Roon ARC "Roon Radio" problem - Still no solution [Ticket In]

Support
1

Roon Core Machine

InnuOS Zenith Mk3
8GB RAM (4GB Dedicated for RAM Playback)
SSD Storage
Quad-core Intel CPU

Networking Gear & Setup Details

FritzBox 7530
and as a dedicated Audio Network Switch the AQVOX SE (Tried it with and without switch, no change to the problem)

Connected Audio Devices

Streamer: Weiss DSP502 via Cat5e Network Cable

Number of Tracks in Library

40.000, using CD-Rips, Qobuz and Tidal

Description of Issue

Hello again dear community,

I’m writing again, since my first two postings were left completely unanswered. I wrote about the problem here Roon ARC Roon Radio Problems in December '22, but received no answer. I tried it again in March '23 Roon ARC Problems with Roon Radio . Now I’m trying it a third time.

I’m using an InnuOS Zen as Roon Core, have around 2TB music stored on it, also I have Tidal and Qobuz integrated in the Roon account. When I’m using the native Roon App, I can use Roon Radio perfectly - no bugs, no problems, no issues. I’m using it 24/7 in my shop, also at home.
When I’m using Roon ARC, “normal playback”, so picking an Album or a Song, no matter if stored “local” on the InnuOS, or via Qobuz or Tidal, works perfectly. But when I try using the “Roon Radio” function, there is very often a problem with playback. So e.g. you are choosing a Song to create a “Roon Radio” playlist, and randomly it works, and next time it doesn’t anymore. It just shows “Roon Radio starting…”, but then no Song is played. I tried turning of “limitate Roon Radio to library”, sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn’t. Strangely, when you choose the same song in the native Roon App, everything works perfectly and you can play. When you stop the playback and switch to Roon ARC, the same song can’t play via “Roon Radio”.
When you close the app several times, it can sometimes work. There is no option to “force” the error, or to replicate it. I was thinking of bad connection or problems with the library, but I just can’t find the problem. Also, it’s no difference if I am trying a song/album/artist which is accessed via Tidal or Qobuz, or stored localy.

Is this a known bug? Did somebody experience similar problems?

All the best

5

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for writing in, and I’m extremely sorry you have yet to get a response across multiple threads. There’s no excuse for the lack of support you’ve received so far, and hope I can help get you a solution ASAP! :+1:

I can confirm that Roon Radio should very much function normally for you while using Arc.

Getting right to your issue - I was able to pull diagnostics from the mobile device you’re using Arc with. The first thing I’m seeing are frequent low-memory errors reported from your iOS device. If you head into your Arc settings> Downloads - how much free space is reported?

Next, if you update the playback settings to ‘Bandwidth Optimized’ does the same issue occur?

I’ll be on standby for your reply. :pray:

6

Hello and good morning from Vienna,

thank you very much for your reply Ben, I’m very happy that you are the first person responding to this topic. I really hope that we find a solution for this problem.
To answer your questions:

  • ARC- Settings → Downloads → 58GB Free Space.
  • Problem occurs also with “bandwidth optimized”. I’ve tried all the setting, there is no real change to this problem. My mobile speed is: 300 Mbit/s Down, 50 Mbit/s Upload.
  • When I reported the problem the first time, I was using a different iPhone, the problem occured the same way. Also, I had a different mobile contract. So I don’t really think that it’s a matter of connection problems. Also there is no difference if I’m using mobile data or wifi data.

All the best
Lukas

1 Like
7

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for the update! Before troubleshooting any further, it may be a good idea to tag or create a playlist with all the local tracks you typically have downloaded to Arc on your device. That way, if we need to reset or reinstall Arc, you can quickly access them for re-download.

As a next step, we’ll need a more specific timestamp of the issue, which I know you mentioned is a bit difficult to force or replicate the issue. If you’re able to share a specific date, time or name of track played, that would help us pinpoint what might be going on within both your Core and Arc diagnostic.

I’ll be on standby for your reply. Thanks, Lukas!

8

Hello Benjamin,

thanks for answering me. It’s no problem to reset or reinstall Arc, I’ve done it already plenty of times, hoping that it could resolve this bug. I have no local saved music on my phone.

According your timestamps: Roon Radio isn’t working 9 out of 10 times. It doesnt matter where I am, it doesn’t matter which time it is. It doesn’t matter if i’m connected via wifi or using mobile data. It just isn’t working most of the time. It doesn’t matter if it’s 6am in the morning or 8 pm. It just doesn’t work most of the time.

There are random moments (really random moments) where it is working for a short while, like 2-3 tries (with a “try” i mean picking a song, or an artist and pressing “Start Roon Radio”, not skipping tracks), after that the bug happens again.

What I’ve noticed: When in 1 out of 10 moments Roon Radio IS working, you can listen to about 15-20 songs, sometimes more, after that it just starts showing “Starting Roon Radio…”. Also, when I manage to start in 1 out of 10 times Roon Radio and it plays those 15-20 songs, you can “kill” the Radio-Queue when you insert one Song in between.

I hope this helps. I’m really desperate.
Cheers
Lukas

10

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for the update. We’ve taken this issue to our development team who are reviewing Arc diagnostics more thoroughly.

I don’t have any immediate next steps, but should have some more information to share next week. I very much appreciate your patience until then. :pray:

11

Good morning Benjamin,

any news on this case?

Best regards
Lukas

12

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for checking in! Our developers are still working on improvements, but I haven’t been given any definitive timeline yet.

I hope to get some more information to share soon. Thanks for your patience until then!

13

Good morning again,

any news on this case? I’m trying to keep this topic alive.

Kind regards
Lukas

14

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Our team is still investigating the origin of your issue. We have a few additional questions and test for you:

  1. Test out playing roon radio from the Roon Remote app directly (from the same iOS device that has Arc) for a few hours and let me know if you experience the same issue.
  2. Test out playing any content from your same Roon Remote (not just Roon Radio) for a few hours and test for playback issues.
  3. So you experience this issue outside of the house, using cellular data? If so, reproduce and share the name of the song.

Any timestamps (date, time, name of song) would be helpful while you test out the above steps.

Thank you!

15

Hello Benjamin,

Like I explained in many postings, there is absolutely NO problem with Roon Radio when using The Roon Remote App. It doesn’t matter which device I’m using, there have NEVER been problems.

Generally there is no problem in playback when using Room Remote. It works flawless. I tried it already often enough to know that there must be some bug in the ARC. I tried it with different Smartphones and different OS. It all comes down to the ARC.

The problem occurs while using indoor WiFi and cellular data. I have speed up to 300 Mbit/s.

Sometimes Roon Radio in ARC works perfectly fine with a bad LTE connection (like REALLY slow, almost 3G), and sometimes it doesn’t work with Full Speed 5G (300 Mbit/s).

I just did this test: started Roon Radio on my iPhone via roon Remote:

Al Di Meola - Short Tales of the Black Forest than it played “Flim & the BB’s - Tru”. And it played on and on, some songs.

After that I opened ARC (and from now on everything I describe is in ARC, not Roon Remote!), while in WiFi i started “Al Di Meola - Short Tales of the Black Forest”. It worked.

I put off Wifi and switched to cellular data, with a very bad LTE connection (I’m deep inside a building, almost no connection) After that I started via Roon Radio “Flim & the BB’s - Tru” - also, this worked flawlessly (in CELLULAR!).

While ARC is playing roon Radio (still playing “Flim & the BB’s - Tru”) i picked “Tsuyoshi Yamamoto Trio - Angel Eyes” - it also worked.

While this plays I now do a completely random pick - i Choose via Qobuz “Sturm Cafe - Hymne für die Ewigkeit” - it works.

I skip to next track - “Medieval Lofi - Endless Pastures”.
I could now use ARC Roon Radio without problems, I tried around 20 different songs - everything normal.

I’ve killed the app, re-opened it, waited for Sync, everything works fine. Roon Radio still working without problems. But I had this situation a few times in the past, it was always a random event.

I will try to enforce the bug and will keep you updated - actually it works fine.

Update: I played and skipped now quite many songs, completely random picks. Then I left Artist/Album Section and went to “Track”-Section, here I connected to WiFi again.

I tried starting Roon Radio with the Song “1349 - From the deeps” and: Bumm. The Bug is here. Roon Radio doesn’t start again. I deactivated WiFi and went back to the cellular connection, and here it also doesn’t work.

Now I killed the App, restarted ARC again: I see the song (album/albumcover) in “recent activity” marked “played”, but in playback view I see the song which I was playing while trying to start the new Roon Radio Selection.

Now roon ARC Radio doesn’t work at all, no matter what I try to do. Killing App, restarting phone, etc.
Again, I’m lost.

As last step I went out from the building, full 5G connection, ARC Roon Radio still doesn’t work.

I thought ok, maybe I will try it back again with one of the songs which worked just a few minutes ago - so I choose again “Tsuyoshi Yamamoto Trio - Angel Eyes” (which is by the way located on my NAS) and unfortunately it doesn’t work.

I’ like to quote my first posting again, as I get the feeling that you are asking more and more questions which I did already answer/specify:

When I’m using the native Roon App, I can use Roon Radio perfectly - no bugs, no problems, no issues. I’m using it 24/7 in my shop, also at home.
When I’m using Roon ARC, “normal playback”, so picking an Album or a Song, no matter if stored “local” on the InnuOS, or via Qobuz or Tidal, works perfectly. But when I try using the “Roon Radio” function, there is very often a problem with playback. So e.g. you are choosing a Song to create a “Roon Radio” playlist, and randomly it works, and next time it doesn’t anymore. It just shows “Roon Radio starting…”, but then no Song is played. I tried turning of “limitate Roon Radio to library”, sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn’t. Strangely, when you choose the same song in the native Roon App, everything works perfectly and you can play. When you stop the playback and switch to Roon ARC, the same song can’t play via “Roon Radio”.

All the best
Lukas

16

Hey @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for going through the above in such detail. :+1:

We were able to further discuss your case with the Arc team today. We have some additional questions for you:

  • Do you notice if there particular radio station seeds that spark this issue more frequently than others? For example, selecting a seed from a local track versus a 96k file or album from qobuz.

  • When selecting a radio station in arc, are you already streaming a song in Arc when doing this? If so, what file format is the track?

  • By chance, is the core also playing music to Roon separately when Arc has this issue?

  • What happens if you fully disable Roon Radio on the core side, does Arc still reproduce this issue?

  • Lastly, have you reset Arc at all recently? I’d update to the latest build, add all your downloaded tracks to a playlist so you can easily add them back to Arc, and give the app a reset.

Thanks!

17

Hello Benjamin,

I’d like to answer your questions:

  • There is no difference in File format, or source. it doesn’t matter if it’s a mp3, aac, m4a, aiff, flac or wav. file. Also, no difference in sample rate or bit depth.

  • the problem occurs while playback, but also on “fresh” start, without any playback going on. There is no difference. While the few times when it works it works during playback of a song, like there would be no bug. But most of the time it just doesn’t work, no matter what you do. It just shows in the lower section “Roon Radio starting…” and it adds the certain track to playback history (which shows up when you kill the app and restart it again).

  • It has nothing to do with core playback. I use ARC 99% of time when I’m not at the place where I can use the roon remote function. There is only one person who can use the roon core and it’s me. Also, ARC works normally even when I do play via Roon Remote. Roon Radio in ARC does sometimes work when the Roon Core is playing via Roon Remote. But there is no causal dependence.

  • What do you mean with “fully disable”? There is no feature in settings section where you could do that. Also, as I mentioned above, I can’t imagine that there is any causal dependence between roon Radio in Roon Remote and Roon ARC. Because normally I’m playing on The Roon Remote OR the Roon ARC, never using both at the same time. Also, I’m doing regular updates and reboots of the Core and the InnuOS Zenith.

  • I’ve deleted and reinstalled the App like ten times.No change to the problem.

18

I would assume he means turning Roon Radio OFF for all endpoints, done one at a time on the Queue page.

19

Thanks for the thorough response @Chrome_Bumper32.5! Our Arc team is actively investigating this issue further, and so I don’t have any immediate next steps for you yet - my apologies there.

@Rugby was correct on this - apologies for the vagueness on my part.

1 Like
20

@benjamin,

Good day, it’s almost a month since your last reply. Is there anything new about this case?

Kind regards
Lukas

21

Hi @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Our team has not yet been able to reproduce this issue, and so the investigation is still ongoing.

Outside of this, we are working on related Arc performance improvements that may help with this as well. I’ll be sure to keep you in the loop when new updates arrive.

My apologies for not having more information to share :-1:

22

@Chrome_Bumper32.5 I feel your pain. I’ve been having Arc bugs since day 1 which others aren’t complaining about and don’t get much attention. Yours is a nasty one. I also tried various solutions including switching core machines and starting a fresh DB and so far with no success. Looks like they are very elusive bugs since they reproduce for just a few users or under specific and unknown circumstances. I hope this one gets fixed soon.

23

Hi guys,

I’ve got an update for you. Yesterday I moved in my new flat. I have a different Internet-Connection now, using Fibre instead of DSL. I have now 300 MBit/s down and 50 MBit/s up. Also, my “T-Mobile” Router is in Bridge mode. I just bought a new FritzBox, installed it, everything very basic. I opened the ports for ARC, tried 55000, 55001 and 55002 - the whole Network in my new flat is VERY basic. No switches, no long cables between the Roon Core and the router. Still: the same problem. It’s only: T-Mobile Bridge → Fritz.Box → RoonCore.
So I went in the FritzBox and allowed the Roon Core (in my case the InnuOS Zenith) to open Ports itself, without any additional permissions needed. No change. I could play some random tracks, but after several tries the error started occuring again.
Is there nothing you can do to help me? This case is now going on for a very long time. It’s really getting frustrating.

All the best
Lukas

24

Hi @Chrome_Bumper32.5,

Thanks for the update and I’m sorry to hear you’re issue persists. Our Arc team still has a ticket in for review on this issue, but movement is slow and I do not have any updates to share yet, unfortunately.