I’ve been thinking about this for quite some time in observing posts on the forum, and sometimes considering my own posts. Maybe this is a different thread than the topic at hand…but…
This is somewhat inherent in Roon for two reasons:
ONE, Roon is substantially more expensive than its competitors. Not meaning to get in a debate about value and whether it’s worth it – certainly I am paying and thus consider it worth it – but when you charge what Roon does you sort of paint a target on your back…you create an expectation that Roon will eventually meet not only your needs but your wants that are not needs;
TWO, Roon adopters generally have to make some changes to their network topology to optimize the benefits. That tends to knock out the ability to use other apps and utilities in the same way we used to.
Good example is RAAT as an endpoint. I converted my audio PC into a headless endpoint so it’s a lot harder to play some random piece of media over my system than it used to be. For example my son sends me a 30 second clip of his music. I don’t want to go through the hassle of adding it to my Roon library to play it…but I can’t use VLC player without dealing with the headless endpoint directly…so I want Roon to transport that audio without interposing its library.
So there is both a sense of entitlement due to the pricing and a real suction of need based on what Roon knocks out of your system if you jump in with both feet. (And yes, obviously one could maintain parallel systems for the other purposes).
Again, not a comment on the value of Roon. Just noting the natural results of its positioning both in terms of price and configuration.