This is me. If Roon can do this…. I’m back in. If not I’m out.
Already ditch Qobuz for AM. So far I’m enjoying it.
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No Room requires a lot more than a Web API.
I wasn’t disagreeing that a lot of people seem to want this integration, just highlighting that Roon has addressed this plenty of times in the past. Their general point (please look up the previous responses for their exact words) is that having a barebones implementation doesn’t have a lot of value. You may as well use that service directly.
Maybe you think differently and that’s fine and I see your point about a lot of people joining who primarily stream. Thing is, in Roons current state (this may very well change in the future) features that are important to people who primarily stream are catered to better on other platforms.
If you want music discovery, stream a huge library then Spotify. If you need to carry over your small existing library or you want lossless / spatial audio then Apple Music. Both have Airplay and connect if you want to cast music to devices, including HiFi gear.
Obviously there are other features regarding RAAT, DSP etc and for a subset of those stream only users that will make Roon the best platform. However, I think for a lot of them they may end up just going straight to Apple Music or Spotify and in which case why integrate a barebones implementation of that service?
To me Roon is the best at a comprehensive experience, makes perfect sense for a mix of library and streaming (as of right now) and the value of this simple implementation doesn’t make sense but that is my opinion and of course as you and others feel differently by all means say what is important to you.
As a final note, if you really do want this integration it might be worth elaborating on why so that Roon can make decisions that cater to the actual need. Is it because Apple Music is cheap ? Ok then they can consider pricing, is it the library size ? Then they can evaluate partners that are willing to work with them that have the same selection of music etc.
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Why “unfortunately”? I don’t care being wrong (or right for that matter) 
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You gotta believe
Oh, sure, I didn’t intend to contradict anything you said. And, yes, I have seen past statements from Roon about why they wouldn’t want to do partial integrations (and those make perfect sense to me).
I think with the new Apple Music developments, my sense is that “things are different now” in terms of interest in integration from Roon’s user base – and in terms of potential loss of some proportion of Roon’s user base.
That’s a very good point.
My thought is: In order to stem the loss of Roon membership. But you are suggesting, I think, that it would not stem the loss. Yeah, I guess I was assuming it would, but you could well be right.
Great questions. My reasons are:
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I want Roon to stay healthy (because I want to continue to enjoy the integrated experience of Roon across local and streaming and metadata, which for me is a/the key part of the value proposition.)
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I am making the assumptions that adding weak integration of Apple Music will counter a decline in majority-streaming users leaving Roon for either of the following reasons: (a) Qobuz/Tidal no longer exist, and there is no streaming alternative that is integrated into Roon. (b) Qobuz/Tidal still exist, but people who have switched to Apple Music cannot play it through Roon.
A lot of assumptions in there of course; perhaps (hopefully!) Roon has good evidence that they are incorrect!
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From the main “Apple Music” thread, from someone who I believe has been one of the most stalwart (streaming-only) Roon enthusiasts:
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I posted that.
For me I’d like:
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A streaming service integrated with a library that has a trivial amount of gaps
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Better music discovery / rediscover features (Daily Mixes, here’s a mix of your 90s j pop)
2a) More nuanced valence recommendations - getting suggested Christian rock when I have zero religious music and I am personally an atheist isn’t my jam
2b) A here’s all the new music only from artists that are in your library
To each his own!
Bottom line, there is a lot of musical happiness yet to be found in simpler things, without giving a ■■■■ on deep integrations and stuf like that!
@Roonlabs here’s info. on the Music API
It’s not clear to me what it allows or not, but thought I’d pass it along as it does look like is at least open to the idea of some form of integration of Music.
The link near the bottom which states:
Find and play songs, audio podcasts, audio books, and more from within your app.
is particularly interesting.
Looks like this implies you’ll be using apple hardware only.
I am both a Roon evangelist and an Apple stockholder. My opinion is this: if Apple wants Roon integration, Apple writes a check.
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What would Apple get for their money that they don’t already have?
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The operative word in my post was “if”.
Access to HiRes streaming to tens of millions of devices worldwide.
As far as I can make out the only option with Apple is to use a USB DAC directly attached to the computer, have it play on the computer, or have it play on the mobile device.
I am not sure there is any option to use high quality end points except by using Airplay (maybe chromecast?)
If there is enough demand for lossless now, so much so that they would launch the service, then you can bet the demand for HiRes is going to grow.
For anybody who wanted it, solved that before Roon came to be.
Even with Roon, lots of people are still mystified by streamers and going for expensive solution from big companies, even some of these still use chromcast or RPI internally.
I used iTunes from day one and everything else like LMS, etc. that was around. There was always a way to pull music and play it, to push music and play it, just needed a bit of DIY.
Yes, Roon managed to better it and it was just perfect timing for pandemic!
It is not without serious problems though. AM does not crash my M1 mac mini the way Roon does, it doesn’t corrupt its database the way Roon does. It messes things in other way, like dropping support for audiobooks :sigh
Roon still doesn’t do sync and remote on the go, Apple solved that long time ago and it is the majority of usage. If they think it is worth solving, they will.
Apple doesn’t need Roon as much as Roon would benefit from integration with more streaming services.
When I got Roon, I got it for my local music, when Tidal and Qobuz integrations came along it was great, and now we think that we should be able to use every service via Roon, reminds me of this song: https://youtu.be/cCQLSddKKHg
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I hope Tim has signed the check.
So with AM how would I send my HiRes music files, or AM’s high res music files, to my hifi and play them bit-perfect at full resolution?
It’s a pretty simple use case and I can do it with absolute ease using Roon, but I am not sure how I would do it with AM. I do know that if Apple integrated with Roon it would be easy.
We’ll have to wait until Apple upgrade Airplay to stream hi-res. If they do.
If you don’t have Airplay compatible gear, then add one which is. Like a Raspberry Pi with Ropieee which can pick up the stream and feed it via USB to your DAC. Cheap as chips and should do the job.
As it stands, we’re stuck with feeding our DACs with Apple Music via USB and from an iPhone, iPad or Mac. The latter does not do auto sample switching unfortunately.
Edit Just remember Ropieee Airplay is not certified Airplay so that’s that and I guess we’ll have to see if it will play ball with any upgrades.