Roon 2.0 and Required Internet Connection

Hi, I tried ARC out and it works for me when I am offline. I have downloaded some local albums before (see Download section under My library within the app) and I can play these albums when I am offline with my smartphone. Do you want to say that this workflow doesn´t work on your side?

Thanks got it working on Sat - but given the system I built and invested in it’s crazy that I’m reduced to an iPhone and a blue tooth speaker

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That is why I don’t buy ARC as the solution for this situation. ARC is ok for portable or mobile use. I will not use ARC to feed my crappy high end stereo. It will just make it crappier.

I am staying with Roon 1.8 Legacy.

Welcome to Roon 2.0.

To not have an offline mode for Roon when it exists for ARC (fledgling product) begs the question why? I think that there is more to it than at first might come to mind. I might be off base here but my guess would be that there has to be a reason that makes sense.

One possibility is that Roon wants to move away from being a hardware seller and wants Roon to eventually not need a local computer running to do the search work etc.

I am also guessing Roon is looking at an end goal of being purchased by one of the larger streaming platforms (Tidal, Spotify, other?) and this makes much more sense if they are a software only entity.

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Clearly yes at least in part, and this goes back at least to 2017 in Danny posts:

And recently

Id have thought that just the straighforward ‘filter’ functionality would be acceptable for most in an offline scenario.

You can play and filter local content when the internet is down, doesnt seem an unreasonable ask or be impossible for Roon to achieve. It has been called ‘limp mode’ in the main thread and I think that is the best way to describe it.

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Totally agree. During hurricane Ian we lost the internet. Very frustrating not be able to use ROON. Some of my friends lost the internet for one week. Totally unacceptable of ROON not allowing the use of their excellent product for short period of time in case of outage.
Half of my albums are on local storage.

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Without hosting your files can’t see how this would work this could infringe copyright and DSP would be more problematic as your getting higher bandwidth files sent put and more latency for multiroom sync, especially where some are using dsp resampling etc. It’s all surmountable but at likely a much higher cost. Personally I have no interest in cloud hosted service to stream my own files it’s just makes no sense to me.
Might as well just use a streaming service that’s cheaper and less prone to outages.

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Yes, Danny did write somewhere at some time that storing personal files in the Roon cloud is not going to happen.

Two ways around this that I see

  • A Roon Lite, maybe cloud-(i.e., streaming)-only but without local files and cheaper (Danny discussed here)
  • Local file storage without a local powerful core, with the heavy lifting in the cloud. Probably needs faster and more reliable internet connections, and maybe more powerful mobile remotes, but both will be available in the future

Just using streaming service may be an option for some like it is today, but as I am using Roon mainly for database and editing features, not for me until the streaming services offer that

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They have added ARC and together with that they limited, seriously limited at point it doesn’t work anymore, possibility to decide to use our local library offline, and wasn’t so in the past… and that is, imho, really really bad!
I have here a NUC and an hdd and my files in it… it MUST be possible to play them even without internet connection and without adding new app and downloading again in mobile what i already have!
If this is not possible then is a serious fail is how people in Roon evaluate how their customers use their software!
Once I have here my library and a hdd with enogh free space in it Roon should/must store all info, like covers etc., locally (what backup is there for?) then why not allow people to play without any crazy freedom limit?
Imho we need less new facelift (and simular b.s.) and more attention to how customers use and what customers don’t like.
do you want to add ARC? Good, but don’t do that at cost of flexibility… I’ve here, and I’m not the only one, a NUC… a hdd… and external hdd for back… that are not for free and i can’t use them as i like (as it should simply be normal) because of what?
As I’ve already said in other post… very bad!

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Final count - 3 days without internet and couldn’t listen to my own library which I spent years and $$ building. Heck when I love an album I buy it on Qobuz just so I don’t have to stream it… Roon 2.0 rendered my local library worthless. After this experience I won’t be renewing my subscription next year - already looking for alternatives. More than willing to pay for a “stand alone” version that doesn’t require internet but based on everything I’ve read that probably won’t happen. Doesn’t matter how robust the interface is or meta data if you can’t play your own music!

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I expect I am going over old ground, but I must say I don’t really understand Roon’s long term point of difference from any other streaming service if they envisage each user’s Core to be hosted in the cloud, and internet service a requirement (as it is now even with a user-hosted Core). Is it the ability to stream locally to a wide variety of endpoints? I’m not diminishing how challenging that is by any means, but that doesn’t seem a big enough point of difference to other, internet-independent solutions.

For me, the generally seamless amalgamation of user-owned and stored content with streaming services is a key distinguishing feature in Roon’s favour. Take away my ability to play my own content from my own files without an internet connection and I fail to see what Roon then provides over any streaming service. What good multiple endpoints and nice metadata then?

Looks like I too will be dusting off an LMS server in the short term and looking elsewhere in the longer term.

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Good for nothing, but if it’s a day per year, it still provides a service the other 364 days. And that day can maybe be bridged by solutions mentioned above.

Whether this is fine for any one person depends on their requirements. Some will leave Roon over this, but this doesn’t mean that there is no business case for Roonlabs, if they keep and gain more than they lose by providing cool features faster (which currently they seem to be doing).

(I still think there should be a simplified offline mode for unexpected outages, but that’s beside the point)

They need an offline mode pure and simple, it’s ridiculous it doesn’t. Seems more of an excuse to make things easier for them than to make things better for customers.

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I have not experienced such a long outage, but I too find the inability to play my own files without internet access is a problem. I never had any interest in ARC.

There is no good alternative to Roon in my view, but the combination of increasing annual subscription fees and requirement for a perpetual internet connection are a concern.

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Try Logitechmediaserver with RopieeeXL on a Pi4 endpoint (includes Squeezelite) and the following plugins installed:

  • Material skin
  • Chromecast bridge
  • Music and Artist Information
  • UPnP/DLNA Media Interface
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I think it would be great if Roon could develop a small, light “companion” app that does nothing but play local files without internet access. Give it away to those who own annual or lifetime Roon subscriptions.

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They have, its called ARC in offline mode.

Not quite, but it’s a start. It needs to run on any Roon core and use RAAT to any Roon endpoint. I don’t think anyone is going to load 500,000 local tracks on a cell phone.

EDIT: I was just playing Roon ARC with HDMI from iPad to Bose system. I tried free Splashtop Personal, but unfortunately, it will not control an iPad.