I’m not even convinced different amps really sound any different, let alone software, Yet I’m sensitive to different digital masterings and vinyl pressings 
2 Likes
Yeah, but that only makes sense.
2 Likes
I’m sure I get my witchcraft fix somewhere else in life.
1 Like
Different digital masterings and vinyl pressings can sound radically different. All this Roon doesn’t sound as good as other software stuff is pure hokum. It’s bit perfect. I’m growing very very tired of the constant ‘golden-eared’ audiophoolery that pervades the Roon community. There’s so much cognitive and expectation bias around the newest, latest and greatest solution to a non-problem and wholesale hook, line and sinker buy into bullsh!t and pseudo-scientific testiculating (waving your arms and talking b0ll0cks). FFS - wake up, smell the coffee and grow at least an infinitessimal grain of objectivity.
I love Roon. I spent last night on a meandering musical journey via Roon radio after playing a couple of selected tracks from my ripped library. My wife had to chase me out of my man cave to go to bed. That for me is one of it’s best features.
17 Likes
@Graeme_Finlayson - Taken out of context, that is perhaps the best 2 sentences I’ve read together in a while.
9 Likes
Makes me wonder how manufacturers or audio software developers deal with this wall of irrationality that they face from many of their customers. Must be very difficult to know what to do when designing equipment if you don’t believe the ‘golden-eared’ theoreticians. I don’t envy them at Roon.
1 Like
They don’t say a word as they don’t want to alienate the believers.
Or they give up on principles and sell what the customer wants, magic rocks and all.
4 Likes
“Sir, I have a better sounding server to sell you (…)”
2 Likes
This is why I love Jason Stoddard / Mike Moffat and buy their stuff even when I know there might be something better out there. Value engineering audio wonderfulness.
on my side, while I like roon UI much better, I can clearly tell my moon 780iv2+700iv2 running their native application sounds more joyfull and springy thanks roon raat on the same machine (no intermediate endpoint). this is a bit sad. to the point that I find my music in roon and select it in moon mind application… If any of you has any advice…
@brian I know you have said in the past that you need something objective to work on in order to deliver any sound quality improvements. You should have a Moon 780 in house as it’s Roon Ready can you measure the output from it with both inputs and see if there is any difference or not. Have you already tried this on other gear?
Yes. Sound quality will improve by 1.8%. The incremental improvement of sound quality is carefully allocated to keep subscriber churn at a minimum while maximizing profit over the course of Roon’s viable product lifetime.
And of course if they gave us perfect sound all at once, our brains would explode. Not a good strategy for long term success you know.
Goose, golden egg, and whatnot.
3 Likes
We are now again at a point, I hear it. It is not possible. It is an illusion. But I can hear it.
I do not want to stop here.
If we do not apply any DSP, EQ we can say:
- Roon is bit-perfect.
- Squeezelite is bit-perfect.
We can also conclude
- we accept, bits are bits. The data stream is not modified. Everything arrives as it was sent
- we accept, you hear a difference
It has nothing to do with software but there are other observations
- I hear a difference with another switch
- I hear a difference between different Ethernet cables
- I hear a difference between different USB cables
- Optical connections are better
- A different powersupply makes an audible difference
Now I ask what do all these things have in common.
- we have always multiple electrical devices connected
- the problem is only audible, if electrical connections between the devices are involved
- it does not happen over WiFi
- it does not happen using optical connections
The only common thing which I see here is “electrical grounding”.
And now I just mention Ground Loop and Leakage Current without further details. I claim these two things are responsible for the differences we hear. How to avoid these two we should discuss.
And these two things can not be solved in Software.
4 Likes
@Vincent_Gizzi. Ah Yes,. In the 1980’s. CD red book … Better than human hearing. By any measure (what ever that was) better than vinyl. Yet in the 1980’s jitter was not fully understand!
Roon 1.8 marketing to me seems to be messaging ‘form and function’ rather than SQ…!
Roon 1.7 sounds great - in the sense that it doesn’t have its own “sound signature”. I’m pretty sure this won’t change in 1.8.
Maybe that’s because SQ (super advanced processing / room correction GUI feature request put aside) is a solved problem ?
1 Like
It is so easy said, they have to focus on SQ.
What do they have to do in your opinion to improve it?
We have common sense, that Roon is bit-perfect. What more can they do then being bit-perfect?
2 Likes
Depending on the language, bit plus-que-parfait ?
1 Like
What some people seem to want is to be wowed by super-whizzy and hyperbolic marketing speak about sound quality improvements. Whether they actually exist or not is irrelevant, it would make them happy.
2 Likes
yup, If roon is providing software driven ‘bit-perfect’ delivery then SQ = bit-perfect delivery and I am happy with that. That said IMO some software does sound different, I can not say if its worse or better. roon has DSP should you wish to tinker, so I am happy with that also (I do not btw).
I do hope roon 1.8 sorts out classical box-sets / complications (i.e. an album per track!!! etc. or is that just me not understanding something in ripping?)
1 Like