Roon / streaming simplified

Could you be more specific, please? Unfortunately, most simple questions can’t be answered usefully, and most simple answers aren’t much help to anyone.

“Why isn’t my music playing?”

“I don’t know.”

The audio industry (tech in general) seems addicted to them. Maybe a glossary of acronyms somewhere would be useful? I know I’d appreciate it.

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I think the “gear-heads” (no offense) don’t even realize they are acronyms. To them, they are normal words used everyday. People should speak to their audience.

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It’s not that I have a specific question right now. Everything works well, and I enjoy Roon very, very much. But I like to learn and the forums present the opportunity to do so. However, when the conversations are happening so far above my head, it’s not useful (to me) or fun.
I have a MacBook Air hooked up to a Mytek Brooklyn+ via USB. Seems to work for me, but so many people are talking about “NUC’s” and Ropiee’s and hubs and I have no idea what those are.

My second choice (after abolishment) would be a glossary.

I had them in my old job, too. But part of my job was to effectively communicate. If I used my industry jargon to communicate with people outside the job, I was not an effective communicator and, therefore, not very effective at my job.

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Yeah. Most people on this forum don’t know very much about the others, the ones asking questions, so it’s hard to judge the correct way to respond. And, let’s face it, many of us don’t know how to “dial it down”.

And then there’s this dense fog of mythology and marketing that lies over the whole area of “elite” audio. (And I use the word “lies” advisedly.)

Not the first time we’ve discussed this:

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Which I’d bet sounds great. I like this Mytek gear.

Seems to me that you don’t need to. Just for completeness sake: “NUC” is an acronym for an Intel marketing term, “Next Unit of Computing”, and what they mean by that is a small-form-factor computer with an Intel CPU (sorry, central processor unit) inside. They come as kits, sort of; you buy your own RAM (random-access memory) and disks and assemble them. They’re popular in this community because you can run ROCK (Roon-Optimized Core Kernel?) on them, an operating system optimized for running the Roon Server (the Roon “Core”). “RoPieee” (which isn’t an acronym) is the name of an operating system that’s optimized for running RoonBridge on a Raspberry Pi computer, and together with a Pi can be used to construct a very low-cost but capable “endpoint” for a second or third or even first Roon endpoint in a home. “Hubs”, well, generic term, you have to look at the context to know what is meant.

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But that’s not a myth. Even Roon recommends ethernet over a USB connection. That’s something a new user should know on day one while he or she is setting up their system. That doesn’t mean that every USB connection is going to be a problem, however.

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Sorry, Jim, I disagree here. The “dirtiness” of USB is indeed pretty much a myth, but a newbie has no need of getting into that esoteric lore.

I’ve never experienced that myself, but I disagree it’s a myth. Too many knowledgable people disagree. I would definitely want to know about that before I tried to pull a USB cable.

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You can also try a browse through the Help Center articles. If there’s something there that is not clear, you can always come and ask here. Would help to improve the articles as well.

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Well, to quote Mark Twain, “The trouble with the world is not that people know too little; it’s that they know so many things that just aren’t so.”

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You guys rock!!
(Not the acronym for Roon Optimized Core Kernel rock, but rock, like you’re cool and awesome!)

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I’m confused, so here goes;
I thought an ethernet connection was for internet connectivity. A hard wire for device connectivity from the router, as opposed to wireless internet connectivity.
I don’t think my Mac even has an Ethernet port and I’m not sure about the Mytek (I could look).
So, I am connected to the internet wirelessly from the Mac and to the Mytek with a USB cable (and a Jitterbug on the USB output of the Mac just in case there is something to the fabled USB issues :wink:).

Don’t know what you’re confused about, though. It sounds like you have a handle on it.

Don’t know about the Jitterbug, though. A core engineering principle is, “remove unnecessary parts”, because it is just something else that could fail. The Brooklyn+ is a modern well-engineered DAC, not some fossil from the 1990’s.

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Yes, it is for internet connectivity. Your Roon core device is connected to the internet. Roon recommends ethernet instead of WIFI because there is a lot of traffic. Then, you have to connect your Roon end-points to your Roon core. You can do that with USB if close by but many people think USB can carry detectable noise. I’ve never experienced that, but many say they have. Therefore, ethernet is a preferred method for connecting Roon end-points. Also, they are frequently located far away from your Roon core, making ethernet a desirable connection method. I have ethernet to my Nucleus and all Roon end-points except one portable WIFI RPi4.

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Thanks.
I do tend to be a purist in my audio pursuits, but the Jitterbug didn’t seem harmful and may alleviate a problem from a $.49 usb connector in the Mac.

Try it with and without and see if it makes any difference.

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My experience is that price does not correlate with quality, particularly in the audio field. There are lots of people who want to sell you unnecessary stuff at wildly inflated prices.

If it was a problem you heard before adding the Jitterbug, and adding it fixed the problem, great!

If not, remember that the folks who prey on audiophile consumers deliberately create that fog of FUD – fear (of missing out, hence FOMO), uncertainty (about what is and isn’t necessary), and doubt (about what advice to take) – in order to scare folks into buying their products.

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And frequently, the higher the price, the better it sounds. At least, that’s the expectation bias if not always real.