Roon client fails to show music - on same Win10 machine as core, and iOS and MacOS

Support
1

Roon Core Machine

Windows 10, fast / lots of ram, free disk space

Networking Gear & Setup Details

Roon client failing on wired and wireless and local, although ARC is working
AT&T gigabit fiber
Araknis router, switches, WAPs
DietPi at 10.10.1.9 for DNS cache, Pi-Hole - (confirmed same Roon behavior if removed)
DietPi also runs Roon Extension Manager for RHEOS

Connected Audio Devices

Fails on MacOS, iOS, and Windows clients

Number of Tracks in Library

25,004
I’m using Qobuz. Switched away from Tidal a few months ago.

Description of Issue

Hey @support @benjamin — I’m having lots of problems getting Roon to run reliably. I’ve included my version info below. Note I’m using Early Access. This behavior has persisted for at least a few weeks now. Also, fwiw, I recently upgraded to a Lifetime subscription. That seemed to glitch the account briefly, then it resumed working again.

Roon starts and shows the header of the page with number of artists and tracks. The main body shows blank album covers (or entirely blank) and a spinning Roon logo. The “now playing” area shows the image and title/artist for the last track I had been playing. But the main display stays blank under the header, and never updates, just shows the animated Roon logo. It’s doing exactly the same behavior on Windows, MacOS, and iOS clients. Clicking “Play” does nothing in this state, even though it looks like a track is selected. I can open Settings and browse around, but I can’t get it to show any music or art (other than the last song played).

Weirdest part is it the system is currently working okay on Arc. That used to be generally less reliable for me.

When I reboot the server it seems to behave okay for a little while. But usually after a couple hours away it starts behaving badly again. Not sure I can figure out any sort of trigger.

For example, this is Roon client running on the local PC where Server is installed:

image
image2188×1184 126 KB

image
image900×586 60.8 KB

I have captured client and server log files from the Windows PC. Apparently cannot paste those here but let me know if you’d like them.

monty

2

You can’t mix and match versions. Core and remotes need to be on the same Early Access version or Production version.

3

Weird they were last I checked. In any case same exact behavior on MacOS and iOS which are each on build 1280.

4

The issue sounds more likely to have a networking cause to me.

You appear to be using Araknis products, which I believe include managed switches. I know from bitter experience that managed switches can be problematic unless you are a networking expert and I note this in the Networking Best Practices article:

Some Roon users opt for more advanced networking setups, including enterprise-grade routers, managed switches, and ethernet-over-power.

We have many users who have successfully configured their networks using this gear, but note that in some cases this gear requires more in-depth knowledge of networking, and these technologies can make troubleshooting more involved.

If you are having issues with Roon and you are using any of the networking technology listed below, we may ask you to temporarily simplify your network to help us rule out common stumbling blocks.

Any chance that you can simplify your network as a test?

5

Doesn’t seem likely. Have run this setup for years. Also, it fails when core and client are on the same machine. But … only after a few hours typically. Doesn’t sound like network - but does sound like something that should show in the debug logs.

Waiting for Roon @support as usual ….

6

Core and Remote updated to build 1292 - same behavior.

7

Hey @support @benjamin it’s been a couple weeks with no response. Lots of Roon updates but still I’m having to restart my Roon Core device about every day when I want to use it.

8

Same problem on Mac and iPad. Loadings with Roon logo, songs doesn’t play half time, albums or suggestions can not show. Looks like lots of freezing. Tried everything in my network, switching DNS, changing routers, changing nucleus - nothing helped. Have this problem for one week, before that had no problems during year.

10

Hi @Monty_Kosma ,

Thank you for your patience here until we’ve had a chance to review your case. I’ve enabled remote logging for your account and I did notice some abnormal traces, it looks like there is a lot of background library activity happening on your Core. Can you please confirm:

  1. If you temporarily disable the API extension you have, does the same error occur?
  2. Do you happen to have a large number of albums by the same artist saved in your library?
  3. If you try to host the Roon Core on another PC (for example your Mac) as a test, are you also able to reproduce the slowness behavior there? To switch Cores:
  • Create a Backup of your current database
  • Open Roon on the other PC you wish to try as the Core
  • Roon Settings → General
  • Disconnect
  • On the “Choose your Core” screen, press “Use this PC”
  • If asked to Unauthorize, you can go ahead and do so. You are limited to one active Roon Core at a time but you are free to switch between them as often as you’d like
  • Verify if the same behavior occurs on the different PC
12

This topic was automatically closed 45 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.

13

Continuing the discussion from Roon client fails to show music - on same Win10 machine as core, and iOS and MacOS:

Roon Core Machine

Networking Gear & Setup Details

Connected Audio Devices

Number of Tracks in Library

Description of Issue

Pretty frustrated at the slow responses from @support and the lack of a notification after that.

I took it into my own hands and shifted from the win server to MacOS, clean install on a MacBook Pro M1.

Some things are running better, many are the same and quite bad.

Right now I’m experiencing dropouts / pauses in streaming to my appleTV endpoint. I notice at the same time there is a dropped audio (1258a Chicago time on 23 Aug) that Roon iOS on my phone displays the sequence of screens that tell me my Roon core is no longer on the network, then it asks me to choose a new core, then shows me the same one / same IP address.

IMG_0398
IMG_03981284×2778 243 KB

IMG_0399
IMG_03991284×2778 259 KB

IMG_0400
IMG_04001284×2778 250 KB

15

Hi @Monty_Kosma

I’m just a fellow Roon user.

In your linked thread others mentioned networking being a possible cause.

Could you explain your network setup. VLANs etc if any.

I operate a Ubiquiti Unifi network and keep it very simple (although have been successful with VLANs).

I also don’t operate my APs with Mesh turned off.

Drop outs does suggest a network problem.

Roon Support did post back to you, but there was no reply from yourself so that thread was automatically closed.

1 Like
16

SMB-category wired network, gigabit fiber to Araknis router to Araknis PoE managed switch, cat6 to core MBP, cat6 to AppleTV (dropouts) and to Araknis WAPs (also dropouts). ARC also has drops. None of these things occur when using the Qobuz app directly on any device, wired or wireless.

Yes it could be some network setting that Roon is squirrely about, I’ve been through about every post on the forums here and tried everything to no avail. There’s no sensible reason that the Roon clients should be saying my Core is unreachable.

Presumably Roon @Early_Access or @support #support will eventually show up and look at the logs although it may be weeks before that happens. I sort of thought that upgrading to lifetime membership might gain some extra level of service, but maybe it’s the other way around?

1 Like
17

In your previous topic you mentioned running the RHEOS extension.

I am/was also running this extension. On 2 occasions in the past two weeks I noticed that my Roon server was using excessive memory. Earlier today this also lead to a few “waiting for core” pop-ups. I am not saying that the RHEOS extension is responsible, but checking the Roon server log file, I noticed that an 8 MB file was being generated every 2 minutes or less. The majority of the entries in the log files appear to be related to the RHEOS extension.

As I said, I am not certain that RHEOS is responsible and your issue may be different, but perhaps this is something you could check?

1 Like
18

In the advice on Roon help pages it suggests (excuse the poor choice of word) dumbing down your network. Try simplifying it. An off the shelf one box router, switch and AP. If I run into troubles, I pull out one of my Google WiFi units and troubleshoot from there. Thankfully I rarely have any troubles :crossed_fingers:.

I may have said already, I have a full Unifi network. It’s in its simplest of forms. No VLANs. Managed switch is just acting as a dumb switch. Nothing special going on.

Multicast DNS is enabled.

I only have WPA2 security on my wifi, but have now changed this to WPA2/3 to see if that could lead to trouble.

1 Like
19

Just reading through you older post again.

I notice you changed from Tidal to Qobuz.

Did the issues with Roon/Qobuz start around the same time?

Might also be worth checking your DNS.
I use 8.8.8.8, 8.8.4.4, 1.1.1.1, 1.0.0.1

:innocent:

20

Have you tried the suggestion from the Moderator in your previous thread ? If it ran fine previously that’s great, but it doesn’t now so the history doesn’t matter. Something has changed to create the issue.

Have you responded to the message from @noris ? They had set up remote logging of your account. I get that you’re frustrated with the delay, but help them help you.

2 Likes
22

I’ve merged your new topic in the existing one to keep all the history together. It looks like it was automatically closed after 45 days as there was no response following the last post by @noris

23

Thanks for the merge.

It’s very challenging to simplify the network - the central managed switch provides PoE to the entire structure. Also, the network structure hasn’t changed, and it was never doing this previously.

The switch isn’t doing anything else fancy. If there are settings that need to be enabled or disabled I’ve pretty much conformed to everything in the Roon best practices:

Managed switches can be very robust, but they are often designed for professional installation, so in many cases the out-of-box configuration is not right. If your switch has a “flow control” setting, please make sure that it is enabled. Also, make sure that the switch is not performing any sort of throttling that might impact communication between cores, storage, remotes, and/or audio endpoints. Finally, ensure that the switch is configured to pass multicast and broadcast traffic. If in doubt about any of this, try temporarily replacing your managed switch with a “dumb” switch to see if things improve.

@noris answers:

  1. I can try disabling the RHEOS extension.
  2. what’s a large number? I don’t think I have more than ~10 albums by any one artist, but not sure
  3. I moved the core from Windows to MacOS