Roon Discussion Thread

[Dan Gravell]

I actually find companies that require a credit card before a free trial of any product not to be worth conducting business with.

It is a dubious practice and IMO again should be illegal. If your product is good and is worth paying for you will not need to force your customers to "opt out" of the trap!

 

From the point of view of the manufacturer, a couple of other reasons:

 

- It removes people who aren't as serious about the problem their software is solving, so they can concentrate resource on those that have opted in showing their trust.

- You tend to get much better feedback about the product when you have the trust relationship that only paying money really engenders. This is especially important early in a products' lifecycle.

[Keith_W]

Ah, so you need file/folder structure reading? Because meta data editing is too painful?

You're possibly barking up the wrong tree with Roon (as it currently stands).

I'm talking to one of the Roon guys this arvo so I'll ask about classical meta data handling.

Absolutely no interest in editing metadata. Point out to them, I have more than 18,000 files with names like "Kantate BWV 54 - "Widerstehe doch der Sunde" - II. Recitativo (Alto) "Die Art verrucher Sunden".

It is already organized the way I want it. All I want is for Roon to respect the folder structure.

[New Sensations]

Absolutely no interest in editing metadata. Point out to them, I have more than 18,000 files with names like "Kantate BWV 54 - "Widerstehe doch der Sunde" - II. Recitativo (Alto) "Die Art verrucher Sunden".

It is already organized the way I want it. All I want is for Roon to respect the folder structure.

You'll be waiting a long time.

[sir sanders zingmore]

Absolutely no interest in editing metadata. Point out to them, I have more than 18,000 files with names like "Kantate BWV 54 - "Widerstehe doch der Sunde" - II. Recitativo (Alto) "Die Art verrucher Sunden".

It is already organized the way I want it. All I want is for Roon to respect the folder structure.

If I understand correctly, the only reason you were looking at Roon was for HQplayer.

If so, I have a couple of questions.

- is there a sound improvement from HQplayer ?

- is there another interface you can use or failing that can't you just run HQplayer directly without a third party interface?

[Qwertyqaz]

HQ player is used if you want to get the most out of your audio.

Trial it, it's da ****.

[A J]

I can't wait to get my stuff back and get Roon going again (waiting on our container) - I'll be like a dog with two reproductive devices

[Jumbuck]

Correct me if I am wrong but HQP is a stand alone player so why do you need Roon? They work well together if you want the Roon front end but if just want to point a player to a file then just do it.

Edited April 20, 2016 by Jumbuck

[Keith_W]

If I understand correctly, the only reason you were looking at Roon was for HQplayer.

If so, I have a couple of questions.

- is there a sound improvement from HQplayer ?

- is there another interface you can use or failing that can't you just run HQplayer directly without a third party interface?

Hi Trev, what are you doing on SNA when you are on holiday with your family in Italy?

I don't know if there is a sound improvement with HQPlayer. So far I am listening to it on my main desktop PC, using the motherboard's DAC and a pair of cheap computer speakers. I can't hear a difference.

With HQPlayer, you are betting that your 64 bit PC does a better job of upsampling lo-res digital files than a dedicated upsampling chip found in some DAC's. Whether it actually IS better or not - I don't know. But I want to keep the option to use it open.

HQPlayer is only compatible with two interfaces - Roon and Muso. As I indicated earlier, Muso was built from the ground up to handle Classical music. However, it is browser based and NEEDS an older version of Internet Explorer. It does not play well with the Edge browser on Windows 10 - most importantly, you are not able to scroll so you are always stuck on the first page. You can't even scroll through the help files.

[Keith_W]

Correct me if I am wrong but HQP is stand alone player so why do you need Roon? They work well together if you want the Roon front end but if just want to point a player to a file then just do it.

The interface on HQP is very basic. But it does have something very important - it allows you to browse for your music BY FOLDER. Something Roon doesn't have.

The other major problem with HQP is that it is not touch screen friendly - the buttons are too small. I am building a new media center PC, and the parts are slowly arriving. I have already received my monitor - a 7" touch screen. If I can't control my PC through that, then it's off the list.

[djb]

I just find the cd and put it in the CDP

[Tony B]

I just find the cd and put it in the CDP

So did I a year ago, now I just don't touch them.

 

It's amazing how things change so quick.

 

Roon is Great!

[Keith_W]

You'll be waiting a long time.

That's fine, i'll keep going around telling everybody that Roon is garbage then

[Jumbuck]

I just find the cd and put it in the CDP

Still my preferred option despite being a big fan of Roon. I still have Roon in front of me even when playing a CD as a source of info/lyrics etc. Plus it is helpful in working out what CD I actually want to play as I know which ones I have a disc for and those that are digital only (and their format/resolution).

[rastus]

Oh my, oh my-my.... valid question: the Roon software developers don't listen to users (or potential users)? And it's not free, and I need a credit card, and I have to edit meta tags on all my collection, and I have to re-arrange how I store my music collection (let Roon do it for me), so much to think over. If I use Roon, and it re-arranges my collections' folder structure, will it put the folder structure back the way it was before it disembarks the ship?

 

Edit: And it helps me work out what CD I want to play? Now I know why it's not cheap, or free, it's intuitive.

Edited April 21, 2016 by rastus

[Jumbuck]

Oh my, oh my-my.... valid question: the Roon software developers don't listen to users (or potential users)? And it's not free, and I need a credit card, and I have to edit meta tags on all my collection, and I have to re-arrange how I store my music collection (let Roon do it for me), so much to think over. If I use Roon, and it re-arranges my collections' folder structure, will it put the folder structure back the way it was before it disembarks the ship?

 

Edit: And it helps me work out what CD I want to play? Now I know why it's not cheap, or free, it's intuitive.

Someone woke up grumpy today.

[Tony B]

Anyone running Devialet Air with Roon??

 

It's setup as a zone but I hear nothing.....

 

Usb is perfect.

[paul30d]

Oh my, oh my-my.... valid question: the Roon software developers don't listen to users (or potential users)? And it's not free, and I need a credit card, and I have to edit meta tags on all my collection, and I have to re-arrange how I store my music collection (let Roon do it for me), so much to think over. If I use Roon, and it re-arranges my collections' folder structure, will it put the folder structure back the way it was before it disembarks the ship?

 

Edit: And it helps me work out what CD I want to play? Now I know why it's not cheap, or free, it's intuitive.

 

 

Based on their forum, the Roon developers do appear to listen to users. A lot of what users wanted has been included in the last 2 updates. Some things naturally do get rejected/ignored or put on low priority. You cannot please everybody.

 

It does not rearrange your music storage, unless you specifically ask it to - in this respect, it is similar to many other available music management software options. I would not recommend letting it (or any other software) control where your music is stored, although it might be useful if your music collection is a complete mess to start with. It's not free, you do need a credit card.

 

I find the artist information to be a waste of time (as mentioned by someone else, generally you don't need to be told who Beethoven was, or who the Beatles were). But the linking between artists, albums and other performers is excellent. This is what the other poster meant by "helping me work out what CD to play next". If you are listening to the Eagles, you just click on "Don Henley" and you see all the albums in your collection by Don Henley, which you can click on and add to your playlist. It also suggests other music in your collection that might be "similar". For the Eagles, in my collection it is suggesting Crosby, Stills & Nash, Neil Young and also Billy Joel (maybe a bit odd). Then you can go click on those links and add something else to your playlist. I actually do find this type of thing very useful, and I end up playing stuff that I would probably not have thought of.

 

It's not for everybody, but it's not garbage. Personally, I like it very much, although I agree the price is a bit steep.

[wanta911]

Well I have the trial up & running and so far so good. I'll take my time and assess if it's worth the outlay.

 

Interestingly, I had a bit of trouble initially to get it to populate from the watched folder. My Music is on a NAS and the path is: smb://QNAPNAS/Music/AIFFMusic but it wouldn't do anything, so I shortened the path to: smb://QNAPNAS/Music and it started working straight away 

[Qwertyqaz]

Well I have the trial up & running and so far so good. I'll take my time and assess if it's worth the outlay.

 

Interestingly, I had a bit of trouble initially to get it to populate from the watched folder. My Music is on a NAS and the path is: smb://QNAPNAS/Music/AIFFMusic but it wouldn't do anything, so I shortened the path to: smb://QNAPNAS/Music and it started working straight away 

Why not use nfs share, why samba ?

[rastus]

1. Based on their forum, the Roon developers do appear to listen to users. A lot of what users wanted has been included in the last 2 updates. Some things naturally do get rejected/ignored or put on low priority. You cannot please everybody.

 

2. It does not rearrange your music storage, unless you specifically ask it to - in this respect, it is similar to many other available music management software options. I would not recommend letting it (or any other software) control where your music is stored, although it might be useful if your music collection is a complete mess to start with.

 

3. I find the artist information to be a waste of time (as mentioned by someone else, generally you don't need to be told who Beethoven was, or who the Beatles were).

 

4. But the linking between artists, albums and other performers is excellent. This is what the other poster meant by "helping me work out what CD to play next". If you are listening to the Eagles, you just click on "Don Henley" and you see all the albums in your collection by Don Henley, which you can click on and add to your playlist. It also suggests other music in your collection that might be "similar". For the Eagles, in my collection it is suggesting Crosby, Stills & Nash, Neil Young and also Billy Joel (maybe a bit odd). Then you can go click on those links and add something else to your playlist. I actually do find this type of thing very useful, and I end up playing stuff that I would probably not have thought of.

 

1. OK, I didn't look and was a bit pre-emptive, I should know better too (knowing what I do about software development).

 

2. I see, it's an option as apposed to being force upon. Manual categorization of music folder is tedious (but helps me remember where everything is), and usually reflective of my own preferences.

 

3. Indeed, I use google, sometimes that gives me something to do while listening to music.

 

4. mmmmm, yes well that is interesting isn't it... I do like that feature, it could open me up to new artists that I've never heard of before that are linked to the same genre or style of music that I may chose to play (depending on the moon phases), and I do enjoy many, many, many different styles and genres.

 

Thank you paul30d.

Edited April 21, 2016 by rastus

[wanta911]

Why not use nfs share, why samba ?

 

Good question - I don't know 

 

I basically have smb & afp as options between my MAC and my NAS and have found no difference when it comes to playing music files. What will NFS do for me?

[rastus]

"Native file sharing protocols always win out: In an intranet, network clients have several options, such as AFP, NFS and SMB/CIFS, to connect to their file server. But for the best performance, and 100% compatibility, the native client file sharing protocol is the right choice. So AFP is the best protocol for all Mac clients through OS X 10.8, SMB is the standard for Windows clients, and NFS is perfect between UNIX servers."

 

http://www.helios.de/web/EN/news/AFP_vs_SMB-NFS.html

[rastus]

Well I have the trial up & running and so far so good. I'll take my time and assess if it's worth the outlay.

 

Interestingly, I had a bit of trouble initially to get it to populate from the watched folder. My Music is on a NAS and the path is: smb://QNAPNAS/Music/AIFFMusic but it wouldn't do anything, so I shortened the path to: smb://QNAPNAS/Music and it started working straight away 

 

In this smb://QNAPNAS/Music the 'Music' folder is the configured as the shared folder. When you tried smb://QNAPNAS/Music/AIFFMusic, Roon recognised that it was not the actual shared folder... and if it had run, it would've missed all sub folders from the 'Music' folder. Or, your router does not recognise 'AIFFMusic' as a shared folder, but it does recognise 'Music' as a shared folder (which results the same as above). Either way, and as I don't know your exact network hardware and configuration, this is a guess.

 

Edit: Well some of it is a guess, not all. LoL!

Edited April 21, 2016 by rastus

[Dolphy]

That's fine, i'll keep going around telling everybody that Roon is garbage then

I don't think that a product that doesn't meet your specific needs can be classified as rubbish, I think you're being harsh.

Nothing is perfect, however I do agree on one point. All players should have an option to browse music via the folder structure.

Sent from my SM-G920I using Tapatalk

[wanta911]

In this smb://QNAPNAS/Music the 'Music' folder is the configured as the shared folder. When you tried smb://QNAPNAS/Music/AIFFMusic, Roon recognised that it was not the actual shared folder... and if it had run, it would've missed all sub folders from the 'Music' folder. Or, your router does not recognise 'AIFFMusic' as a shared folder, but it does recognise 'Music' as a shared folder (which results the same as above). Either way, and as I don't know your exact network hardware and configuration, this is a guess.

 

Edit: Well some of it is a guess, not all. LoL!

 

That makes sense