Roon Labs users?

[AlfaGTV]

I've just started a trial of Roon Labs music software and was wondering if some of you good folks had any experience to share?
http://www.roonlabs.com
Software is created by the Sooloos guys and it truly is a new xperience for handling a large file based music library!

[lovejoy]

I tried it - I loved it - I bought a years subscription. I find myself using it more than anything else, so I shelled out for a lifetime subscription (as they had a discount on at the time).

A lot of people will say its a hell of a lot of money for a piece of music management software, but it's the most trouble free reliable, flexible and gorgeous piece of music management software I've ever used. It has made me treat the collection of digital audio files on my NAS drive as a serious music collection. The way you no longer have to faff about with tags or where all of your files are stored and just let Roon do everything for you (after you've told it EXACTLY how you want everything sorted) is just astoundingly good and it means you can forget about organisation and just enjoy the collection. The way it keeps track of your files by using their audio data is genius. The 'discover' page I use regularly if I'm feeling a bit like I need some inspiration of what to listen to and every time, without fail it takes me on an unexpected journey of enjoyment of my own collection. If I'm listening through headphones through my DAC connected to my PC it recognises the DAC and uses its own drivers and it sounds amazing and it outputs the correct bit-depth and sampling frequency depending on your files too. It handles any file format you care to throw at it (which when you've got a large FLAC connection and a Mac that's a real bonus).

Most of the time though I just have the server running and use my Sony tablet to navigate it with. The server then outputs to my Raspberry Pi via Airplay (at the moment) and I have the most seamless and enjoyable digital music system I've ever had. I know it integrates very well with Tidal too but I dropped my Tidal subscription as I just prefer Spotify these days (most of my streaming is done when I travel rather than at home).

I'm also very excited about the future of Roon. Roon Speakers to me will be the icing on the cake when there is a dedicated Raspberry Pi build for it.

[AlfaGTV]

Thanks Richard! It seems to me i'll have to take the punt for a subscription too!
It's really in a different league to other playback software.
And as of today they even support Squeezebox players (still beta, but available nevertheless)
I actually put together a short intro about e basics in my own language, but i think ill make an effort to translate it into the Queen's English!

[Cotlake]

I'm also very excited about the future of Roon. Roon Speakers to me will be the icing on the cake when there is a dedicated Raspberry Pi build for it.

I am currently using RPi with HiFiBerry sourcing Tidal through ickstream and controlled by Squeezepad. Having seen Roon in use I am also anxiously awaiting Roon Speakers. You mention a dedicated RPi for it. Can you give a bit more detail please or a link to further information on this.

Thanks

[struth]

Had mixed reports re Roon system. It is pricey but if you guys rate it then sure it must be good. Ive got Jriver which is dear enough along with Amazon prime whos music is better than many give credit to. Look forward to more updates to this thread

[Kit1cat]

Was keen to try this, then found out it does not support the older ipad's.

[Light Dependant Resistor]

Hi
I am always suspicious of firms like this that do not out of the box provide Linux
but at least they are thinking about it. https://community.roonlabs.com/t/roon-for-linux/2116/9

Many other nice alternatives in Linux already, so not too much to worry about if they don't
provide for the other half of the world.

Cheers / Chris

[lovejoy]

I am currently using RPi with HiFiBerry sourcing Tidal through ickstream and controlled by Squeezepad. Having seen Roon in use I am also anxiously awaiting Roon Speakers. You mention a dedicated RPi for it. Can you give a bit more detail please or a link to further information on this.

Thanks

Yes, there is a discussion about the Raspberry Pi build over on the Roon Forum here: https://community.roonlabs.com/t/ras...i-support/1129

Specifically this quote from one of the Roon developers:

RoonSpeakers is in the works, both for Raspberry Pi type users and with hardware partners. It's probably a few months out, but it's being worked on. Raspberry Pi 2 is one of the first platforms we will target for that stuff.

[lovejoy]

Was keen to try this, then found out it does not support the older ipad's.

Yeah, that's a real shame. I also wanted to run it on an older Dell Latitude I have surplus to requirements. Would have made for a perfect little headphone based listening system but Roon is pretty graphics processing intensive and has to run on OpenGL3 in Windows. I gather it's down to processing speed in the original iPad that stops it from working well too.

[AlfaGTV]

Brief overview of music management system Roon Labs
Prerequisites:
*. A well functioning network preferably both wired and wireless.
*. A computer with access to the same network.
*. A music library available on the network as a share. Not a necessity but a good starting place for Roon to identify your musical prefs.
*. A Tidal subscription. Not necessary either but a very worthwhile addition.
At least one of the above music sources is critical. Otherwise it would'nt be of much use would it?
*. An audio output solution either on the computer intended as library manager or in the form of a networked Airport Express/Squeezebox
*. A Roon Labs account (Free trial 14days, 1yr subscription $119, Lifetime subscription $499)
*. Preferrably a tablet connected to your local network, such as an iPad to remote control the library and allow for the option to get freakin 'puter out of the listening room

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Lets get started! Go to roonlabs.com and download your library software. It installs itself and automatically selects the normal "current user Music-folder" as the source for music locally.
It will also ask you for your musical prefs and add predefined collections of music from Tidal in gernes such as Jazz, Pop, Rap Classical. These are curated playlists from the Roon guys and contain "must have" albums for each genre. These are NOT stored locally on your pc, they are included in your library but wil play from Tidal when called for. So, if your sub. ends these wont be available.
That may or may not be the preferred source of music so i personally pointed Roon to my network attached storage.
It does not take long for Roon to identify the source files and build the library. It does, however, take considerable time to do the complete analysis of each file.
This part is not necessary for being able to use the library but it caches file info such as a visual description of the song, establishes volume normalization levels etc.
While the library is being built, you might as well go configure some audio endpoint. From the beginning your defult audio output from the 'puter will be available.
In the Settings dialogue you'll quickly find the Audio Setup page. Here you can enable and configure your preferred audio output solutions.


XMOS USB Audio 2.0 is the USB->AES/EBU-converter i use to better the audio output on my MacMini. It is then wired to the corresponding input on my preamp/streamer/DAC Bladelius Embla via AES/EBU, hence the given name "Embla"


When clicking on the cog wheel symbol to the right of enabled audio output you get the full configuration dialogue for each unit. This is the XMOS USB Reciever settings available for my Gustard U10. As you can se, there is an option for sending DSD to the unit, in either native or DoP-mode.

Thats about it, let's enjoy the music! Oh, no, wait! Set the option to "Allow remote" if you are planning to remote control your library from a tablet or other computer. Otherwise youll end up scratching your head for some time, as i did :/
The view of the software is pretty much identical wheter you are using it on your computer or on a tablet, so these are screen dumps from my iPad.

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Overview screen
At the top of the screen there is always this browser-like navigation bar

To the very left is the main meny from where you have easy access to Overview, Settings, Artists, Albums etc. Then there are the usual browser-like navigational buttons. To the right side the bookmark function allows you to go back to certain views that you like and of course the search function. Find genres, composers,artists, albums etc in your collection.

The bottom part of the screen is dedicated to the playback controls

As usual; Rew, Play/Pause, Fwd to the left, after that the playlist symbol. Shifts the view to the current playlist and back to whatever you were viewing. The small "led" to the left of the artist name gives a clue to current playback conditions and whether or not you can expect a real HiFi experience. If it is purple you are playing RedBook lossless material and routing your audio through a lossless path with some forma of "exclusive mode" for the sound card. Give it a click to see the current "audio path":

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Settings are in place, your library is available and you have configured an audio path, lets play some music!

This is a compilation of the Overview-screen. The view is always in "landscape" and by scrolling the view up and down you wouls see something similar to this. Once in awhile some other sections are inserted here, such as the opportunity to add curated selections of music to your library etc.
Almost everything is clickable in Roon, artists, albums, genres, composers etc etc. As you can see in the upper part, its easy to add profiles for your household members that perhaps does not share your particular taste for Slayer and Burt Bacharach!
Your "physical" library is shared for all, unless they choose to hide certain artists, albums, genres. The Roon curated collections are added per profile so if your wife would like to add "death metal" to her profile that won't be visible for other profiles.

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Album- & Artist playback

As an example, i chose to play Rebecca Pidgeon - The Raven from my local library. The little pencil to the bottom left of the artist picture is for editing the album info and Roon labs uses it's own metadata which contain all the necessary connections and tags that makes Roon labs unique. However, some albums and collections gets classified in a manner i personally dont like. As an example i have a Jazz Collection of 25 classical Jazz albums. I dont want each of these albums as part of a "various artists" collection named "25 Jazz Classics", i want them as individual albums such as "Billie Holiday - Lady in Satin" etc.
As noted, almost everything is clickable and possible to use a springboard for a new musical experience. An example, when clicking "Alternative Singer-/Songwriter" in Rebecca Pidgeons view you are presented with this view:

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Playlists
This is an example playlist, with mixed songs from local and Tidal libraries. Trentemøller is playing at the moment, from local library. In queue is "She Zoremet" with "Infected Mushroom", this one from Tidal. The microphone symbol displays that lyrics are available through a click. I have pretty good structure on my library but Roon takes it to another level, adding lyrics, production and all other sort of info that makes it special.


Full screen focuses on the artwork as most other software does.

"Transfer to.." is a nice touch, let's you transfer the playing queue to another output. I still havent tried grouping different outputs togheter though. Thats not one of my prefs.

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Audio units
You can send the audio otuput to any unit you have configured (and enabled) in the settings dialogue, even Airplay units and Squeezebox's.

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Summary
After a few days i am amazed and looking to purchase a subscription of Roon. It has in a few hours managed to untangle my music library of about 50K tracks into an encyclopedia of musical experiences. Classical music is suddenly available in a completely different manner, listening to particular work, or learning more of the composers of this and that period etc. For me, very helpful, as i am a total "newb" on classic music.