Playback with Roon/Aries frequently stopping

Audio Gear Talk Auralic
1

Hi. Awesome forum. I have an Aries that recently (last ~3 weeks) started acting up; Here is the basic setup:

Roon Core, running on fairly current custom built i7 Windows 10 PC. 32 GB Ram, SSD for OS/Applications.
Roon Endpoints:
-Pair of Sonos Play 1
-Local PC running the Core
-Main Streamer: Auralic Aries

Other Hardware:
-WiFi Router: Netgear Nighthawk X4S AC2600 (R7800-100NAS) Wi-Fi
-DAC: Meitner MA-1 connected via a Wireworld USB cable to the Aries.
-External USB Drives for music libraries (FLAC, AAC, WAV, DSD)
-iPad (modern, latest gen) running LightningDS

I have had this setup running since Dec 1st 2018; It was stable (no dropouts) for many weeks until recently. I usually stream from Tidal but also the DSD-64 files from time to time.

Problem Basics:
Summary: frequent disconnects during playback; sometimes within a minute or 2, others after a few songs. It looks like the Aries drops out of the Roon Zone. Obviously not the desired user experience we want or expect.

Roon & Sonos: Never shows this issue, regardless how many streams the Core is processing.
Roon & PC: same as above. Rock stable

Debug Steps (not in order) > Observation
Located Aries within arms length of Wi-Fi router > Still happens
Power cycle Aries > Still happens
Reboot Roon Core > Still happens
Reboot PC > Still happens
Reset cable modem > Still happens
Reboot Wi-Fi > Still happens
Factory reset Aries > still happens
LightningDS (take Roon out) > still happened but much lower frequency
USB Drive into USB Port on Aries > Never happened --> update: after playing with direct connected USB drive, after 2 or 3 songs playback will stop and restart from very beginning or just stop altogether.

Wired connection to Router > Still happens; actually was SUPER bad this way. Ended up totally messing up my router in a real nasty way that required me to hardware reset the router. MAC’s were being cloned when viewed by the ISP (had them on the phone). I setup the wired connection with LightningDS, followed all the steps and then all manner of router hell began a few minutes after Aries was playing songs from Roon.

Misc Puts:
Like many typical home networks, I’ve got about 5-20 wifi attached devices at any time coming and going. The router has been a rock star; we stream Amazon Prime, Netflix, etc during times of Peak evening activity and these other end user experiences RARELY have any QoS issues.

When the Roon/Aries/Meitner path is working, the audio results are all I could hope for (and afford); Please share your insights and/or ask me for other tests to run.
Cheers and Happy Trails.
Dave

2

I returned my Aries to the dealer because of issues such as the ones you’re describing. Auralic never seem to be able to get the product out of beta, sw or hw-wise.
Now I’m happily using roon with a Moon Mind2 streamer and not looking back…

Sorry if that reply was a bit harsh. I just totally gave up on the Aries in the end…

3

@oafrenning that’s fine. Not to worry. I know how good the Aries/DAC combo is; at one point it worked ‘just fine’ and now, not so much. I read elsewhere that it might be a hardware issue with the actual Wi-Fi module. I am an EE and love to troubleshoot and fix stuff, so if I could, I would replace the Wi-Fi module with improved hardware; the firmware would need support and that’s where it comes to a full stop however
…these radios are pretty cheap, like 10’s of $$$
Cheers,
Dave

1 Like
4

One wild question; why are you running the Aries over wifi? Why not a cabled ethernet? It just works so much better in general. I tested an Auralic Vega G2 for a few months; that worked flawless as a Roon endpoint.

5

I tried the Wired connection to Router ; dropout Still happens; actually was SUPER bad this way. Ended up totally messing up my router in a real nasty way that required me to hardware reset the router. MAC’s were being cloned when viewed by the ISP (had them on the phone). I setup the wired connection with LightningDS, followed all the steps and then all manner of router hell began a few minutes after Aries was playing songs from Roon.
Never had this much trouble with basic network hardware.

6

Did you recently update the firmware of your Netgewr Nighthawk? I had the exact same issues both wired and wireless after updating the firmware. It took me weeks of testing to realise that it was the update.

After downgrading to the firmware from May 2018 everything was back to perfect.

7

@Quaerit thanks for input! I have been running with V1.0.2.60 now and WIRED connection. I’m afraid to mess with anything now that i have found 100% rock solid performance via cable. I might try to revert though at some point. Please send me exact FW version.
This forum is AWESOME.
:100:

8

I reverted to 1.0.2.52 from 1.0.2.60 and it solved my issues. Somehow Netgear knows this but still have not done anything to fix it (yet). This issue also affects network performance for other things such as Airplay.

Link: