I think Roon made decisions necessary to continue to evolve this platform and they certainly accomplished a whole lot right with v2.0 and ARC. But losing access to local music if the internet is offline is both an unwelcome surprise and a likely, if infrequent, significant annoyance. Worse, when it happens Roon becomes useless and thus, a big fat target for ridicule. I leave it to the smart folks at Roon to figure out if a a short-lived solution can be found for this scenario. But if worst case is that all I could do was select and play albums (you know, like we all did with LPs & CDs), then, IMHO, that would more than fill the gap.
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I agree, I donât need nor expect super-clever search/cross-reference capabilities when the internet is down, just a way to see and play my locally stored music.
As fate would have it, our internet connection went down the morning after my previous post (as a result of an automatic overnight firmware update on our main switch).
It just so happened I had someone from the Hi-Fi industry coming to visit that morning. I think he left less than impressed after I told him that all music was off the menu as Roon would no longer operate without the internet.
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Had an internet outage every afternoon last week whilst working.
Was extremely surprised that I was suddenly unable to make fresh searches or see any artwork [ even my own ] for anything in Room⌠now I know why.
Added my vote, honestly this is really a bad decision.
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
It would seem that Mr Dulai is content to walk away from his installed base.
This is an absurd decision.
I pay for Roon to have a concise interface for all of my local music, as well as that which I stream from the cloud. If this software is no longer able to function without access to the cloud, then it no longer serves the purpose for which so many of us purchased it for, or are paying monthly for it.
Sure am glad I did not purchase a lifetime membership.
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
Are you then saying that our input to you is of no value?
You have received many impassioned requests for some form of local access to local files using Roon. Iâve been in IT Infrastructure for 2.5 decades, with such small firms as AT&T and IBM.
What we are asking to be returned to us is not an insurmountable coding task. And you well know it.
Upset in California.
-Stan Sorensen
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
The local Roon database holds the information needed query locally available music.
Iâm of the belief that going to the cloud allows them to more easily sell user metrics to other parties.
I disagree that itâs quite that simple, I just believe that a basic fallback operation with much reduced features that can bridge a limited time w/o internet would be doable if they wanted, is not an outrageous request by users, and would remove an annoyance that I expect to come up on the forum for a long time.
I believe this is a complete red herring because nothing prevents them from sending information to their server whenever they want as long there is internet from the local core.
As for what they share with 3rd parties, read your license and donât use the software if you disagree with it or donât think that they comply. I donât have a strong opinion on that.
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
I managed coders for AT&T and IBM and a bank. Itâs amazing what a coder can do when faced with an implacable order from above. Especially if the pre-existing code can be called via a sub-routine.
Itâs not that hard.
I think we agree there. Sidestepping the whole thing with a basic fallback mechanism is what I suggested.
@Stan_Sorensen Just FYI, long edit 
ânot quite that simpleâ was referring to what I quoted. (Sorry that wasnât clear). Really smart search algorithms would want to refer to internet sources even for searches that involve local music. If I search for an album A that I have locally, itâs not unreasonable to display a related other album B by an artist who plays on A, even if I donât have B in my library or locally.
So yes, I understand that they want always online for better search features, and that providing a quality experience that works offline for extended time would be a hindrance. In this sense, 1.8 Legacy is the fallback mechanism for this use case of long planned phases without connectivity, and thatâs fine.
My concern is more about unplanned short-term outages. For these, it would be totally acceptable to just have music playing and a much reduced UI, and I think that you and I agree that this should be doable.
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
Except that now the DB has changed itâs format in the latest 2.0 release, and a complete reinstall from âGround Zeroâ is now required.
And any and all support for 1.8 will soon be deprecated.
Itâs a 1-Way Street.
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Thatâs true, and when the update was announced, I did think âaah, this had been overlooked in that argumentâ Obvious in hindsight.
Personally I can, however, accept this. For, me, it was never a question that Roon needs internet to do the things that are my reason to use Roon. Itâs just the having to mess around when my internet goes out (and I donât know if 1 minute or 2 days) thatâs bugging me personally.
[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
I agree with this assessment. Audirvana, BluOS and others manage this task without requiring always-on Internet. Roon is choosing to remove that capability for reasons other than necessity.
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There is no basis in fact for this statement, please donât make things up. If you think that, then state that specifically using imho, etc.
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[The comments below are the customerâs opinions they do not accurately reflect Roonâs decision or positions]
Obviously, theyâre not user-motivated.
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You are correct in that the date of deprecation of 1.8 is unknown and according to the FAQ will depend on the adoption rate for 2.0. The FAQ does state the following: âPlease, note that Roon 1.8 wonât be supported forever.â and further âHowever, if you are more comfortable using Roon 1.8, you can always continue to run it on your own after the official support period ends.â In addition it limits the period of time to downgrade from 2.0 to 1.8 to 6 weeks from release, which may have already passed.
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I took this as meaning in practicality. 1.8 Legacy as a temporary fallback is only somewhat practical if you do the backup of the DB state and download all needed software before the DB of 2.0 became incompatible. If somebodyâs internet goes out after this, even if you have the installer files, if you donât have a compatible DB backup you still canât use it. As I said this was to be expected, but it does weaken the âjust use 1.8 Lâ argument considerably
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Not quite true. One can always start fresh again with the installer.
Can I? There is no internet at this point, so how would I authenticate?
In any case, even if somehow I can authenticate without internet, this is not a very good workaround and itâs IMHO close to âjust donât use Roon but something elseâ.
Iâm not Roonâs marketing guy, but where I work we would not tell users âjust start overâ or âthere is other software you can use instead of oursâ
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I hope that there will be a useable alternative to Roon. For users with hardware investments in âRoon Readyâ gear (like myself with over $15K in multiple endpoints) this may be an obstacle.
Hi @Stan_Sorensen,
Youâve been asked nicely by moderators. Iâm going to ask you one last time to STOP expressing your opinions about our decisions as the truth. Your feelings are not facts.
You have absolutely no insight into our motivations, and your continued assumptions merely reflect what you choose to believe. Just because you think something doesnât make it true.
Regardless of your professional work history, you donât know how Roon is coded and therefore have no point of reference for how much work would be involved or a complete picture of the reasons why this change to requiring internet for Roon was made.
Youâre running 2.0 on your Core and remotes successfully, which makes your incessant axe-grinding and soap-boxing about 2.0âs internet requirement rather incongruous to me. Furthermore, it begs the question just how much youâve been impacted by this change? Do you have an issue that requires support?
In closing, No oneâs information has been sold to anyone. Stop posting untrue statements and misinformation if you want to continue posting on this forum. Enough is enough. This is the last time weâll make this request.
1 Like