And let’s not forget the motor in the fan, too. Fanless wins.
Slightly different topic but related: Does the Roon core machine construction matter at all when distributing over RAAT? I feel reviewers have never tackled this question, probably out of fear of server manufacturers getting mad at them.
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In my opinion (and experience) there are differences still, but they seem lesser than when feeding the DAC directly from the Core.
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I’ve used 2 machines as Roon Core. First old quad core PC i5 8GB RAM running Ubuntu which I replaced with an old MacMini i7 16GB RAM. Both wired to my router. I have 8 zones and the only difference I noticed is that the MacMini has no trouble with DSP to multiple zones while the PC/Ubuntu would stumble when 2 or more zones were playing. I have a variety of endpoints, amplifiers and speakers AudioNote, NAD, Anthem, Bluesound, Harbeth and Bowers and Wilkins. The Cores did not produce any difference in SQ in my experience.
My library is on the small side, 32,000 tracks locally and about 10,000 from streaming services
thank you for that, I think that’s another part where they differed greatly. My Mac mini was using a regular hdd, where the MBP had a soldered ssd.
That’s the crux of my question. Surely an underpowered machine will make a difference when using DSP.
Good point. In my case playing to a single zone I found no SQ difference between the 2 machines.
Could I make a Macmini as Roon Rock?
If yes, any difference for this Macmin with Intel CPU or M1?
If Macmin could not be Roon Rock, could i make a Macmini as Roon Core？ any difference for this Macmin with Intel CPU or M1?
Cheers.
Yes. I made my 2012 Intel Core Duo dual-core Intel i5 into a ROCK. You just need a generic compatible USB Ethernet adapter. I have a Cisco/Linksys that uses an ASIX AX88772A chip. Works like a charm.
Using a new M1 Mac mini would be a waste and the ARM processor probably wouldn’t work. You can find a i5 or i7 Mac mini for $200 on OfferUp or Craigslist pretty easily.
[Moderator Edit: CPU specification corrected]
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You can run Roon core on macOS. That’s all you need to do.
So that is to say, Roon Core is ok on Macmini M1, but Macmini could not support Rock?
You have posted this multiple times. It is wrong. You do not have a 2012 Core Duo Mac mini. Core Duo was added to the spec sheet in 2006 and gone by 2007, replaced by Core 2 Duo, which remained through 2010. By 2011, all Mac mini models were i5 or i7 for the next seven years.
AJ
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Roon Core will run fine on an M1 mini because macOS will revert to Rosetta2 to run Roon if the code is not ARM compatible. It will run. Having said this, because Roon is written in .NET, I would say the mac is the worst platform to run Roon right now. Best is Windows, almost identical today is Linux.
I run Roon Core both via ROCK on a NUC10i7 (city apt) and mac mini i7 2012 (top spec at the time, at the beach house). Simply put, Roon doesn’t run tip top on mac mainly due to inefficient emulators I understand.
So if you have the option, I strongly recommend a NUC with ROCK.
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Any platform that is not a NUC, which is what the NUCleus is, could potentially run ROCK, but a ROCK update could potentially break it. Why oh why would you bother???
If you want a powerful machine to run all sorts of DSP, do yourself a favor, get a powerful PC with Windows 10 and be done with it. If you have a machine where you have or would put linux on, do that and run Roon Core on linux (not ROCK). If you have a mac, run macOS. Any other combo is asking for trouble.
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I can’t believe I started this thread! 
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At the beach now and suffering from Roon running on macOS! What a piece of crap.
Hi Miguel,
Tons of thanks for the comprehensive guidance! This is super helpful.
As I have the Synology NAS DS916+ plus 8G RAM, the Roon on NAS shall be better than MacOS as the Synology is Linux at least?
The Synology you note is not a Mac with an M1. It’s not even a shadow of the same machine. The Mac will run circles around that NAS.
It’s not emulation that’s the problem, it’s that the garbage collector of Microsoft’s.NET is far superior to Mono’s. This is moot on Linux since we already use Microsoft’s .NET. it’s soon to be moot on MacOS too.
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Hi Danny,
I am fully aware that Synology is not MAC. I have said that it is Linux.