Running the latest RoonServer (Build 884, since the day it was released) on MacOS 10.15.7, Mac Mini Late 2012 w/ 16 MB RAM. Accessing via Roon on a MacBook, iPad, or iPhone.
Networking Gear & Setup Details
Not a networking issue, but: Eero 6 hardwired to the Mac Mini running RoonServer.
Connected Audio Devices
Various Airplay devices, Devialet Phantoms, Devialet Expert Pro CI
Number of Tracks in Library
No idea, library won’t load.
Description of Issue
Roon worked fine yesterday. Today, it says there’s an issue loading the database. I tried restoring from the backup from earlier today, from one earlier in the week, and from one from last week. All appeared to restore fine–the last one even let me browse my library from my MacBook for a minute or two after restoring–but then, following relaunch, failed with the same database error.
I tried restarting the server computer and then restoring. I also tried deleting the RoonServer folder in ~/Library/ and then restoring. Same result.
I suppose I could try earlier backups—although that would lead to more data loss, which I’d like to avoid—but I thought that, with recent versions, the DB integrity is confirmed on backup and (as noted) restoring from the three most recent backups completes the restoration process and then fails following relaunch.
I also tried deleting all the Roon-related folders in ~/Library/ and then the RoonServer application itself, then re-downloading RoonServer, and then restoring from a backup. It actually worked, and played music, for ~2 minutes. And then back to the “issue loading your database” screen. I give up.
Thanks! What’s strange to me is things were working fine with Build 884 (and its predecessor) since the day it was released until the day before yesterday—including making regular backups that (per Roon, check for DB corruption). So nothing changed on the computer, and then Roon went haywire and won’t even work with supposedly checked-for-corruption DB backups.
So none of the Roon-made backups seem to work. I can complete the database restoration step, but when I relaunch RoonServer, it opens into the sign-in / restore database screen.
I also have backups of my RoonServer folder going back a few years. Can I do anything with these–e.g., restore one of those into the appropriate location so that RoonServer will load it? Do I also need to restore the accompanying RAATServer folder?
It seems, that you are a late victim. But you are not alone. We all have received an automatic update. Since the update I have to reboot my NUC-Roon every 45 minutes because the system tells me, “There was an issue loading your database”. Unfortunately, importing one of the previous backups so that the loss of data is limited does not help. Problem is, that your database has been inconsistent for a longer time. and beginning build 880 Roon checks, if a database is corrupted. If so, you can’t use it further.
Yes, I’m aware of the database issues since Build 880. What’s strange here is that, for nearly a month after installing that build, Roon worked fine and continued to save backups without reporting any error. This suggests that (1) the database-integrity checks implemented since Build 880 are broken and don’t properly verify database integrity or (2) there’s some other bug at play.
If an event occurred that caused corruption in your database and Roon’s checks didn’t catch it, then you should definitely follow up with @support so they can amend the Backup logic accordingly.
Well, I seem to have fixed it. I restored a month-old backup of the RoonServer and RAATServer folders–saved to Amazon Glacier, which was a pain–and that seems to have worked. After the restore, I was able to do a database backups in Roon, which suggests (?) that there’s no corruption.
So, long story short:
Everything worked fine for ~1 month following Build 880, including regular database backups that reported no errors whatsoever.
Roon reported database corruption and conked out.
Roon’s database backups–made before and after Build 880–didn’t work.
What did work was a raw backup of the RoonServer folder.
Four days after I posted a support request regarding a complete failure of Roon’s software, no response whatsoever from @support.
All in all, not an encouraging experience. I will no longer be recommending Roon to new users until there’s some indication of progress on quality assurance and support. And I’d just hate it if one of the couple dozen folks who’ve bought Roon on my recommendation had to deal with something like this and lost their data.
Congratulations Andrew, well done.
Unfortunately, this will not work as a general solution. The question ist, how big is the timeframe between the “accident” (e.g. loss of power, writing error, disk error …) and the build 880. It seems that a lot of us had this corrupted database over many months. The longer this timeframe is, the more useless is such an old backup.
Regarding the Support of Roonlabs … I better refrain from my comment.
