initial discount on the lifetime licence. It will be "free" for me from April this year. Time goes quickly and it has been a great purchase for me. The best thing for me is that I have users connecting reliably and happily from 5 different "fixed" locations within my home (hifi system, headphone system and 3 Apple TVs) as well as a bunch of iPhone connections over wifi. While over software can do this cheaper (JRiver, Plex), I don't think any do it as well as Roon. And it will soon be free for me anyway.

 

My only wish is that I could access my Roon server "on the road".

 

Cheers

Paul

[asdf1000]

24 minutes ago, paul30d said:

Time goes quickly and it has been a great purchase for me.

 

Tell me about it.

 

After I purchased the lifetime membership I was thinking if it was a good idea. Will they even be around after 4 years? Will there be something better and cheaper soon? 

 

But I've very quickly passed the halfway point and it's not long to go now until the 4 year milestone (next year).

 

And I don't know of a better solution (for my needs) still.

 

24 minutes ago, paul30d said:

My only wish is that I could access my Roon server "on the road".

 

This has been confirmed by the Roon Team to be coming. No timeline given but it's on the roadmap...

 

[maddog95]

I implemented Roon last November and am very happy with it. Before my initial membership is over I'll convert over to Lifetime to take advantage of the discount and forward pricing offered.

 

I understand the concerns of others regarding setup and I learned a LOT from the Roon Community forum on their website. Plus, I got responses within a day from their support team to my flagged questions.

 

I kept a diary of sorts while installing Roon, setting up and managing my digital files and configuring Roon to suit my needs. I'll post up a separate thread which will lay out what I did, and what I learned, when implementing Roon.

[DancingSea]

I'm a year into my Roon experience.  There is a lot to like about it for sure.  But, I ultimately only use it because the HQPlayer GUI is tedious at best.  If HQP had a modern day library management system, even something approaching the iTunes level, or Audirvana... and if HQP had an easy to use EQ (I know, its a sin) and track rating system.... I'd ditch Roon in a second.  Yes, the interactive magazine meta data element is second to none, I just rarely use it.  I prefer to play music and not read about stuff while I'm listening.

 

I'd happily pay a $100 - $150 flat fee for Roon with to subscribe for all meta data stuff.

 

But if wishes were horses, dreamers would ride.  HQP's GUI remains tedious, but its SQ is the best I've found.  And so I begrudgingly remain a Roon subscriber.  Begrudgingly because of cost, and also because Roon's standalone SQ is not great, HQP mops the floor with it, imho.  Even buggy Amarra sounds better than Roon.

 

To the positive, Roon is trouble free and the iPad app is great.  It is an excellent piece of software, but does feel overpriced - to my personal world view.  If it wasn't for HQPlayer, I would not use Roon at all.

[paultaylor]

On 7/30/2018 at 1:45 PM, firedog said:

Roon does not have folder view. If your albums aren't tagged it will tag them itself from it's database (unless you turn that feature off). It will also display album art. You can edit this information within Roon

But what happens if your albums arent tagged and Roon cannot identify them ?

[firedog]

32 minutes ago, paultaylor said:

But what happens if your albums arent tagged and Roon cannot identify them ?

You have to manually identify them. But there aren't many albums Roon doesn't identify at all. If you manually tag (even just an artist name or an album name), after that Roon will use your ID. But there are very few albums that aren't tagged at all. CDs all have at least some minimal tagging built in which should be copied when you rip them.  It shouldn't be a major issue.