I wonder if the following is even possible. In my system, I’m running RoonServer on a Mac Mini and I have a Remote install on my Laptop, iPad and iPhone. I’m going to be away from my main system for about 6 weeks but I’ll still have my laptop with me. The last time I was away from my main system, all I did was to click the “Select a different library” button and point Roon to the folders where I have music stored on my laptop. That turned out to be a big mistake and when I eventually reconnected to the main system, my database got completely screwed up and it took many weeks to clean up. Now granted, this was a much older version of the software and I added the library back as an organized rather than watched folder and much of the problems were due to the file reorganization. Still I’m wary and loath to try this again.
But this time I’m better prepared. I have a backup of my RoonServer database as well as a copy of my entire music library on a portable drive. So now I’d like to figure out whether I can do either of the following (with actual instructions on what to do to make it happen and what to do when I’m finally back on my main system):
Run Roon on my laptop pointing to the music files on the laptop hard drive with all my existing edits intact (and, of course, to be able to go back to my old setup once I’m back).
Run Roon on my laptop pointing to the music files on the portable hard drive with all my existing edits intact (and, of course, to be able to go back to my old setup once I’m back).
Hi @rbienstock ----- Thank you for the feedback and my apologies for the slow response.
When moving your database from the Mac Mini over to your laptop, the important thing to keep in mind is that you don’t run the database on both machines at the same time. So when you copy it form the Mac Mini to the laptop, make sure to shut down your Core on the Mac Mini. And when you get back home, make sure you shut down the Core on your laptop before booting the Core on the Mac Mini again.
I am pleased to hear that you’ve made backups of your database, this is always a wise decision when performing any type of migration like this. Just in case you needed it, I have also provided the instructions on how to a do DB back up here.
In order to move your core over to your laptop you will need to do the following:
Copy your Roon folder to the appropriate database location on your new operating system using an external hard drive or network transfer. You will need to replace the “remote” database you’ve been running on your laptop previously.
Go back to your Mac Mini and shut down Roon.
Once Roon is shut down on the Mac Mini, open Roon on your laptop – confirm you are running the Core on your laptop by checking the Library listed at the top of the General tab of Settings.
The storage devices you use with your Mac Mini should still be listed on the Storage tab, but because those devices will not be available while travelling, remove them.
Once the old storage devices have been removed, add your “travel” storage devices to roon – they will be rescanned, and your existing edits will persist.
When you get home from travelling, make sure you start with a new database on the laptop before restarting your Roon Core on the Mac Mini
Thanks. I have no issue to test, though, I just need to run Roon on my laptop for a day or two as I won’t be at home.
I normally run my core on a NUC running ROCK, so I’m not sure if I should/can rename my database on that as ‘old’?
Maybe I’m on the wrong thread for this? What I’m trying to do is just temporarily run core on my laptop, non-simultaneously to my ROCK/main core (I can turn this off for a day or two while im running the new core on laptop). The database does not have to match at all on the temporary core. What I really want to ensure is that I don’t screw up the main core which contains all my edits.
My apologies for my misunderstanding of your situation.
First, make a backup and ensure it’s in a location accessible to your laptop.
Using your laptop, you can easily change your core under settings>general and click disconnect. There you can select “Use this Mac”. From there, import the backup. You will also need to point the new core instance to your music storage under settings>storage!