What best describes your playback issue?
· Music stops playing unexpectedly
What type of Zone is affected by this problem?
· *Network Zones* are affected.
Is the affected network Zone connected with Ethernet or WiFi?
· WiFi
Does the issue affect all file formats?
· The issue affects *multiple/all* file formats.
Does the issue happen with local library music, streaming service music, or both?
· *Only streaming* music is affected.
Please select the streaming service(s) with which you're encountering playback problems.
· TIDAL, Qobuz
Have you tried logging out and back in again to your streaming service in Roon Settings?
· Logging out and back in had no impact, the issue remains
Do you have an approximate timestamp of when the issue last occurred?
· Right now, several times today and last few days
What are the make and model of the affected audio device(s) and the connection type?
· already answered
Describe the issue
Intermittent Chromecast group playback issues
Describe your network setup
KEF LSX II x 2, KEF LS50 W2, Nest Audio x 2
This is essentially a follow up to my previous issues with Chromecast group with mixed KEF/Nest Audio speakers, in a Deco mesh network: Roon skips all tracks in Chromecast group zone after a few seconds (ref#87LSYA) - #11 .
Unfortunately now I’m having a variety of playback issues throughout the day; sometimes music stutters for a few minutes then resumes, most of the time if it starts stuttering it will eventually stop and I have to reselect the zone and hit Play again.
Several days, when I wake up I see that the KEF LS50 W2 also stops connecting to Wi-Fi, and I have unplug it from power to get it to reconnect. As I stated in the first ticket, KEF’s “wireless” speakers have very crappy Wi-Fi stacks. Everything else in that room has flawless near 1Gbps Wi-Fi to the router.
I re-plugged in the LS50 to ethernet, and right now things are ok, but I’m not holding my breath. The two Nest Audio, and the two KEF LSX II, are still on Wi-Fi.
Any further suggestions greatly appreciated.
Hey @Raul_Acevedo,
Thanks for writing in and for sharing your report! From a fresh Roon Server diagnostic report, we can see that there are three distinct failure modes occurring, often in combination. The primary driver behind the issues is your Google Cast Group’s WiFi instability, which cascades into the other issues.
The logs show the Cast Group (“The Ocean” zone) losing its connection and being torn down completely, requiring Roon to rebuild the zone from scratch. This is why you have to reselect the zone and hit Play, the zone is literally being destroyed and recreated.
Each time this happens, playback stops mid-track with full buffer (100% buf shows it’s not a streaming speed problem). Critically, the Cast Group’s virtual IP address is constantly changing, it’s seen appearing on .1.4, .1.7, .1.8, .1.11, .1.16 over the same period. This is a hallmark of WiFi mesh instability: the group’s leader (the member acting as receiver) keeps roaming between access points or changing, causing the mDNS discovery to fail and the Cast session to collapse.
These indicate Cast group members are actively announcing they’re leaving, often caused by a Google Home/Nest firmware update, a WiFi reassociation, or a mesh node failover.
Next steps to try:
- If your router/mesh system supports 2.4/5 GHz band steering, try pinning all Cast devices to 5 GHz only, or at minimum, ensure they’re all on the same band. Roon and Chromecast groups are particularly sensitive to mDNS traffic being lost across mesh nodes.
- Assign static/reserved DHCP IPs to all Cast devices (both KEF speakers, both Nest Audios, LS50 W2). The constantly shifting IPs .1.4 through .1.16 suggest DHCP leases are expiring and re-assigning, which forces mDNS re-announcement and disrupts active Cast sessions.
- Enable IGMP Snooping and/or mDNS repeating in your router/mesh settings. This ensures Cast group discovery packets are properly forwarded across WiFi nodes.
- Check for pending firmware updates on your Nest Audio devices and KEF speakers — the TLS failures specifically correlate with the Nest Audios (
969c0c36... and a80966a0...), suggesting they may be running outdated firmware with certificate handling issues.
Thank you! 
1 Like
You are absolutely right, when this stuttering happens, the group drops then reappears.
I did everything you suggested; I should’ve assigned reserved IPs before but didn’t initially find where to do that in the Deco app, now I did. All the speakers have reserved IPs and are on 5 GHz only.
Unfortunately I couldn’t find IGMP Snooping or mDNS repeating settings in the Deco app.
Odd about the TLS failures… the Nest Audio speakers are apparently on the latest firmware. Since I never turn them off, I rebooted them in case that forces new connections using new TLS certs.
I’ll report back how it goes, thank you so much for the detailed help!
The music stopped suddenly today at 10:55am PDT; I didn’t get to my phone quickly enough to see if the group zone got recreated, but I suspect it did since a minute later when I hit Play, I heard the connection sound from my speakers.
Also… I keep waking up to find the KEF LS50 W2 disconnected from Wi-Fi (even though there’s a Deco pod a foot away in a cabinet from the main speaker). I’d like to try reconnecting it to ethernet; do you think that might cause any issues since everything else is on Wi-Fi? They all have reserved IPs now.
LS50 keeps losing Wi-Fi, this won’t work, so switched to ethernet and a reserved IP for that interface. Fingers crossed.
At 9:50am PDT, the zone got recreated… but now there are two of them, with the same IP address. This happened before a couple weeks ago.
I just went to the Mac mini running Roon Server and Roon is stuck showing “Waiting for your Roon Server”. Very odd, because music has been playing through one of the two identical “The Ocean” group zones. Clicking “Start Roon Server” results in the same thing.
Then I quit Roon, and somehow the music is still playing even though the Roon app on the server is closed. Apparently RoonAppliance is still running, so I killed that and started Roon app again, and now there’s only one “The Ocean” group zone.
Hey @Raul_Acevedo,
Thanks for the updates! Based on your last response, it’s unclear if you’re still experincing issues?
Feel free to share a fresh timestamp if the issue is still present. Thank you!
Things have been going pretty well, the only issue so far was when I somehow ended up with two “The Ocean” group zones, they even had the same IP address; my Roon Core application on the Mac mini server was stuck on “Waiting for Roon Server” (even though it was the server); quitting Roon showed that RoonApplicance was still running.
I had to manually quit RoonAppliance, start my Roon core again, then everything went back to normal. This happened once before a few weeks ago.
Timestamp was 4/12 9:50 PDT when the zone was recreated, and I ended up with two identical “The Ocean” zones. See my last two messages.