Roon ROCK does not see ASIO DAC

I’m running Roon ROCK on an Intel NUC, which is the Roon server and also an endpoint. I had been outputting music through an Audioquest Dragonfly, which ROCK saw immediately. When I replaced the Dragonfly with an exaSound e12 DAC, Roon no longer sees an output device. Since the exaSound DAC requires installation of an ASIO driver on an ordinary Windows 10 PC, perhaps the driver needs to be installed on Roon ROCK as well. But I don’t know how to install a driver on ROCK.

Here’s a screen shot from Roon setup:

If you connect the dac to a widows machine does it get seen…assuming roon or roon bridge is running on the windows pc and ASIO driver is installed? Some dacs only work with windows drivers

Rock doesn’t support installation of other drivers…it’s a Linux based os and might not work with the exa sound at all…I would check with the supplier or the manufacturer

First comment, always put a name in an endpoint that you have activated. Sometimes things can get weird if you do not. Anyway to the point.

You cannot install drivers on Rock. It is a closed system. Some DACs support or are supported in Linux some are not. You have to investigate and research to determine which is which. It does not look like the e12 has much Linux support, although I would imagine it should be seen as a basic DAC. According to their website that DAC only has

OS X and Windows ASIO custom high-performance drivers.

The first thing I would do is get in touch with exaSound tech support and see if they can give you some suggestions. There may be options that they can provide.

Otherwise, you are left with

  1. Redo your Core to being a Windows PC, and then load the appropriate drivers.
  2. Setup another Windows PC to be the endpoint that runs the drivers for your DAC and is connected to your DAC.
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Yes the DAC works fine on a Windows machine with exaSound’s ASIO driver installed.

I’ve emailed exaSound for help, and they’re usually very responsive.

Given it’s a weekend I guess you have to await their office hours to get a response.

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Essentially this thread suggests exaSound need more than standard class 2 USB drivers to work. I don’t know the details of the E12 but if it is multichannel then it may not work in Linux.

It is not.

They’re a small company. The big boss called me the other weekend. The reason I’m installing this DAC in a new location is that I replaced the one in my listening room with their e32 Mk II model, which sounds great and does MQA.

Well I see my answer in a post from exaSound honcho George_Klissarov in the thread Henry_McLeod referenced:

Roon Rock runs on a proprietary Roon-optimized Linux distribution. The e38 requires our proprietary drivers, and we offer only Windows and Mac drivers. We don’t offer Linux drivers because it is not practical to distribute and maintain closed-source drivers on Linux. The drivers play a significant role in achieving sonic fidelity. They also allow us to do things that are not possible with USB Audio Class 2.0 drivers, for example to support 8 channels of DSD256. So the benefit of multichannel native DSD256 comes with the limitations of compatibility with third-party devices.

The only way to use the e38 with Roon Rock is to use the exaSound Sigma Streamer.

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