I was a huge fan of my Mac Mini M2 with Roon until Sequoia was released. Now it’s a boat anchor and Roon is unusable. I don’t have the interest I once had in dealing with this. I want Roon without the constant maintenance. If it can work like Spotify or Pandora, I’ll continue to invest. Does anyone have a server that just works without issue? Lost audio zones, iMac/iPhone crashing - etc. Is it an IOS or OSX thing? Not sure. I’m mostly using WiiM endpoints with a rPi and an iPhone. Thank you.
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I’ve got an original Nucleus
Apart from adding the (optional, I believe) internal SSD, it’s plug and play
Mine’s been faultless since 2019 - touch wood!
At $499 it seems very reasonably priced, in the great scheme of things. My Nucleus was over twice that I think
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My roon setup has been super reliable since I switched to ROCK a few years back.
Effortless to maintain - and has never gone wrong.
Much more reliable than its Mac mini predecessor.
I’m sure a nucleus would be the same.
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My Roon Server runs on a Beeline mini PC with an i5 processor and has been 100% reliable since I switched from Windows to Linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS. Just remember to disable the automatic updates
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… and be exposed to attacks.
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I run the update process about every 2 weeks and right away if there is news of a vulnerability.
That’s good to know, but that’s not what your advice was. Anyway, isn’t it a lot easier to let it do it automatically and not have to keep an eye on the news?
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Maybe - but I was previously on Windows where the constant automatic updates caused a lot of stability issues with the server so I made a number of changes to get the reliability I need
- no more windows
- hardwired the server to router
- switched to manual updates
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Not if protected by a firewall external to the non-updated machine (or any other OS/machine) and you don’t allow unknown hosts to connect to your network. Setup a guest wifi network for ‘unknowns’ and don’t allow access to anything internal.
I have several machines, mostly RPi running specific ‘jobs’ for me. The nearly continual updates of the open-source community would break some functionality for me each week or month. Life is too short. Just disable updates and protect it by other means.
This isn’t specific to Roon, rather a philosophy…I run Roon Server on Windows 11 and it reboots nightly on a schedule. No fuss, always works. I ran ROCK/MOCH for years prior and Windows now outperforms it but for my library/use needs a reboot regularly to not get ‘funky’.
But again, you can’t just tell people “disable updates” and leave it at that. And if we’re not talking about Roon specifically, we have to think about systems that can’t benefit from external protections (e.g. laptops).
My philosophy is simpler: don’t mess with security and leave automatic updates do their job. That, and to remind people about the risks whenever someone tells them to turn off updates on this forum.
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I didn’t say just ‘disable updates’. I agree it’s not wise alone but would argue automatic updates in and of itself isn’t enough to protect the OS either. Anyone without protection at the network edge is truly living on the edge.
I find it’s best to treat the Roon Server as an appliance (precisely what Roon has done with Nucleus and we all can do with ROCK/MOCK). Set it up to do one job, don’t use it for anything else, ever. Just like a microwave or dishwasher. Cautiously update Roon Server itself when compelled but only after either being willing to lose your db or having multiple backups (beyond just db backups) and having tested the restore.
I spent the last ~15 years of my 35 year career (just retired last month) creating, implementing and maintaining cyber defense and prophylactic active systems, including user training…as people are the most significant liability these days. Prior to my cyber focus I designed, built and managed large scale international enterprise networks along with all the ancillary systems connected. I was still consulted regarding major changes right up to retirement.
I should add, I’ve been running Roon since 2017 or was it 2016.
I know, I didn’t mean you, just in general. I know how dreaded updates are for IT people, for good reason. The good thing is that IT people can mitigate risks some other ways; the bad thing is that most Roon users are not IT people. And for most Roon users, a slightly elevated instability may be a price worth paying for staying safe.
(Regarding the appliance concept, I think I’d have to have too many appliances if each computer did exactly one single job.)
Get a 2012 Mac Mini, install ROCK on it, use an USB network adapter and you are good to go.
You won’t regret by going with the most powerful quad-core i7 and two SSDs, small one for ROCK and one for your library, even if you use NAS, internal SSD is much, much faster and a joy to start with.
ROCK is a must.
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Don’t think Roon is any more stable really on any specific platform. It has its shares of issues across all of them. Whilst certain Os add to this, the software itself is hardly the most reliable of late.
Having Run Roon on Rock, and other flavours linux over several years can’t say I would say one is anymore reliable than the other, each has its own advantages and disadvantages. You chose what works best for you.
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This I wholeheartedly agree with. No need for it. If Roon needs this then I would certainly argue there is something fundamentally wrong with the software. No music software should need a dedicated pc to itself.
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I use a NAS. See A Roon on (Synology) NAS Primer
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FWIW
I moved from Windows PC to NUC/ROCK nearly 3yrs ago it’s been perfect since.
its a 10i7 NUC 256 SSD , 32 Gb RAM, 4Tb Internal SSD
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I, on the other hand, am perfectly comfortable with the appliance concept - I don’t like having all my eggs in one basket.
So I prefer having a ROCK/NUC system for my music, a RPi4 for our Home Automation (Home Assistant), a RPi4 for PiHole and a couple more RPi4s running RoPieee, all of which are on 24/7…
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As did I for a the last 6-7 years but I thought why am I doing this it’s not good for power consumption, my time managing different devices and overall physical footprint. My nas will be the next thing likely to go when I work out a plan of what to do as I don’t really use this enough any more to warrant it.
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