I believe Roon is at the start of its evolution with regards to topology.
At this moment there are three elements in play:
end point (ranging from a high end Meridian ID40/41 to a basic apple TV)
the core software running on a PC or Mac
a remote running on either the core pc/mac a seperate pc/mac or on an android tablet (and soon an iOS tablet)
In the future it has been suggested by Roon that the following is on the roadmap to be added:
Rhaspberry Pi end point
light pc/mac end points
seperate ācoreā software (ie on linux or in a docker vm for NAS usage)
Audiophile wise, I believe that at this moment you get the best setup with Meridian end points and a nuc/mac mini core. Adding a tablet as a remote for convenience.
If you want to use a USB dac then you can setup Roon on ie an intel NUC, with server 2012 in minimal mode and audiophile optimizer for tuning and use either Roon remote from a different mac/pc (i.e I use my imac) or android tablet.
I run both and am not complainingā¦ (but could do with the ios app, the rpi client and the docker core vm ).
I have an i7 based Windows 8 unit with USB out that feeds my (MSB) dac. The i7 unit was purpose built for the task (multiple dedicated power supplies, heavily modified USB output card, etc) and is on an appropriate AC isolation circuit. Ethernet into the unit is via fiber with the converter box also on a dedicated linear power supply. This unit has plenty of processing power to do file format conversions, etc., in real time. Call this Desktop A
When I first signed up I was told to make this the Core device.
I use a Windows 7 laptop as my display/navigation and (some day soon please) tag editing device. Call this Laptop B. That unit does NOT have the processing power required to do format conversions, etc. Itās got enough juice to do library management/navigation, but not file processing.
Is it now the advice to do something different that that proffered in the link up above?
Is the āCoreā unit in this configuration doing ALL the file format conversions, clock management, etc?
the ideal setup i believe to consist of three pieces, including a ānon pcā type end point. But, if you want to attach a dac to roon directly, with a 2 piece setup than you have what you suggest.
I for instance have a dedicated i5 core, hooked to a dddac. With a tablet as remote. I also have, using the same core, a meridian id40 as an end point. With the same tablet and an imac with a remote roon install as controls.
My HT setup with my ID40 sounds great, but my stereo with my dddac sounds awesome as well (uncomparable to be honest).
I donāt think so. I think your setup is fine. I"m not sure where you are getting the impression that something different is advised. @rovinggecko was just pointing out that there CAN be 3 discreet (actually potentially 4 imho) functions in the Roon playback chain. These functions can be as hardware discreet or consolidated as you want them to be. In your case, your Core and Endpoint are the same and you have a remote and maybe a NAS(?).
Someone else might have a Core server, a remote and a streaming Endpoint that is attached to a DAC (Think Auralic ARIES). And someone else might have all functions in one computer as a stand-alone.
The beauty of this is that you have control of how you want to deploy and that it is changeable to accommodate all necessities. Not all endpoints are going to (or should be) audiophile grade - it depends on the function. For example, when Iām in the garage brewing, Iām using my Samsung Note 3 phone as a remote and endpoint that is streaming via BT to my NAD VISO 1 Boom box. Not Audiophile at all but allows me to use Roon to facilitate listening to music at high volume whilst I brew beer (going to be brewing a Zombie Dust clone this weekend, in fact).
Seems like the spec for hardware to run Roon will continue to evolve. I have been building audio PCs for years and this is what I consider the best options for now and the future.
NOW
Get a good NAS like a Synology or a VortexBox for your music. You donāt want a spinning drive in your listening room.
Get a powerful, low noise PC like a CAPS Micro ZUMA with a Linear power supply. You can attach your DAC to this and run Roon on it. It will pull music files from your NAS and play them. The CAPS is very electrically quiet and with the SOtM card your DAC will sound great.
NEXT
Get a small super low electrical noise computer to run Roon speaker on and attach this to your DAC. I would not recommend a Raspberry Pi for this. All the USB ports and the Ethernet chip are on the same USB hub on the Pi. This is really bad for latency as the audio in from the network and the audio out to the DAC are fighting for the same hub chip. There should be much better dedicated solutions available for this.
Use a table to control Roon once the app is available
FUTURE
At some point some company or companies will build a NAS with a powerfully enough processor to run Roon server on. I will hopefully be building one of these!
Once a powerful Roon server NAS is available you will only need it, a small specialized computer for your DAC, and a tablet!
Besides Intel NUCs, there are a great many m-itx motherboards for a do-it-yourself system. I tend to build my own so that is what I do. There have emerged some boards which have a special USB connector which can be de-powered and has its logic voltage isolated from the rest of the motherboard. Also comes with a nice Coax s/pdif option as well. Iām thinking of dropping server 2012 on it to test the sonic difference between OSs.
The core can get heavy too, with all the background analysis, file importing (especially when your drives are fast, like SSDs), and doing anything to 384khz and DSD256 is heavyā¦ We index and build stuff fast, but if you go slow on your Core, you will feel the pain.
JFYI, Roon on Windows is going to outperform Roon Mac or Linux box, assuming the hardware is identical. Roon is mostly build on the .NET framework, and weāve seen that Microsoftās implementation performs about 20% better than the Mono solution. This may not be the case in the future, especially with Microsoft opening up their runtime, but it is the case right now.
You can probably take the fastest fanless cpu you can find, run Windows + headless Roon on it, and have a pretty ultimate Roon box. I like the various fanless Core i5 NUC boxes
Combine that with the various hardware manufacturers releasing RoonSpeakers capable devices, and you have something that will have fully Roon, silent, and with audio quality that canāt be beat for your price range (no matter what it is).
Headless builds for Windows and Mac are going to alpha testing next week, released soon after. July is going to be a fun month for new Roon configurations.
Yep, there are several NUC manufacturers, not just Intel. I have deployed several at work as small server appliances and they are great for set it and forget headless operation.
Nice audiophile analysis. Disappointing that as far as I know there are no Naim or Arcam endpoints. Many people canāt afford or donāt want Meridian. The iOS app is a must to go forward.
We are working with many manufacturers you will be familiar with, not only Meridian. I have been more open with names in the past, but Iām being told to be less loose lipped.
We have an NDA with a few manufacturers, and I was not aware that even the fact that we were talking with the manufacturer was āprivateā. That led to me being scolded
The only reason we have Meridian so early is because of ancient history.
For me semi decent means ds415+ or better :).
And importing of large new set could be done offline as for most that will be a one off.
But agree that transcoding typically is a very heavy load.
Will be fun to test out and see in what setups what works.
Personally i think that information adds to the great community vibe!
Something about forgiveness and permission applies i guess.
You can by the way write ndaās any way you want, you could agree it is ok to share ie intentionā¦
You ājustā need to agree that with the other party.
[quote=ādanny, post:69, topic:976ā]
This may not be the case in the future, especially with Microsoft opening up their runtime, but it is the case right now.
[/quote]Agreed, I doubt thatād be the case once transitioned to the m$ runtime.
Comes with an i5, just add hard drive and memory and software. Bluetooth, Wifi, gigabyte ethernet and option to use coax spdif. I might get one of these just to play around with.
I have just built myself a nice little fan-less NUC i5 (1.6 Ghz Boadwell) in a new Tranquil PC case and I am trialling it as my core. The case gets really hot, but acting as the heatsink, I guess that is point of it.
The intention is to run as my Roon core, it will not have any other duties other than as the music server, so not even connected to any replay system directly. I want to run it headless, and currently use Remote Desktop to oversee things, with varying results. So your impending headless build is going to be a god-send, at the moment sometimes Roon refuses to start via RDP probably due to the inferior graphics setup within the remote connection, I get a message about insufficient GD_ARB_framebuffer_object (something to do with Open GL).
How are you intending that the headless Roon is managed, via Remote Destop (or similar), or via one of the Roon Remote installations?
).
the ideal setup i believe to consist of three pieces, including a ānon pcā type end point. But, if you want to attach a dac to roon directly, with a 2 piece setup than you have what you suggest.
