I use Qobuz and Roon, and I currently use an iMac which has Roon Core installed on it.
I use a Lumin T1 streamer
Everything is connected conventionally through a router and a switch.
However, I am currently building a fanless PC, which will have dual ethernet sockets on it.
I wondered therefore if the following will work:
Connect the Lumin T1 direct to the second ethernet connection on the fanless PC.
See diagram of both current and proposed systems. (only network connections are shown)
I presume that I MAY need to use a crossover cable between the Lumin and the PC, and have network sharing turned on. (crossover cables are usually used to allow the ethernet ports of two computers to be connected directly, to share data and internet connections)
I made this with another DAC and Roon ROCK on Intel NUC. It is working fine, and sound quality is mutch better than via router/switch.
Crossover cables may not be required (most NICs have connection auto-sense).
Of course, your DAC must accept manual IP configuration, and you must to know how to do this, because you will not be able to acces your DAC via local network.
Thank you for your reply. By DAC I presume you mean Digital to Analog converter? Also, your NUC has 2 ethernet ports? Mine is an ATX board, with one ethernet socket but using a PCI-E card, I can add another and this one can be an optical (LC fibre) port which I am seriously considering using to reduce any possibility of interference.
Yes, DAC = Digital to Analog Converter.
My NUC has one Ethernet port (going to DAC), but I use an USB to Ethernet adapter as second Ethernet adapter (going to router).
In the past, I made the same configuration, but using ATX mainboard and a PCI-E card as second Ethernet adapter.
The vast majority of commercial streamers cannot be manually configured. They need to be on the same subnet as your internet access and to do this with ROCK they need to be on a private subnet and you won’t be able to administer them via their apps or a web page. You can using Windows, OSX and regular Linux distros including the two main audiophile ones, AudioLinux and Euphony. I believe Euphony actually has a gui button so it does it without having to go to command line. I put in a feature request to get this into Roon OS because I felt it would be beneficial to users but it hasn’t made it onto ROCK or Nucleus yet. I personally think Roon are missing a chance to enhance Roon OS but I guess they are the ones who have to support it.
In my setup there is no routing / IP forwarding on ROCK, and no Ethernet Bridging. It is just ROCK connected to two sub-networks: one with DHCP (to router and internet), and one with manual IP (to DAC).
If Lumin does not support manual (static) IP configuration, then my setup cannot be applied.
Yes.
192.168.168.x - subnet for router / internet / DHCP, other devices, and 1st ROCK network card.
172.168.168.x - subnet for 2nd ROCK network card and DAC network card (both having static IP, direct cable). No internet access.
This is what I wanted to address with my feature request. To get ROCK to expose a second Ethernet port to DHCP, to allow direct connection to any streamer without the addition of a switch.
Hi Daniel,
i’m trying to do the same thing using a NUC with ROCK, but connecting the NUC via WiFi to the router (DHCP, internet access) and a Pi 4 directly connected to the NUC via Ethernet.
All LEDs on both LAN ports are happliy flashing, but roon doesn’t detect the endpoint.
Could you provide some more detail on the static IP configuration, i.e. which gateways and netmasks did you configure on the NUC and the endpoint for the direct connection?
Thanks and regards,
Roland
My home network:
IP: 192.168.168.x (router is 192.168.168.1)
MASK: 255.255.255.0
All devices are using DHCP, including my Roon ROCK Ethernet_1, connected to router. The same should be for your Roon ROCK WiFi.
So, Roon ROCK Ethernet_1 will be something like 192.168.168.x.
Roon ROCK Ethernet_2 - Manual IP config. This one is connected to DAC (direct cable). The same should be for your Roon ROCK Ethernet.
IP: 172.168.168.101
MASK: 255.255.255.0
DNS: 0.0.0.0
GATEWAY: 0.0.0.0
My DAC Ethernet - Manual IP config. This one is connected to Roon ROCK Ethernet_2 (direct cable). The same should be for your Pi 4 Ethernet.
IP: 172.168.168.102
MASK: 255.255.255.0
DNS: 0.0.0.0
GATEWAY: 0.0.0.0
NOTE: This is meaning that your Pi 4 is not connected to your network, so you will not be able to access your Pi 4 using network computers etc. But Roon ROCK should be able to access Pi 4.
Hi Daniel,
thumbs up, it works! I set the NUC’s IP as gateway for the Pi to be sure.
The Pi endpoint shows up under settings/audio and can be enabled.
Music plays!
However, the roon bridge is not listed under settings/info, which made me think it wouldn’t have been detected by Roon in the first place.
I can’t tell anything about differences/improvements in sound quality yet, still need to do some more listening.
From a practical standpoint the setup is not ideal. As you pointed out, remote administration of the Pi is lost in this config and one has to reflash, if service/update is needed. I use VitOS btw.
