I’ve been using Roon on and off using a dedicated Mac mini as the host. It’s never quite worked as well as I would like, or think it should. Some tracks in my iTunes library won’t appear, etc.
Should I just bite the bullet and purchase a Nucleus? Then Rip my CD collection at hi res? Is it going to make that much of a difference? (I think I know the answer to that last one!)
Sell me on making the purchase, those of you who have a Nucleus.
Thanks!
What is it you suppose a Nucleus would do for you? It’s not going to help you rip, over what a Mac can do, and it won’t stream the music differently than what your Mac and Roon Core will already do.
It does have a kind of cool-looking case.
I suppose convenience, ease of use, fewer issues with setting it up, connecting, etc. Biggest frustration is Roon not seeing my complete iTunes library on the Mac. That’s why I’m asking Nucleus owners to chime in about - was it worth it?
Either way I’m ripping my CD collection from scratch. But if I do it with the Mac and Roon doesn’t see all the files as I’m experiencing currently, then I’d be wasting a ton of time. If I buy the Nucleus I would be committing to using it all the time, leaving the iTunes ecosystem for the most part.
What I’d do is rip on the Mac, but not with iTunes. Use dbPowerAmp or the like instead. Rip to ALAC or FLAC (I’d do FLAC).
As for the other issues, I doubt there’s a difference, but it depends on your habits. If you are using the Mac anyway for other things, you’re already doing the various update things, so I wouldn’t expect a Nucleus to buy you anything in particular.
Rip to CD quality because this is all that’s there on the CD. I’d use FLAC as @Bill_Janssen said. If for some reason you want to upsample to hi-res later, you can still do that, starting from the bit-perfect CD copy.
I really love my Nucleus+. It looks cool. It always works. It’s silent. It wasn’t cheap. I’m glad I bought it. The end. 
I own a Nucleus and like it very much. It will do nothing for your SQ. Get one if you want or don’t.
See below:
This is great advice! The Nucleus’ CD ripper is meant to be used here and there. It is very slow because it is configured to get the highest quality rips out of scratched-up CDs. We use a great ripper to do this, but dbPowerAmp or EAC (on Windows) are equivalently good, and let you tweak the settings to make things faster.
You can always just drag and drop the files you ripped onto Roon and it’ll copy it to your Nucleus.
This is why we make Nucleus. Can you achieve this using other solutions? Of course. Nucleus just adds a bunch of opinions the Roon Team have into the mix that we feel lead to success in the areas you just listed.
I fail the first test because I don’t have a Nucleus.
However I have a couple of ROCK/NUCs in fanless cases - which are basically the same - but a little less elegant and a lot cheaper. If you don’t mind some DIY you might want to consider a ROCK.
The main benefits over the Mac mini I used previously was that it always works - and it requires no maintenance. I tried it as an experiment - and I’m still surprised how much better the experience is. I have now build quite a few ROCKs for other people.
On ripping - you should definitely rip your CDs at lossless quality. However not very many ROCK/Nucleus owners rip using roon’s software. The issue is that if you want your rips to be named and tagged well - Roon doesn’t do that. It isn’t needed for Roon - but if you ever want to use the rips elsewhere then it’s helpful to have them tagged and named well. There are many alternatives.
Until recently the Roon ripper also had a bug - that I believe is now fixed - but the fact that it was there for several years tells you now much used it is.
I’m still ripping using iTunes - but sure there are many better alternatives. Do this on your Mac - and copy across the results.
There may be a fixable reason as to why not all your iTunes library is appearing in Roon.
If you’d care to open a new thread in the support category with applicable details we can have a look.
I had a trial Roon membership several years ago and used a MacBook as the core. Gave it up as the software was buggy and not giving any advantage over the Nativ’s software. FF to last year. Nativ is not around. I’ve been using Qobuz for a while and liked it. A few of the audio stores in the area recommended the Nucleus for my purposes even though they carried other players. Unlike others here one of my incentives initially was that it could serve as both core and end point (even though sound is suboptimal this way). Loading my CD collection had it’s arrrgh moments- for some reason migrated from an external drive better through an old windows laptop than through an M1 MBpro. The convenience of having my CDs stored in the Nucleus (awa on a back up drive) plus being able to integrate Qobuz files purchased and on loan along with improved sound quality of an upgraded DAC with an Ethernet card for streaming more than made up for Roon’s occasional bugginess. My limited experience thus is that the Nucleus as hardware works better than what I tried. BTW I don’t use iTunes; Qobuz works for me when driving or out of town.
Just my 2p
I went NUC i7 , 32 gb RAM, 256 SSD For OS then 4tb SSD for content , with ROCK
DIY but about an hour, haven’t touched it since other than ON OFF i am 72 and clumsy but computer literate . It was easy , even get a local suppler to build and you install ROCK
Ripping, the Nuceus ripper works on the basis that Roon adds the Metadata, so files are not easily portable between say Roon and DLNA .Db Poweramp seems the recommend route, i used JRiver as that was what i used back then
If you are Roon 100% for the rest of your life then Nucleus is great but expensive. A NUC can be repurposed by loading Windows if needs be.
A NUC is tiny and easily hidden short of loading and analysis its silent despite the fan.
Just my experience
A Nucleus is for those who have better things to do than mess around with computer hardware. It comes with support and it looks pretty. It only does Roon but that is more a strength than weakness if you are committted to the product. Those are its core strengths, the things common to all of its users. Pretty much all else is take it or leave it.
My Nucleus is ailing at the moment. It’s possible that the OS SSD will soon be broken. The device is just over 2 years old, so this is unfortunate, but it can happen.
Until this incident, I was always completely satisfied with the device. It’s a question of what you’re willing to invest, but for 2 years I had peace of mind. Would love to use it for another 2 years at least.
My next Roon Core would probably be a NUC with ROCK. It depends on whether I can now get my Nucleus up and running again, and then how long it will last.
It should be fairly easy to replace the SSD.
Yes, this project is in my queue now.
If you want to re-install the Nucleus build - you may need Roon to send you the software.
Although don’t know if it still differs from the ROCK build you can download.
Roon will have to make some Nucleus specific fine tuning after ROCK installation.
Never heard a mac mini or other type of home computer that wasnt beaten by a dedicated roon server. Nucleus is a nice piece but check out Small Green Computer. Less expensive. Better specs. And great support from Andrew Gillis and his crew. Roon always works with Andrew on new updates and additions. They just put out the Gen3 I7 with CD ripper and storage on sale. You owe it to yourself to check it out.
I have to second george_ryan. I was running Roon on a dedicated M1 Mac mini but was never 100% happy. I now have a mid level Small Green Computer and it is totally solid. Plus the SQ is improved.