Thank you for the feedback. I am going to purchase the Ethernet dongle right now so that I can use that as an acid test.
I understand your wired suggestions in earnest. Quite frankly, I went down the rabbit hole of Roon and the 218 for the purpose of cutting the cord. I used to run a Meridian AC200 with a cord that I would run to my laptop on the couch when I listed to music. I hated it and was looking for a way to just fire up my laptop, iPod, iPad, etc. and have it work.
I also rent so I cannot do any wiring work and my desk is in the middle of the room, so I once again face the reality of having wires strewn across the floor. At that rate, I would be better off saving my $20/mo Roon membership fees and just going back to a direct-connect solution. Candidly, I like the Tidal app interface better anyway. Just trying to give you guys some background on what I was aiming to achieve.
I suppose my other solution may be to run the Roon Core off of a Raspberry Pie tucked away in the credenza with my 218 and use my phone as a remote. I am looking for a slick solution.
Another strange observation is how sporadic the issue is. A couple hours ago, the system was crashing constantly. Now it is running OK, I have had it cut out once in the past 30 minutes.