Roon Core on 12inch MacBook

Roon Software Discussion
1

Hi everyone, I’m in the process of moving my set up. I’ve bought a Synology as well as a 12 inch MacBook with 512GB SSD.

My original plan was to go headless and buy a Mac Mini to run the Core on but I’m now wondering if that’s overkill considering I play my music through monitors connected to my computer anyway. Considering I’ll have my music on the Synology, is a snappy i7 MacBook more than enough to be running the Core on, or is there another advantage to going headless?

Thanks!

2

Unless you plan to keep your MacBook on a lan connection then I would opt for having a dedicated machine for the core that is on a wired lan connection.

3

Do you mean LAN as in wired?

If I have my MacBook (core) receiving music from my Synology, is that less efficient than having both a Synology and a Mac Mini connected by ethernet to my router and using the Mac Mini as a core?

Thanks,

Henry

4

Get a NUC install the Rock os and fit and forget, the MacBook is to nice to have it just doing Roon duties, you can of course use it as a remote, I do just this e.g. NUC7i7BNH with 8tb LaCie USB disk for Rock and MacBook Pro for occasional remote along with iPad Pro.

Russ

1 Like
5

Thanks Russ, I was planning on using the MacBook as my remote as well as my core as I use my speakers that are connected to my MacBook.

I’m just wondering if there’s a major difference between:

Music On Synology --> MacBook on wireless (Core and remote)
Music On Synology --> Mac Mini connected via ethernet to router (Core) --> MacBook on wireless (remote)

Hope this makes sense!

Thanks,

Henry

6

Depends on the quality and stability of your wireless, I would suggest you try wireless if that is easiest, then try temporarily wiring via Ethernet and compare.
Remotes via wireless are just fine, no need to wire them, there is no right way to do it just different ways, choose the one that suits you best.

Have fun