“Metadata improver: paused”

[r1979]

Core Machine (Operating system/System info/Roon build number)

Ubuntu Linux 20.04
36-core Intel i9 128GB RAM workstation
Roon 1.8 build number 783 stable

Network Details (Including networking gear model/manufacturer and if on WiFi/Ethernet)

Wired 1Gbps network from server to ubiquity dream machine WiFi router, 802.1ac WiFi from ubiquiti dream machine to iPad Air 3
WAN connection of the workstation on which the server runs makes permanent use of ProtonVPN

Audio Devices (Specify what device you’re using and its connection type - USB/HDMI/etc.)

Bose loudspeakers connected to the audio out of the workstation.

Description Of Issue

“Metadata improver: paused” See picture. Indexing goes smoothly, no other issues I could spot. I’m in my 5th day of the trial period and the metadata improver never worked so far. Maybe VPN related?

[r1979]

Update: I turned off the VPN and now it seems to work. Does RoonLabs blacklists IP addresses known as being exit points of commercial VPN providers?

[Nepherte (Bart Verhoeven)]

No they do not blacklist IP addresses to my knowledge. More likely the VPN slows down your internet to a point where this error shows up. I’ve seen Roonlabs suggest to change DNS providers (to e.g. 8.8.8.8) but that would partially defeat the purpose of the VPN.

[Nepherte (Bart Verhoeven)]

Come to think of it, instead of slower internet speeds and based on the dns recommendation’s of Roonlabs, it might also be a stale dns cache entry (ie. the VPN provider contains a no longer valid ip address associated with an address at which Roon checks for metadata).

PS: just speculation on my part

[r1979]

Thanks for the reply! It might have to do with NextDNS then… Nevertheless, I was thinking to configure Roon to use Wireguard to overcome network segmentation issues (I use different zones for home/work) and I found your excellent post about WG!