Any Zappiti devices out there? Are they in the process of being Roon Ready?

Zappiti have just released some players, Neo, Reference and Signature… Anyone here use Zappiti?

According to Zappiti they are planning on getting them Roon Ready, can anyone from Roon confirm if they’ve been approached by Zappiti?

Thanks

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I bought a Zappiti 4K HDR NAS and a Zappiti Mini player a little over a year ago. I have been patiently waiting for the new players to come out because they support 4K Video with Dolby Vision. I just purchased a new Signature player from Zappiti and got it shortly before Christmas. I have been informed by Zappiti personnel that they are working on making both the new Zappiti players and their Reavon Bluray players Roon Endpoints. They would not give a timeframe as to when they expected to have them Roon Ready. I also have the Roon Core installed on my Zappiti 4K HDR NAS and find it works beautifully as a Roon Server. I had previously used my desktop Windows computer for running my Roon Core. I notice a significant improvement in sound quality between running Roon Core on my Zappiti 4K HDR NAS and running the Roon Core on my desktop.

I am finding the Zappiti Signature Player to be an unbelievably good video player. I have more than 2500 discs ripped to my Zappiti 4K HDR NAS which includes about 325 4K discs as well as many DVD’s and Blu Ray discs. I have roughly 50 Terabytes of data on the Zappiti NAS currently. It will also rip and play back iso files of all my DVD Audio discs and all of my Blu Ray audio discs as well as movies. In addition it will also play ripped iso files of SACD discs. This is important to me because as of yet Roon cannot play iso files of SACD discs. Playing ripped iso files of SACD discs and ripped CDs in ALAC format (I use iTunes to rip CDs) play on my Signature better than any other source I currently have in my system. I am anxiously awaiting Roon Ready status for my Signature so that I will be able to use it as a Roon endpoint.

I did find some difficulties with running the Roon Core on the Zappiti 4K HDR NAS. Zappiti installed the Roon Core on my Zappiti NAS for me. The newer model comes with Roon Core already installed. Once it was installed, I had to figure out how to switch from the Roon Core on my desktop to the Roon Core on my Zappiti NAS. It turned out that the simplest way to do this was to do a Roon backup on the desktop and restore the backup to the Roon Core on the Zappiti NAS. This would have been a simple and straightforward process except for the fact that there is some kind of wall around the Zappiti NAS. I could not find any way to access my desktop from within the Zappiti NAS. I ended up using Windows File Explorer and drag and drop to move the backup file from the desktop to the Zappiti NAS. I then did a restore on the Zappiti NAS with this backup file. At that point I still had a problem. I currently have all my music library stored on a Synology NAS. This library consists of about 1500 ripped CDs in an iTunes library and about 20 ripped Vinyl albums in a separate folder stored in FLAC format. The Roon Core on the Zappiti NAS could not access these libraries on the Synology NAS. After several tries I simply used drag and drop to move copies of these libraries to the Zappiti NAS. The copy process took quite a bit of time but was successful. At that point the Roon Core was fully functional and performed flawlessly in my system. As previously noted, the sound quality was better than using my desktop for the Roon Core.

I am very happy with Roon Core running on the Zappiti NAS but need to have a solution to the problem of accessing other places in my network from and Zappiti NAS and accessing my Zappiti NAS from other places in my network first before I can be happy with this solution. Both my iTunes app and my Vinyl ripping software reside on my desktop and I need to be able to access the Zappiti NAS from the desktop in order to add new music to those files. As for the Synology NAS, I initially purchased it in order to back up the windows computers in my household. Additionally I used it to store my music libraries. With the latest changes to Windows, I am now backing up the computers to the One Drive instead of the Synology NAS. If Zappiti can tell me how to access the Zappiti NAS from my desktop as easily as I can access my Synology NAS, I will no longer have a need for the Synology NAS at all.

I am planning on ripping all my SACD discs to the Zappiti NAS so that I can use my Signature to play them. I would greatly appreciate it if Roon played iso files of SACD discs as the Signature does only a rudimentary job of this as compared to what Roon does. Playing iso files on the Signature is still a great leap from having to play the SACD discs as I currently do. When I learned that the Signature player could play iso files of SACD discs I researched on the internet how to do this. I found out that I could use an old Bluray player I had and a piece of software available on the internet for this purpose. All I do is plug in the Bluray player. Turn it on. Turn it back off. Stick a USB thumb drive in the USB slot that contains the software and wait. The drive tray will open. I stick the SACD disc in the drive tray. The drive tray closes itself. The Bluray player begins operating and about 15 minutes later the tray opens and I remove the SACD disc. At this point the USB thumb drive contains an iso file of the SACD disc. This is a very simple and straight forward way to obtain an iso file of an SACD disc.

The above is probably information overload, but hopefully you will find it useful.

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I wanted to give an update on my reply above. Zappiti has adjusted the settings in my Zappiti 4K HDR NAS. I was ripping videos and needed to access my Zappiti NAS from my windows desktop. When I attempted to access the Zappiti NAS through Windows File Explorer, I was prompted for a login and password. I entered my Zappiti Video login and password. From that point on I am able to access my Zappiti NAS just as easily as my Synology NAS. The Zappiti NAS is now my preferred device for my Roon Core. I am able to update my iTunes library from my desktop on the Zappiti NAS just like I was able to on my Synology NAS. Sometime in the next week or two I will be ensuring that everything on my Synology NAS is backed up in the One Drive or has been transferred to my Zappiti NAS. Once I have done that I plan to sell my Synology NAS on ebay as I no longer need it. The Zappiti NAS is capable of performing all the functions for which I need a NAS and makes an outstanding media server. I have my photo library, my music library, and my video library all located on my Zappiti NAS. With my Zappiti Signature Player I am able to access all my media. Once Zappiti makes the Signature a Roon endpoint I will be completely satisfied with my Roon setup.

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