Roon drives me Nuts with dropouts

I am very open to all kinds of root causes, some other people are pretty blind to them.

No one said uninformed.

Root Cause Analysis a scientist basic starting point , maybe all users aren’t as scientific as others

To me dropouts doesn’t first point to dodgy software — just my thought !

No, I don’t think you got that right. What Brian said in his post on hardware requirements for the Roon Core is that, alongside the other tasks that the Core is doing,

we’re trying to push high-resolution audio out to your DAC in real time. If you can believe it, this is the “easy” part.

Hey Geoff isn’t it what Tidal does, including metadata?
With Regards to ask the customers constantly feedling with their systems, are yargeting f
uture sound engineers as tge clientel.
Can someone also answer me why Tidal spending all resources on metadata and libraries and radio analysis wh3n all that exiat in their streaming vlienta like Tidal.
In fact tidal predictive song playing selection in their radio is if not identical than more accurate and reliable

No, that would be CPU bound.

Roon is I/O bound. In most cases, network traffic (in spite of people’s protestations) is the culprit.

No. Roon is maintaining a fairly large database on your computer. If you look at an album or artist page, there is a ton of information from various sources all over the internet. Roon is either pulling that from the database, or is pulling it down from the internet. It does a lot of this. It is very ‘chatty’ to keep things up to date and informative. This is a big part of the network difference between Tidal and Roon.
At times Roon may also be analyzing music or ingesting new music which is also network and CPU intensive. Tidal doesn’t do that.
Tidal also does not have to keep track of various endpoints and potentially send different streams of high resolution music to various devices with different communication protocols (and maybe signal processing).
All of this stuff comes at a cost of computing power and networking. Tidal is comparatively easy.

1 Like

You are correct. In another thread where Tidal “buffering” is discussed the reply suggested that Roon endpoints buffer 3-5 seconds of data at the endpoint to “smooth out” local network variability. If this is true for 44.1, I assume it’s proportionally less leeway for higher res streams. I found that Tidal used to experience dropouts from Roon intermittently and then realised it was whenever my time machine backup was running. These backups would consume as much bandwidth as was available for an amount of time that was often greater than the “3-5 seconds” of Roon endpoint buffer the previous post on the subject implied. Once I moved time machine to a locally connected disk, Roon has played tidal content flawlessly ever since. People need to understand that “bandwidth” is only one variable on your network, traffic prioritisation is another. Saying that a stream “only needs” 5Mbs is one way to describe the network resource requirement but it could be suggesting an “average” of 5Mbps supported by a decent buffer or “continuously” if the end point buffer is small. “Continuously” is much harder to guarantee if you have a number of heavy duty bandwidth consumers contending for the same piece of wire or god forbid, radio spectrum.

But how do we test network stability, bandwidth etc. I am not a computer geek and so i dont know how i can sort out my network. If roon is so system heavy then maybe it isnt for the vast majority of people.

Yes, its a problem! But 9 times out of 10 (or is it 10), dropouts ARE caused by local network bottlenecks.

Yes, IMO that is Roon’s Achilles heel.

You didn’t say how your Roon Core and endpoints were connected, but WiFi is generally a problem.

It is all ethernet (not even powerline) the only wifi is the ipad.

One reason why you are able to watch HD movies, but Roon may be problematic is that RAAT is more real time sensitive so that it can synchronize multiple zones. HD movies can buffer way ahead. The stream between your Roon core and endpoint cannot. Also, it depends upon the bit rate and resolution of the audio file you are playing. For example a DSD256 will use more bandwidth than a streaming HD movie AND will not buffer.

Wired ethernet connections to endpoints are much more reliable than WiFi. I have 5 Roon zones and only two of them are WiFi (both Bluesound devices).

Also, I am a big Apple fan, but Apple has exited the WiFi router and access point business. Their products are all end of life. I would replace with something that is supported so that you have somewhere to turn to.

Good luck. Hang in there. Roon is awesome and we are here to help.

Then roon should consider to buffer as well and push the tunes before metadata, i dont know what bitrate Tidal is using but i suppose its the same on all the tunes.

if i should have a wired ethernet i would rather a digital controled mixer and wire everything from it, it would be much cheaper and rock steday.

the Mac mini only serves as a core and is freshly instaled, my wifi 5GHz is showing 637mbps as the lowest and 702mbps at the highest, the core is hardwired.

Roon could downsample, buffer, al least it could continus with the song and not stop or skip the song.

it worked great in the start but it got worse after a software upgrade, so i think it is software related.

Hello @Morten_Venli,

Did you have a chance to replace the routers as you previously mentioned?

Can you please note the exact local time + date + track you have an issue with and then send us a set of logs as previously requested?

Thanks!

Since the wifi6 and wifi6e is on its way i wont invest in new routers before they are awailable in Norway, i stil would think it should woork with the xtremes.

Im not sitting down in a listening room i usualy walk around my garage and my house working so how important is the tune and time when it comes from tidal, wont the log show when it skips etc?

About a month since i used roon now, but i was eager to try it again today so i could play some tunes from tidal so it could fail so i can send logs to roon…and booom, i cant login to tidalScreenshot 2021-02-04 at 19.10.11
retry didn`t work, restart didnt woork.

yes i could probably remove the link, do it all overt etc. but this is what i mean with unfinished product, and that i feel like a paying guinea pig…

Roon offers support and that`s fine and good but i should not have to do that in the first place.

Sorry, im mad again!

I can’t just buy new expensive gear when I think it is the software.
Today after I can’t login with Tidal, Roon has played for several hours without stopping or skipping
And I streamed hd movies from plex (qnap) to iPad Pro , YouTube on my other iPad and Vgtv on my iPhone over WiFi at the same time as Roon played on all my endpoints over the same WiFi, so there should not be anything wrong with my wife setup that can’t handle the payload.
So right now it looks like there is some trouble with roons tidal integration.

Hello thanks for reaching out. Yesterday Tidal can’t login, i tried logging off and logg inn again with my iPhone and iPad but it wont work. I login via apple.

Anyway, without Tidal i have played for hour now without skips or stops, I also stress tested the WiFi and streamed hd video from a qnap to Mac Pro, Netflix to iPad Pro, YouTube to a iPad mini, and vgtv to my iPhone (the iPhone might have used 4G) over WiFi at the same time as Roon played on all my endpoints over the same WiFi, so there should not be anything wrong with my WiFi setup that can’t handle the payload.

A few thoughts, you’ve probably tried them all …

Have you checked out WiFi interference, Google it.

Also you can download any of the WiFi signal strength apps to check not only your strength but the bands being used by neighbors.

I have untold problems when I am cooking :rofl: the microwave simply kills everything

I used to run my main kit WiFi, no problem all day then at 17:00 everything went haywire as my neighbors came home and started using their WiFi

There are many things that interfere, microwaves, baby alarms, phone base stations etc , they all use the same 2.4 band, have you tried 5 ghz band

What are your walls like? Thick, metal reinforcing rods etc …

Have you tried a WiFi Extender?

My favorite is the position of the parrot cage !!!