Loving the software, but there are a few thing you really do need to implement - iPad app (I know its coming) and PNP/DLNA. I need to be able to send the music to the end point of my choice with the iPad as my browsing/remote control. I have been using J river and j remote in this fashion to control music in the various zones around the house with very simple DNLA endpoints. In fact my M-DAC was running a Raspberry Pi2 with Volumio / Rune. I don’t want a computer attached to the M-DAC when a $50 Pi will do the job.
I agree wholeheartedly with you on this. I am very impressed with Roon so far but having a Mac tethered to my Oppo BDP105D by USB, whilst marvellous in terms of sounds, is a pain to control in a family living room.
The biggest problem with the lack of computer is that with an RPi for anything but audio playback, you get user experiences that match what’s out there now. JRiver, Twonky, A+, etc… Roon requires more horsepower in a brain of sorts, and that brain is the Core you must have somewhere on the network.
The right way to solve this is to get you RoonSpeakers with RPi support, you can plug you DAC into that. Also, many hardware providers are looking to embed Roon Core into their devices as well, or you could get a headless NUC to do the same.
I think you may slightly misunderstand. The advantage and selling point of Roon is the way it integrates with Tidal and the way your service allows you to explore music linking to other artists and the wealth of information that surrounds that music “surfing”. This is brilliant and is what j river etc dont offer.
This browsing can still happen on the ipad/tablet, so the Roon user experience is maintained. I just want to send the audio to the endpoint of my choice, selectable on the ipad. This is something which DLNA will allow me to do, something J river does with ease. If Roon could also do this it would be a killer app.
I already have lots of devices that support DLNA, and I dont really want to spend money on putting NUCs into the equation running a proprietry solution. For example, M-DAC in one room running off a Raspberry Pi, Oppo 103 in another feeding an AV amp, Onkyo DLNA AV amp in another, DIY speaker running Pi with built in amp…and so on…
However, if you get roonspeakers running on a Pi, then that is a major step forward for me personally.
The iPad app will let you do exactly what you want, but you still need a Roon brain somewhere, we call it the “Core”. The iPad will just be a remote that does no library or endpoint management.
You would need 1 NUC or equivalent device for Roon. The RPi thing only gives you the endpoint, not that brain.
Unlike DLNA, our RoonSpeakers protocol allows endpoints are very lightweight, which is what you want near your audio renderer. If you make a DLNA endpoint that light, it’d be a WAV file streamer and not much else. We offload all the CPU and electrical noise in your system to 1 machine, which can be put far away from your audio gear.
Yes I do have a roon core, the same machine I use (used) for J river DLNA server, its in a cupboard next to the NAS where my library is stored. Thats not the problem. I think we may be talking at cross purposes
All I am looking for is endpoints/renderers controlled by the ipad. My RPi running volumio (DLNA from the Jriver server/J remote on the ipad) is very light weight and sounds just fine. It is connected to my M-DAC via usb, small low power and doesnt have the complications of a Windows PC . In this particular circumstance I am not clear what your proprietary roonspeakers protocol offers? It certainly cant be used to send audio to my Oppo 103, or my Onkyo network AV amp. With DLNA I can.
I dont want or need the endpoint to do anything else, all the important Roon functionality is on the ipad (served by the core)
With DLNA, the queue is owned by the endpoint. With Roon, the queue is owned by the brain, because the queue has smarts to it… Radio for example, and multi-part works.
This means we can’t let DLNA endpoint own the queue. This is one of the many reasons Roon doesn’t work with UPnP/DLNA. RoonSpeakers allows the endpoint to be very dumb, but at the same time, unlike Airplay/Songcast, lets the endpoint own the clock. The DLNA architecture is made for dumb control points, dumb file servers, and smartish endpoints. We feel it is totally the wrong architecture for a rich experience.
We are in discussions with Onkyo about RoonSpeakers. They are eager. Oppo is on the list to reach out to.
If you can connect to your Oppo and Onkyo via a RPI over USB, RPI + RoonSpeakers gets you a way to support those boxes without having to move them, nor having to wait for firmware upgrades.
There are a number of posts on the forum explaining why DLNA is not supported. Like you, I already use other devices as endpoints (except I use Logitechmediaserver as the core and Squeezelite running on a Wandboard as endpoint) and I’m hoping I’ll be ale to leverage them rather than buy additional hardware. I’m speculating, but I surmise the RoonSpeakers protocol is going to be installable on many existing devices such as the Wandboard, Raspberry Pi etc, effectively turning that device into a Roon endpoint and addressing your concerns re having to spend on additional hardware.
Whilst I am not entirely convinced of the argument there, J river manages to do this without issue, its obvious its not an architecture you are going to support, so I have my answer.
The only way this is going to work for me is if you release a RPi version. Do you have any timescales on that? Would it support usb to SPDIF converters?
Whilst the future support from manufacturers such as Onkyo and Oppo is very interesting and welcome, would they bother to update firmware for anything but their current model range? Seems unlikely to me. I suspect my 18 month old NR5010 wouldnt get updated.
