Duplicated Chromecast Groups [Ticket In]

Support
68

@support Is there any update on this ticket?

69

Hi @simon_pepper,

I totally understand the frustration given the age of this thread.

We need to know a few details in order to make progress with development, since the team can’t reproduce these symptoms internally.

Chromecast discovery relies entirely on mDNS. Roon listens for announcements from Cast devices; it doesn’t control them. In previous fixes to improve stability, development has made targeted adjustments to how Roon handles these announcements (to prevent duplication, etc). In this case, when a device vanishes in Roon but still works in Google Home, it most often means the mDNS announcements suddenly aren’t reaching Roon Server at all. UniFi’s newer firmware has some multicast handling changes that might affect this if you’ve recently updated your network.

Please check in your UniFi controller, even if you’ve made these changes before:

  1. Is "Multicast Enhancement" or IGMP snooping enabled on your network?
  2. Is client isolation enabled on the Chromecast SSID?
  3. Are Chromecasts and Roon Server on the same VLAN/subnet?
How willing are you to spin up a second RoonServer on a laptop for testing? This can be a fresh database. Try connecting to the same AP as your most problematic Chromecast device.

We’ll watch for your response. Thank you.

70

Hi Conor,

Thanks for your response. I am presently not at home, on an extended work trip to Africa until mid-May. Roon ARC is my travelling companion on Hotel WiFi and downloaded content for the plane based journeys.

However let me provide some further details about my network configuration, which will rule out of the potential corner cases for mDNS discovery & management.

  1. There is only one VLAN and network subdomain for all devices - 192.168.0.x with submask 255.255.255.0

  2. All devices that can be wired are wired & given a fixed DHCP allocation so at fixed IP address

  3. 2 Chromecast Audio, 1 Chromecast units as they ‘always on’ elements on the network are also fixed DHCP allocations, so at fixed IP addresses

  4. There are 2 Chromecast Groups containing these devices & two other Chromecast devices which can be switch on & included in the groups for the duration of their usage. These are in the bathrooms. The groups will associate and establish in Google Home/Roon against one of the devices with fixed IP address

  5. There is only one WiFi AP, a UniFi U7 Pro Wall, which is connected to a Cisco Gateway/VPN router

  6. The problematic Chromecast Audio device that ‘disappears’ from Roon, can be sometimes ‘brought back’ into Roon by opening Google Home, and clicking on the device’s status

    Sometimes it plays in the group without being present in Roon, at all.

    Sometimes, it plays in the group without being present in Google Home

    Sometimes it has to be restarted to be present in either Roon or Google Home & part of the Group for playback.

    Other devices can be bought in and included for Playback, as they are powered up

  7. When I was analysing my logs from Roon Server for memory usage as part of EA testing of the 2.65 builds - taking recent log files from the ROCK server and giving them to our private ChatGPT account for processing, there was mention of mDNS discovery issues, with disconnects & redisovery

  8. Yes, it is all related to mDNS discovery - but within the same network and one AP, any complications around the mDNS discovery around different VLANs or network subnets is not present. It is a flat network from the gateway at 192,168.0.1, AP at 192.168.0.7, ROCK at 192.168.0.12, Chromecast Audio devices on WiFi at 192.168.0.21 & 192.168.0.22 etc.

    This should minimise any discovery issues for Roon Server & Google Home.

  9. What I may try, when I am back, is swapping over the 2 Chromecast Audio Units, to see if the problem follows the device.

71

Hi @simon_pepper,

This is exactly what we need to proceed and we greatly appreciate you taking the time to write this out.

Please allow us a chance to escalate this internally and we’ll reach back out with more information as soon as possible.

72

Hi,
Following my return home from my extended trip, where RoonARC worked all of the time, there seems to be an improvement with the Chromecast devices/zones not dropping.
Whether this was the latest Roon Server builds 2.65 & 2.66, or an updated firmware from Unifi for the U7 Pro Wall WAP - but the troublesome Chromecast Audio is consistently there.

However I still have duplicated Chromecast Groups

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See ‘Bed & Bathrooms’ anchored off the same Chromecast Audio device attached to my B&W Zeppelin Mini at its assigned IP address 192.168.0.21

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On the iPad, the Roon Remote app was also showing the ‘All Rooms’ group as duplicated also.
But this is not present on the MacOS Roon Remote app.