As per the subject line, is it possible to use VST plugins in Roon?
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Not as of 20th August when I asked the same question, what is your need for this feature?
This feature is not planned at the moment. Not saying it wonāt be ever, but right now we have no scheduled plan to implement this feature.
This would be a GREAT feature, and is the ONLY thing preventing me from making Roon my preferred player. I use Fab Filter for PEQ, and there are numerous VST plugins for headphones that are very, very nice.
+1 for this.
Would also allow room correction and other EQ type plugins, and so the final result could be sent to the endpoint once RoonSpeakers is available, which would be nice and a very clean setup.
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Supporting plugins would be really nice, but Iām hoping that Roon will also add built-in EQ and room correction. I believe they were listed on an early list of planned future enhancements.
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Upping my post to a +100!
Iāve fallen in love with Dirac Live - pretty much love at first sight in fact - after a couple of years struggling to get a decent sound out of my lounge, and probably pointlessly swapping kit.
But I also want to be able to use RoonSpeakers / RoonReady devices when available, so the only way to realistically do it is to use a plugin (which Dirac have in beta).
So, hereās hopingā¦ā¦
Just noting that HQP has a convolution engine and can do real time EQ
Thank you @andybob, I had seen that, but its not an ideal solution for me for a few reasons.
If Iāve understood correctly from what Iāve read:
-You canāt run Dirac through HQ player as its proprietary, so can only be run through (a currently in beta) AU/VST plugin, or as a virtual sound card (which is what Im doing now despite it not remembering the output device on OSX).
-HQ player also means another license, and an extra setup layer that Iām not looking for right now.
-HQ player means moving to NAA rather than using the excitedly anticipated RoonSpeakers.
Since Iām very new to Room Correction, and lazy, Iāve tested Dirac and really like what it does, so would love to be able to carry on using it and within Roon. There arenāt many other options for a Mac.
Not everyone wants HQ player 
Admittedly my test of HQ player was very short, as the interface put me off along with the fact that ALAC wasnāt supported and thatās what my whole libraryās in. But from the few test tracks into the Devialet I couldnāt honestly gauge much of an improvement. I will definitely revisit when its running through Roon though, maybe with the interface out of the way, Iāll have a better idea of what it can do on a longer test.
Meanwhile, please, please for those of us who didnāt take up loads of resources moaning about HQ player not being supported, let us have a little plugin loveā¦. Iām sure the groundwork has been laid with what youāve done for HQ playerā¦.
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This is a feature I would like to see definitely. My current chain looks like this:
NAS -> Roon -> HQPlayer -> Dirac -> SPDIF -> DAC
So to make my wish come true, there can be a several routes.
1. Roon implements VST/AU support;
2. HQPlayer implements VST/AU support;
3. Dirac be able to produce convolution filters; and
4. Dirac be able to stream its output to HQPlayer
Each route has its own complications but I like the last one best. That way, we keep the Roon interface clean and relieve Dirac from worrying about license issues (if you know what I mean^^).
My 2 cents.
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Amen to shinycās list. I lust after AU/VST plug ins in Roon. One of my zones is a Meridian Prime headphone amp, coupled (obviously) to some phones- which clearly points out the shortcomings in my left ear. I do a 2db cut (think balance) to the right ear, and have to add a 1.7 db hi shelf to the left to get them in āsyncā (I prefer Fab Filter for the job). Sure, the audio chain is compromised, but any damage is far less than my āuntreatedā ear! So, Iām voting strongly for plug insā¦
Minus that, Iām searching for a standalone AU/VST host with little success. I used Pure Music in their āstreamthroughā mode, but it only works if the final delivery to the Prime is 44.1, regardless of source. Changing PMās settings to anything other than 44.1 produces clock errors, with all the resultant crackles and pops. JBridgeM is in beta at best, but that didnāt work for me. HQPlayer became more grief than itās worth. Appleās AU Lab didnāt cut it.
Once again, if anyone knows of a standalone, Iād appreciate the tip.
I would love to use Dirac with Roon but only option (1) is actually under Roonās control.
(2) is an HQPlayer feature request, and Iām pretty sure AU plugins have been ruled out by the developer.
(3) is a Dirac feature request.
(4) would be a Dirac & HQPlayer joint project.
I can imagine a couple of other workarounds:
Dirac Audio Processor able to output back to Roon via a virtual sound card āloopbackā type thing. I think this has been rules out.
RoonReady code added to the DiracAudioProcessor to enable endpoint control directly - but I canāt see this happening anytime soon. Plus Iām thinking about my own case where I donāt use HQPlayer.
Out of interest, have you tried the EQ in HQPlayer since youāre already using it? I wouldnt have thought youāre getting the full benefit of HQPlayer if youāre then sending it to Dirac? Have never tried either though so canāt say.
I was looking at this but couldnāt work out a way of doing itā¦
Hi Rober, hi Steve,
Sorry I could not get back to you sooner.
HQPlayer thing. I use it without any filter, modulation or upsampling strategy. I did A/B with and without HQPlayer and what do you knowā¦ I get more transparency. Not by much but immediately noticeable. Our ears must be very intelligent ^^.
I think I came up with a solution. I have not implement it yet. Too busy. You guys can tackle this. I will do that in time myself. Here we go:
1. Set up two roon audio zones.
Zone #1: NAS -> Roon -> Dirac
Zone #2: Internet Radio -> Roon -> HQPlayer
2. Feed Dirac output to an internet radio broadcasting software.
3. Have roon listen to the broadcast.
4. Enjoy the roon UI and Dirac and HQPlayer at the same time.
Connection between the broadcasting software and the roon through a loopback connection (in TCP/IP sense, i.e. the radio station address is the localhost). I just need to locate a broadcasting software which can do 192 kbps, which is the max resolution at the Dirac output. Rogue Amoeba Software might have all the necessary components to pull this off. I have not checked specs on the Nicecast software, though. I hope it can handle up to 192 kbps (in/out).
I hope this works. So we can forget about plugins, WDM in the meantime. Say hello to the Internet radio streaming. Ha!
I love your lateral thinking! I just tried this using Rogue Amoeba tools, and as proof-of-concept it seems to work, in a flaky way, but both Nicecast and Roon Radio have limited resolution (320kbps)
That was a super quick PoC and an ouch. I did not know roon can only do 320kbps. Back to the scratch board (running out of options thou). And a typo in my previous post. Should have been 192khz (not 192kbps). Thank you, zappyroon, for checking this out so swiftly.
Roon can do any bitrate - not restricted to 320K at all, most radio streams are about there though.
If Roon can do any bitrate, then the 320kbps limit is imposed by Nicecast. Just read that Nicecast uses Icecast engine which appears to server only up to 320kbps. Maybe there is a much better (easier) solution but for now (and for me) I will search for a streaming engine which can handle (much) higher bitrate (plus ability to take Dirac output as its input). We have no WAN bandwidth limitation for this application.
Yep, my bad. The limit was in Nicecast; sorry. Not sure what I saw in Roon that made me think it was limited. Nicecast does not allow settings above 320 kbps.
Just took another swing at this, paying a bit more attention and doing things slightly differently.
Now, it is not flaky at all, and actually plays through AIR3b as well!
Still, the final signal is ālow qualityā and what starts as rebook finally comes back out as 320kbps.
A small codicil: seems that for whatever reason, Dirac is not applying any filters, even though it is streaming, and the output goes into Nicecast and then back into Roon as a radio channel.
Brilliant idea though.
Now that Roon 216 offers enhanced DSP but without any tools for measurement (and I grant that this is not their business), it is time to revive this thread and promote support for VST/AU plug-ins and/or support for DiracLive or similar applications.
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