From the very start of trying to use ARC to replace PLEX as my remote music service when I travel, it has been ‘flakey’, or unstable.
It seems to work for a day, maybe two if I am lucky, and then simply stops responding. When I get home, I close ROON and open it again, then ARC works once again. However, if a few days pass after the restart, ARC will not work, so before travelling I restart ROON so that I can have music in the car when driving.
This week, I had a 6 hour drive and wanted ROON on the way for music, and it worked flawlessly for the six hour drive, the next day however, cannot connect to the ROON Core.
For clarity, ROON is running on an Intel Corei9 9900K CPU, with music being stored on a fast SSD. My internet link is 1000mbs down, and 50mbps up, so more than fast enough to support music playback.
On the same computer, I run PLEX and have been able to playback movies while I am away from home no problem, without any interruption to the playback either so my link and computer is not the issue, it is simply ARC not functioning after about a 24 hour period.
It is not ROON locking up either, as when I get home, I can play music locally no problem at all. ARC is the issue, anyone else having similar problem?
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AceRimmer
(Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!)
3
A lot of peoples experience with ARC is vastly different to this…maybe have a read through the forums to get a better idea?
I’ve had similarly inconsistent experiences. Sometimes works well and other times does not. The main issue for me seems to be when I have no/poor data (unfortunately common in shopping centres and while driving). In these instances I can’t even play my downloaded music (so what was the point of downloading the music).
You need put it in offline mode if you loose internet then it will work without expecting to be connected to the Roon mothership and your core and will play your downloaded files . If you don’t switch it on it will keep trying and failing to connect. It’s not a perfect solution as ARC really needs to be able to handle switch over its self and not allow the user to experience such things.
Likewise for me, on some occassions ARC on my android (PIxel 6) loses connection to the core and rebooting ARC has no effect. The core has to be rebooted to re-establish the connection. I cannot change to offline mode while driving at 110 kph. Other apps that connect through mobile service, such as BBC sounds, still play fine so it is not a problem with the PIxel itself. (BBC Sounds is available through Android Auto so when roon finally gets around to it I imagine switching to offline might be possible even at 110.)
ARC worked like a charm for the first two weeks then it became unstable and unreliable even in offline mode. I’ve tried uninstalling and re-installing. I’ve reset ARC from the core.
What happens for me is every fifth track or so playback starts pausing then skipping. I’ve checked internet connection and the same issue occurs whether on a rock solid wifi or mobile network. It even happens when connected to the same network as the core.
So for now I’ve offloaded ARC and gone back to Tidal App which allows me to download tracks and play offline on the go seamlessly and reliably.
I’ll give ARC a go every 6 moths or so and hopefully we get to a point where it matches the reliability of Tidal App.
They likely have a larger buffer to cope with internet losses and are are connecting back to your home. I have had it crash my core completely once when I was away but it’s not been repeated. There does seem to be some scenarios where it does fall over finding these issues is likely not easy if they are not reported to support . When it does it’s best to raise a support thread and give as much details as possible and hopefully they might help to identify the cause of it in some users setups.
I have the same problem as @Warren_Green using Arc on my Samsung phone running Android 13.
Initially, Arc works fine but then after 5 or 6 tracks I get the spinning wheel on my screen and then the ‘Poor Connection’ message.
Reinstalling Arc makes no difference, the only way to resolve the issue is to reboot my core. After the reboot, again i can play 5 or 6 tracks then the same thing happens again. The problem occurs both when im conncted to my home wi-fi and when im out and about and connected to 4g.
Its frustrating as when Arc is running i love it.
I share the worries about ARC. The app is unusable for me… nothing works, crashes all the time, message of “bad internet connection”… etc etc
Is there any way to solve those general problems?
If you want reliable remote access now, just pay $120 for a lifetime PlexPass, setup a Plex Server and use PlexAmp outside the home. Roon ARC is a start, but is basically a 1.0 release. Hopefully for Roon users it will be improved over the next couple of years and become a reliable remote access product.
Same problem here on IPhone 11. I take a daily walk around my neighborhood (~2 miles). ARC works the whole way about one time in three. Same in the car. Sometimes it works for hours or days. Then it won’t connect. ARC needs to work reliably every time. Anything less is pretty much useless.
Have you considered to make a automatic scheduled restart of Roon during night time perhaps? Just schedule in Windows and I guess all will work fine? Hopefully…
There is no “generic” answer here. Please open support requests. There are so many different variables in mobile apps you’ve got 100s of different things going on that all look to be the same thing to the user. But they can’t solve the 100s of individual things without details.
Device, OS version, cellular or wifi, location, 5G or LTE, Bluetooth or DAC or 3.5mm, time of day, your astrological sign, sitting in traffic vs. 110kph, your carrier, were you roaming, etc.
Mobile software needs to deal with these things once they are reported. But reporting “its unreliable” doesn’t give the dev teams anything to work on. It’s not like they have a “reliable” knob and are purposely keeping it at 50%.
Absolutely true. Roon is trying to make everyone’s experience as smooth and pain free as possible. However, there are, as you say, 100s of variables. Which is…
Personally, reliability and 100% zero drop outs are why I don’t bother with streaming of any kind while mobile (as in moving about, setting up shop remotely in a hotel is a different discussion). Even 1 dropout or hiccup is not tolerable, for me. But, everyone is different.
Went through the whole process again today because ARC wouldn’t connect to my core (a Nucleus). Rebooted the Nucleus, reinstalled ARC on my IPhone still no luck. Finally disabled and reenabled UPNP on my router. Bingo, bango, bongo it works. I realize my router is not really Roon’s problem but they are relying on UPNP to make ARC work. Is ARC based on flawed technology? Can it ever be as reliable as it should be? I’m no networking expert so I’m asking these questions because I genuinely want ARC to work. Someone clue me in.