My Roon server passes the port test and says that it is ready and accessible. My Roon ARC app says that my roon server is online and ready. However when I press connect in Roon ARC, it just spins then shows green then spins then times out and says "Can't connect to your Roon Server". Once that error goes away the Roon server shows online and ready again. This happens on my local network and on a cellular network. I have never been able to get Roon ARC to work.
Hi @Michael_Silva,
Thanks for reaching out to us about this issue. @Menzies’ suggestion is a good place to start troubleshooting. Please let us know the result.
I did try Wifi on my local network and it had the exact same behavior.
I do have some new information,
The issue seems to be on my phone, it is an Iphone running IOS 18. I tried to connect via Roon ARC using an IPAD with the same OS on my local network and it connected without an issue. I tried uninstalling and re-installing Roon ARC on my phone twice, but it has not fixed the issue.
The only thing that I think might be an issue is the authentication for Roon ARC on my phone, but it does act like it is connected without an issue.
Thanks for giving that a try! I see that your running Windows as your Roon Server machine, as a temporary test, could you see if disabling your windows firewall makes any difference in connecting with Arc over your wifi?
After testing that, feel free to re-enable your firewall. If your issues persist, could you review your Roon Settings>Roon Arc and see if changing your port number slightly has any effect?
SO I am able to get it working on an Ipad and a different Iphone. I tried port 55004 (the old port was 55002) and the same result. I even tried port 25000, same result, but the IPAD works on all 3 ports. (Local Network)
Your RoonServer machine is connecting to a subnet, xxx.yyy.101.zz, while your other Roon devices (including an iPhone), are intermittently connecting to a different subnet entirely, xxx.yyy.100.zz
Do you have multiple routers in this setup, or any managed network switches?
Roon’s Ready status in Settings indicates that the server can receive a response through the port you’ve opened. This test does not ping the downstream connection to the phone itself. So, there are three possibilities for the condition you’re in:
Network security software is allowing some requests to reach ARC but not others. The Firewalla next-generation firewall is a potential culprit here, so please verify that your RoonServer machine’s IP address is safelisted in any rules in the router administration page.
The second possibility is that ARC is not trying to connect to the current version of the database. If you have restored a Backup, moved your RoonServer, or haven’t updated the app in some time, you might be in this condition. Deleting and re-installing is the solution here
The last possibility is that something is fishy with the phone’s actual downstream connection. This was the possibility my colleague @noris already checked for by requesting you inspect the local network settings on the iOS devices themselves. So, we can consider the third possibility closed.
I recommend two steps from here.
First, please try reinstalling ARC on all your iOS devices, iPads and iPhone included.
Second, try installing Tailscale instead of port forwarding. This VPN is supported by Roon and allows for a completely separate connection mechanism to ARC than port forwarding.
In your case, you’d install Tailscale on both your RoonServer Windows machine and also on your iPhone/iPads.
