Want to say how much I love Roon for my Music playback!! Blows the other players in the weeds IMHO!
So I have a 2012 MAC Mini 2.6GHz i7 Quad Core 16GB RAM modified to run on 12 volts DC. I have a 1TB SSD for music and a 1TB HDD for back-up all in the same box.
I would like full dedication to Roon with my MAC. Every now and then I get “Dead Air” for 4-5 seconds then the song resumes. Sometime twice in one song a other times not for several hours.
How do I get the RoonServer to not let the MAC do any other processing while listening to music?
When I first installed RoonServer, it seemed to dominate my MAC like I want it to…buy since then (an update or two to Roon) I always have to click on a Roon icon to get Roon Server to load where as before RoonServer loaded when I first cold boot the MAC.
There also might be something going on in your network. Can you describe your network setup, especially the chain between your mac mini core to the dac/amp/speakers.
I run Roon Server on an unmodified (except for an SSD I self-installed) mid-2011 i5-based Mac mini, and I don’t experience the kind of dropouts you describe. At this point, with the current Roon builds, I really don’t have any issues with the mini (knock on wood). Sometimes I output via HQP on a separate computer, but mostly I’m using Roon’s DSP to upsample everything to DSD256.
If you still experience any dropouts after following through with the lines of inquiry suggested by @RBM and @Rugby, I’d suggest the following:
After backing up everything (including a Roon database backup), perform a clean install of the current MacOS and Roon Server, and then restore your Roon database from the backup. Turn off anything (like Time Machine backups and Spotlight indexing) that could cause unwanted activity on the SSD while you’re listening (as I think you’ve mentioned elsewhere), and you should be good to go.
If you’re not already doing so, for the ne plus ultra in sound quality, I would recommended having a network endpoint (preferably connected by wired Ethernet) in your chain and connecting your DAC to the endpoint, rather than directly to the mini.
My MAC mini is connected through it’s wireless antenna to my Network. Then my Mac outputs though a Split USB out (split with one Signal leg and one Power leg. Power leg is 5 volts DC from my LPS and the other leg to my MAC. It runs straight into my Yggdrasil DAC ( waiting on a Hydra Z DDC to go between my Mac and DAC with an AES output) then RCA’s out to my Marantz 8801 Pre Pro then to my 5 channel Amp, then to my Speakers.
Headphone rig takes the DAC output through balanced XLR’s to my Oppo HA-1 headphone amp.
I just rebooted my Mac Mini and it has the Roon server running and a check mark is by the “run at Start up”
label. But sometimes I have seen my Mini boot up and I still have to click on the Roon Server icon on my Desk Top to get the GUI up in the top right menu bar.
I know…that’s how it worked the very first time I installed it…but somehow an icon got onto my Desktop…Roon logo…hope I don’t have a corrupted version…?
It would be great to get a reply from either Dan or Rene to see if they have an answer.
What I don’t get about using a outboard NAS and still having to go through a computer…you’d think that would introduce more digital and AC crap to the signal. Why would I want a DAC that connects to Ethernet???
The question is why wouldn’t you want a DAC with an Ethernet port.
The Ethernet port provides great signal isolation, as said by Paul McGowan said on the PS Audio forums “… better isolation than USB, I2S, coax or AES EBU for connected music sources. There’s nothing better than Ethernet for isolation and sound quality.”
However, DACs with ethernet capability are kind of rare (but getting more common as time goes by) and on the expensive side, so a lot of people, use small Ethernet to USB adapaters like the mRendu or Sonic Oribiter, or the DIY crowd uses Pi’s. That way the computer and the storage drives are removed from the listening area completely.
As to the Mac icon, @RBM would speak better to that as I am a Windows/Linux/Android user.
@LarryMagoo, could you select the icon on your desktop, press cmd-I (eye), and post a screen shot of the info window that results? That would tell us a lot about the nature of that Desktop icon.
But upon reboot…Roon never shows up in the menu bar…so that means I go to the App folder find Roon and click on it…so somethings still not right…Ands I did have Checked…Launch on start-up
So after moving Roon Server to the Applications folder, verifying that “Launch at startup?” is checked in the menubar widget, and then restarting the mini, you don’t see the Roon logo in the menubar?
