Since I first set up my Roon system (about three years ago?), I have made a few adjustments but I still get more dropouts and disconnects than I think is normal. I am running Roon on a MacMini, connected to a 20TB WD USB hard drive on which I keep my working music library as ALAC and FLAC files. This is in my office, to keep HD and fan noise out of audible range in my listening room. I have a number of vintage ('60s & '70s) amps and receivers and connect Roon to the AUX inputs. So, the signal path (see screenshots) goes like this: 20 TB HD via USB 3.0 to MacMini, Ethernet into SOtM sMS-200 streamer in living/listening room, USB out into Cambridge Audio DacMagic 200M (which I also use as the DAC for my CD transport via coax), RCA cable out into switches for amp AUX inputs.
My question is whether there’s a more streamlined, less dropout/disconnection-prone way of accomplishing this. I don’t even know where to begin. Would a Roon Nucleus work better than the MacMini and could I still plug my external USB drive into it? On the other end, would a different streamer/DAC (like the WiiM Ultra or Cambridge MXN10) eliminate a step and be more stable?
Any suggestions you might have would be welcome. Thanks…
I’d start with considering an update to the MacMini. If it’s running ROCK, it’s a pretty old Intel box, and ROCK is not designed to run on anything but selected NUCs in any case. 20TB drive suggests a rather large library. So, there could be all sorts of bottlenecks, non-fatal errors, and other slowdown causes that then result in dropouts & the like.
I am using the DacMagic 200M in combination with my Cambridge CXN V2. It is a really nice piece of equipment.
When it comes to your drop-outs. My guess could be your system running the Roon Server. Judging the size of the 20 tb hard drive. My music collection sits at about 1.5 tb and with 87k tracks in the library (local and streaming combined) already crawls to the limit of what Roon recommends to be used on a system with 8 gb of RAM.
I did have drop-outs in the past myself. That was when I was using wifi. But ever since connecting my Roon Server and Cambridge streamer to Ethernet I didn’t have any more of them.
Have you made any changes to settings in Eunhasu, the SOtM device?
As i run a couple of those myself, i know they are dependant on the correct config to be stable.
They are fine with factory settings, but can sound significantly better with some tweaking, but that can also affect stability.
But, i also suspect you have a huge library and you might be suffering from Core overload.
No idea, really – but I have them in three separate genre library folders, artist folders within those and then individual album folders. So, there are roughly 2,000 artist folders in pop/rock, 3,500 in jazz/blues/world, 1,700 in classical… and 130 in Xmas music.
Thanks. I haven’t looked at Eunhasu for a while. I discovered last night that my Roon Server software was set to “Accept Remote Connections,” so my iPhone with Roon Remote may have been interfering through the wi-fi connection, even though I use Ethernet for a direct connection to the Roon core…
My Roon Servers stats. Providing for Roon ARC on my iPhone while away from home. A Loxjie DAC connected to my NUC and 2 streamers at home. Cambridge CXN V2 and a Bluesound Node X. Plays great on my MacBook Pro as server.
I’m normally using my iPad for controlling Roon. So it uses wifi, as does my Node X. No issues here.
Your library doesn’t sound overly large to me. So I guess the dropouts result from elsewhere.
The Finder’s Info window will tell you how many files a folder contains, including subfolders. Just go to the top level folder and check this (it can take a while until the count is done).
