Making Roon prefer Tidal to Apple AAC files

Roon Software TIDAL
#1

I don’t understand how to do this on a large scale. I have thousands of purchased tracks in iTunes that are less-than-CD quality. I have a Tidal subscription and would prefer that Roon played the Tidal version.

I can do that album by album in Roon. But how can I do it for thousands of tracks?

I’ve exported a playlist from iTunes and imported to Tidal. What do I need to do next?

Option 1: I could add the tracks to “My Collection” in Tidal, but I don’t see a way to do this for a playlist.
Option 2: I could add the Tidal playlist to my Roon library. But, again, I don’t see how to do it for the playlist, only file by file.

I’m obviously missing something basic. Thanks for your help!

#2

Unfortunately there isnt a way to do this in bulk. Its been raised before and having to have manually done all of mine it’s something that’s needed. I suggest you add a feature request in the feature request thread.

There is a service called Soundiiz that can convert playlist to different services but it’s reliant on matching all the versions you have to the same ones in Tidal. It still might not match all as a result so would have to manually add them and then use group different versions.

#3

Your second paragraph is where I got stuck. I used a tool Tidal recommended to match tracks in Tidal that I have in iTunes. So now I have a Tidal playlist of 5,400 tracks. I just don’t know what to do with that playlist. How do I add those albums to my Roon library? I see two possibilities (one in Tidal, one in Roon), but I can’t figure out how to do either. Very frustrating.

#4

If it’s added to Tidal correctly as albums or tracks and you have linked your Tidal in Roon they should just sync across next time it does a sync. Or you can force it to resync. The playlist will be in your playlists in Roon. Not sure a playlist with force a sync of the files to your library though.

#5

Looks like you can bulk add from playlist. Goto playlists you will see your playlist from Tidal with all your songs. You will need to select use select all then choose the top three dot menu and select add to library.

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#6

Thanks! Unfortunately, my iPhone interface doesn’t have the Select drop down. I also don’t see it on my Mac (where I host Roon server). And I just downloaded Roon for windows. Don’t see it there either!

One difference is that I’m still in the trial period for both Roon and Tidal. Maybe that’s the issue? I’m so frustrated!

Maybe @support can help?

#7

Trial has nothing to do with it as its fully fledged. If hold down on one item in the list until the display changes you should be able to see the menu, sorry forgot to mention that. I suggest you read up on Roons knowledge base as to how to use it as it covers most of this stuff.

https://kb.roonlabs.com/

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#8

Thank you! I knew it was something simple, but that’s some non-intuitive UI.

I’ve launched the massive library add. Fingers crossed.

#9

It will take some time to add all those, how long will depend on how much and how fast your Roon core computer is it could take a few hours or much longer. I would not expect all files to match exactly to your iTunes rips that Roon sees, as the version on Tidal may well be a different release of the same album, Roon won’t merge these as they could be a different resolution, remaster etc. Also ensure show hidden tracks and albums is off.

You can easily group differnet versions of an album and set which version is the preferred one to use when you hit play button. Again familarise your self with the KB and how you can manage your library and then use focus to delve deep, create bookmarks etc for quicker access to favourites. Roon is not iTunes don’t expect it to act like it, but after you get used to the way it works it becomes second nature very quickly.

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#10

An update on this: it took a few days, but the importation was a success. I’m working through the cases where I now have duplicates, of which there were many.

One strangeness is that when I add an album manually from Tidal in Roon, then it appears in the Tidal app, too. But the albums added this way didn’t. Maybe because they came in as tracks, not albums. I don’t use the Tidal app, so it’s no big deal, just odd.

#11

Hi-

I think I posted my thoughts on this in another thread. I really really want to be able to configure tidal so that every singe time i have a lossy track/album in my library, and that same track/album exists in Tidal (or Quboz, though I don’t have it), the higher quality version is what is played. I don’t care if it’s formally the “preferred version”, I want the default behavior to be that the lossless track is played UNLESS i choose otherwise. The value of having the lossless track in my library is proof that I like that artist/performance. But the reality is that I would never ever ever want to hear the lossy version if I have already paid to have a lossless version available. So I don’t want to do this bulk, I want to do this default and passively / transparently to me.

#12

I agree. I want to listen to the lossless versions on tidal of my library songs.

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