Roon Remote won't connect with Windows 10 Firewall on

I’m mainly posting this so that others setting up a new Windows system will find it. When setting up a new Windows 10 system dedicated to the Roon Server I was unable to get the remote clients to connect. It turned out that the Windows Defender firewall (which I could have sworn I turned off right after install) was blocking the client.

The documentation at Why Can’t Roon Remote Connect? incorrectly says “Roon should be able to connect with your firewall enabled.” Windows Defender firewall definitely prevents the client from connecting to the core.

It is likely that you can simply turn off the firewall for local connections. And if your system is dedicated to Roon why have a software firewall anyway, you’re router should have one too. But Windows has in the past occasionally turned the firewall back on during updates, so it would be better if the Roon core installation could install whatever firewall exception it needs.

Hi @Thomas_Smith ----- Thank you for the post!

I wanted to reach out because you mentioned the following in your feedback:

“But Windows has in the past occasionally turned the firewall back on during updates, so it would be better if the Roon core installation could install whatever firewall exception it needs.

Windows Defender should be asking if you’d like to give Roon access to both the “private” and “public” networks when installed on a Win10 device. One of our techs just performed a fresh Win10 install on a computer here and the following was received on first launch:

-Eric

I installed the Roon Server, and didn’t get any notification when it was first launched. I did not launch the UI on the Windows machine.

Good to know, but something is lacking here. How do we solve this? Any registry settings? If I want to keep the firewall on and just make rules for Roon to work?

Hi @ogs —— Thank you for the questions!

If you wish to run firewalls on a device where Roon is installed the best practice is to add firewall exceptions for both “Roon” and the “RAATServer” process. This will ensure that your remotes and audio zones will function without issue.

-Eric

Thanks @eric. I’ll make that a bookmark.