My Roon Core is on my Nucleus, which has a wired connection to my Router. About every 30-40 minutes. the internet radio suddenly stops. At first I thought it was the station dropping out, but I’ve tried several stations and they all do the same. Hit the play button and it plays again…I am playing a playlist stored on the Nucleus SSD at the moment so I’ll see if it does it whilst playing from my library.
On a couple of occasions albums stored on the Nucleus SSD have skipped tracks all the way through the album, without playing anything. A reboot of the Nucleus sort’s it, but it’s not meant to keep doing that.
So we can better assist you, please provide a brief description of your current setup using this link as a guide.
Make sure to describe your network configuration/topology, including any networking hardware currently in use, so we can have a clear understanding of how your devices are communicating.
Does this issue occur for one or a few stations in particular or do all Internet Radio stations exhibit this issue?
I am actually having Network issues at home at the moment which is affecting Netflix and Apple TV. I will sort this out.
Internet stations do drop out occasionally. I had this issue ages ago before my Roon system. I remember that ‘Radio Paradise’ used to drop out quite a bit.
I am more worried about the Album Tracks occasionally skipping from the beginning, to the end of the Album, without actually playing. You can see the Little Circle flashing on each track as it skips through them. Would Network issues cause this?
My setup is…
Sky Router. (38 Mbps) Connected by Audioquest Ethernet Cable to a 8 port Netgear Switch.
Roon Nucleus Connected to Netgear Switch by Audioquest Ethernet cable.
Roon Nucleus 1TB SSD with Music Folder.
Roon Nucleus Audioquest USB cable to Matrix Audio Pro Sabre DAC.
Matrix Audio Pro Sabre DAC connected to Naim Amplification.
Yes, networking issues can cause all the above symptoms. When Roon is not able to load a track, it goes to the next one. Same goes for internet radio streams (since you mention RP in particular, see this thread).
Is this a managed or unmanaged switch? We advise against using managed switches (the one’s you can configure with a web interface).
Hi Noris
Touch wood, the problem is resolved. The Netgear Switch is an Unmanaged Switch.
Cut a long story short, I fed the Router directly to the Roon Nucleus, bypassing the Switch. The system was rock solid! A faulty Switch was the issue. Binned that Switch and installed another one which I used to use with my old NAS. All now rock solid.
Finally…In your opinion Noris, If you have several devices that require the Internet, is a Switch the only answer? Or, is there something better? I was told that a Switch is good for streaming, either from the Internet, or from stored music folders. (NAS, Nucleus etc…)
switches are 100% good for streaming (local files or internet). But as noted, many “managed” switches can cause problems. I’ve been using unmanaged switches for years and have no dropouts. As you found a bad switch, or bad port on a switch, or bad cable, can cause intermittent problems.
Thank you Gary.
My unmanaged Switch is a cheap, plastic Netgear Switch. About $27. I need about 4-5 ports. Should I spend more? Would my system benefit?
Nope. I’m using a cheap unmanaged gigabit netgear switch for at least 10 years. I’m not against spending money, but no need for this. It either works or it doesn’t. There’s no subtle sound quality issues involved here. Remember, internet banking works. My bank account balance doesn’t rise and fall based on subtle differences in the switch’s ability to deliver zeros and ones in a digital stream.
Happy to hear you managed to narrow down the issue to a defective switch!
An unmanaged switch would be the best option to “split” one Ethernet connection into multiple.
As you have seen though, networking hardware such as switches can also fail over time, so having a properly working one is important.
It sounds like the new switch is working as expected in this case, so I’m going to go ahead and mark this thread as [solved] but if you run into any other issues with Roon, just let us know and we can take another look, thanks!
