A Warning against Bluesound (CI580v2) for Roon (Angry Customer Rant)

Audio Gear Talk BluOS: NAD & Bluesound
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Hello everyone.

Since these issues are never fixed, I write this post, to warn others from buying Bluesound devices. Hopefully it will save you a ton of headache and money.

The short story, Bluesound devices does not seem to be fully compliant with Roon, and from my experience, they has not been for years… There seems to be no interest from neither Roon or Bluesound to actually work on this and acknowledge the issues, which is perhaps the most annoying of it all, since they keep the Roon Ready certification.

My story started in 2019, when I started investing into a Bluesound-system instead of Sonos, and then I found Roon. Learning that these bluesound devices (Flex, Pulse, PowerNode, Node 2i, and so on) was Roon Ready, made me happy, but just for a short time… as the problems started to arise.

Back then I tried to run things on WiFi, and these devices were extremely bad with Roon on WiFI… I ended up in long support threads for months with Bluesound, and they always came back blaming either my network, or Roon. Problems was plenty, such as going out of sync, music stopping, slow start / general problems.

This resulted in me upgrading from a consumer ASUS-network, to first a entry point Unifi-system, to where I am now, with a professionally installed Unifi Pro-system with cat6a wired Ethernet for all devices. Everything generally works great in my network, and all other Roon devices I have work 100% flawlessly (including Raspberry Pi’s, Devialet Phantoms and more)

My current main-house setup, is a 12+ zone Roon system, and after some years not using Bluesound, I (stupidly) tried to give Nad CI580 v2 a chance, as it on paper should be a great device to solve my setup, as it gives you 4 zones in 1U in a rack… (I have a rack-mounted system with passive amplifiers.)

Anyway, the short is… these Nad Ci580v2 are bad… at least with Roon. Playing with them using BluOS they work fine, and Airplay and so on, but with Roon, they are just not cutting it. The main issue is, they rarely ever manage to play in sync with each other, nor other Roon Devices. There’s a noticeable latency difference, which is also irregular, so you can’t really adjust it with manual settings.

I am at a point where I will move back to Raspberry-pi based DAC’s to connect to my amplifiers, because these Nad ci580 v2 are quite much trash for Roon playback. I just can’t use them. They are fine for BluOS or Airplay playback, but with Roon, they simply don’t work well.

The annoying thing is, that never during my years (2019-2024) I ever got any solid response from Roon, and hardly from Bluesound. By the end of 2023, I actually did get a support mail thread with Bluesound where they claimed they were reproducing the issue (which should be just connect any Bluesound device and try play multizone-music from different sources a bit…) but in the end that support mail thread also just died out… I have sent in countless of “logfiles” from my Bluesound-devices and spent countless hours, but I am done.

My guess is - Bluesound don’t have the internal tech resources to address these, probably quite hard problems to work out, and they are worried that publicly talking about the issue would probably mean they will have to allow for a ton of product returns.

My strong advice is
DONT BUY BLUESOUND or NAD devices for Roon. They should have their Roon Ready status removed.

Personally I will try to refund these devices or sell them if that doesn’t work out as I am done with this company not caring about their customers.

If you have any questions about this, please feel free to reach out, and I will try to answer.

I have tried many different Bluesound-devices, and all of them I tried had similar problems, so my guess is it is in the Bluesound-system implementation the issue resides, and probably not the hardware itself.

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I have several bluesound devices & I don’t experience such issues. Multizone playback syncs perfectly across my network. Perhaps the issue is with the 580, rather than Bluesound per se.

For reference, I have an NAD m10v2 (wired), a pulse M pair (wired), and a powernode in the back yard (wifi). Even the wifi enabled powernode syncs with Pulses in the kitchen which always amazes me. On occasion, when I first change zone groupings with music playing it is noticeably out of sync, but generally all I have to do is stop playback, switch to a single zone, switch back to group zones and then it is fine. Annoying, but doesn’t happen too often to worry about.

However, I do not have cause to use multizones with any non-bluesound kit. Do you experience the same issues when grouping only Bluesound devices?

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Hi Dominic. Great to hear you’re happy, but I am curious if you have other “non Bluesound”-devices that you can play in sync with your Bluesound/NAD-devices?

The main issue I find is that the Bluesound devices plays out of sync with other brands or types of devices consistently.

I have a theory that it’s somehow related to CI580 also being a “4-zone” player. Grouping seems to be definitely involved in causing more issues… but I also have a Bluesound Node 2i that I hooked up just to test, and that also show similar issues as the CI580v2.

If I do group the bluesound-devices zones in the BluOS-app first (they appear as one single zone in Roon), then generally they play in sync with each other, but still not in sync with other Roon-devices.

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Well, you seem to be posessed or something, because my Bluesound devices are flawless as Roon endpoints and are 100% stable in all aspects, whether as Roon Ready endpoints or Bluesound devices. I have two Vaults and one Pulse Soundbar up and running, and have been since i bought the Soundbar.(very long time ago now)

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Maybe I am possessed… :imp:

Do you have “non bluesound-devices” that you also incorporate in your setup?

Do you run more than 4 zones? It seems to me that perhaps this is an issue that mostly occur the more zones I add.

I have also considered to try reduce the amount of zones I have (let like 3 rooms share and be one zone / one streamer) but I like the idea of being able to play what I like in any room…

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I have 2 blue sounds (node and powernode) Naim atom, wiim pro, wiim pro plus, Matrix 3i and a Sonos and they all work together in sync.

Only the Naim is wired all the rest are wireless and from the 2nd story out to the garden room.

The only flaky one is the Sonos which does disappear now and then.

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A mixture of Blusound, RPi & Heos devices here and all are working well. However all are hardwired with wifi only used for remotes.

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Yes, and yes…
But, what i don’t do is group Bluesound devices as i have no desire to play music in other places than where i’m located.
I have seen posts complaining about grouped devices loosing sync, where Bluesounds have been mentioned.

My response was another perspective on the Bluesound devices in Roon context.

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For what it’s worth, I run Roon on a NAD C700, Cambridge EVO 150, Moon 280D and Eversolo A6 with no sync issues now that all 4 devices are wired. On wifi, it was a different story.

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I agree with you regarding the CI580, it is garbage and NAD was zero help. I recycled mine years ago. If you want a reliable 4-zone unit, get the Whirlwind, as I did. I’ve had it at least 5 years and it works great. Very reliable and no syncing issues. I have at least 12 zones, probably more. I use a wide mix of Roon Ready endpoints. I don’t generally play them all at once, but I know I’ve had at least 6 on at the same time without issues. I do use two Bluesound Node 2i for 2 zones and never had an issue with them, just the NAD.

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I am currently using 3 endpoints in my Roon setup.

A Loxjie D30 DAC connected to my new daily driver. A brand new NUC running on Windows 11 Pro.

A Cambridge Audio CXNV2 connected to Ethernet.

And last but not least a Bluesound Node X connected to WiFi.

Both streamers are currently in my living room, while my ASUS router sits in my office.

I’ve had to get the Cambridge connected to Ethernet as it was suffering from dropouts while playing music using WiFi. Not just with Roon. It also happened with its own StreamMagic app.

The Node X on the other hand has been playing perfectly fine using WiFi ever since I’ve bought it in October of last year. Both with Roon and BluOS. Also when it was located in either the office or the living room.

I am not using zones. Especially not now that both streamers are connected to the same CXA81 amplifier.

I don’t recognize any of the Bluesound issues that you are describing. In my experience the Roon Ready status is well deserved.

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This is nothing new , I bought my original CXN maybe 8 yrs ago and eventually CA provided me with a “prototype” wi fi dongle I couldn’t get stable signal. This was pre-Roon .It was the primary driver to me putting in an Ethernet connection to the lounge where the Hi Fi sits.

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I love reading these “Brand X is Garbage, Don’t Buy It” threads. Users rarely stop to consider the implications of their own GIGO decision making or system design, and they often fail to RTFM, especially when mixing and matching different products.

I’m running various BluOS and AirPlay 2 endpoints in a house with 7 zones on various levels, inside and out. I’ve experienced something similar to the OP regarding latency issues when playing to a zone with mixed wired and WiFi connections (wired PowerNode, wireless HomePod, wired AirPort Express). But knowing it’s an issue, I access that ‘zone’ through AirPlay, and juggle the order in which the various endpoints are added. It’s a workaround, but I’m realistic in my expectations re WiFi latency and I don’t run around trying to cancel a brand.

I’ve been using NAD for 35+ years and currently run a PowerNode, a C658, C399, and M33 (plus various HomePods, airports and a CXN V2), all the wired connections perform perfectly and I’m planning on upgrading to an M66. Keep up the good work NAD…

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Most of my kit is NAD or bluesound. However, just tested with an old BOSE soundtouch which lives in an upstairs bedroom (wifi + airplay). There does seem to be a little latency, but tbh I would never be using this in a group.

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I’ve used NAD before, in the days before bluesound, and had no issues.
The OP did take the time to write a very long post here and seems to have put in a lot of effort to get it resolved, the fact that others may not have the issue doesn’t mean they didn’t RTFM.

This post isn’t going to “cancel” a brand, I’d buy NAD again but I don’t ever use multi room, if I ever did I might look for another solution.

Thank you to the OP.

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I am aware there’s definitely users who find many Bluesound and NAD products to work as of today, and I am happy for them. Potentially it is just these CI580v2, that are by now, getting quite old, and a bit different I guess, as they offer 4 zones in one device…

Some of the issues I encountered in the past, when running more Bluesound-devices, might have been adressed in firmware updates by now, but there has been plenty of issues over the years, and I know tons of others who have had plenty of issues with Bluesound so I am definitely not alone :slight_smile:…

It was very frustrating to have the Bluesound support continuously blame my networking in the past, even making me buy new networking hardware to no avail… their support seems to be only one guy on their forum, who typically just write general guidance responses.

I sent in multiple logs and tried to talk with their support over mail many times, but to no avail.

At the same time I never had any issues with other type of Roon-devices, so it was always limited to the Bluesound-stuff.

The issues I have had recently, are mostly related to the CI580v2, so I won’t say too much about other devices, but I bought these CI580v2 just for the sake that they are supposed to offer 4 zones / unit for a simple and streamlined setup in a rack, but they have not performed as they should.

It’s worth mentioning that they have even showed these “Out of sync” issues when only playing zones from one of them (grouped in Roon), and it’s all wired on cat6a ethernet… It’s also the type of error that does not always happen, but often enough to make you frustrated crazy.

I am curious if there’s anyone who have a similar setup and use these units (CI580v2) very succesfully…

My big frustration is the amount of time and money invested, and the lack of serious response from Bluesound/NAD especially. They never bothered to do any thorough attempts to try fix the problems, or communicate back in any more serious way than “we’re looking into it”, which I find annoying when you have paid a lot and invested into their hardware.

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I’d recommend changing the thread title to something more relevant, as of now it’s just clickbait and you’re gonna get agitated responses.

And you’d perhaps be more informed by responses from people with the multi zone module rather than Bluesound users in general…

And, basically i agree about their support forum, it lost all of it’s cred and function a few years back.

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@OP, thanks for your response. My use of GIGO and RTFM might be a bit strong but, as someone who loves to mix and match various systems, I’ve learned to govern my expectations and be more self-reliant when it comes to problem solving. Forums are great, as far as they go, but anyone who has worked in a large organisation knows that Tech Support cannot always be relied upon to solve problems.

One note of support for your comments against older NAD products, I was running an NAD M51 until a year or so ago. NAD markets their M series products as future proof, but this piece didn’t have any expansion slots and wouldn’t run HD (never mind UHD) through the HDMI ARC port. Pretty disappointing, and no fix from NAD.

I’d agree that perhaps you might change the title, which - whether people agree or not - sounds a lot like a call to cancel the brand. :slight_smile:

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:slight_smile: no worries, I did slightly change the title…

I also love to play around with things… in this case I just want something that works though… and I was hoping that only these CI580v2 would cut it (and for fine listening, complementing with perhaps one or two separate streamers for individual speaker pairs)

Not sure how I will do for the future… changing the setup is super annoying as I invested so much into the setup… I keep wishing that a magic new firmware will appear some day and just fix everything… :smiley:

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every room but 1 has a bluesound device. 5 zones in total so not as complicated as yours. I wasn’t aware there are any “known” issues between them and roon. My system has been incredibly reliable. All devices are on wifi. The Nad,BOS,Roon team may be struggling to help because there are so few people with issues. It’s easier to solve problems with there is a large user base with the same problem.

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