The one issue there seems to be is that I can’t travel with Roon? I do a lot of travelling in areas with little to no internet connections and if I can’t listen to my music, Roon unfortunately doesn’t work. For example, if I can push some of my files to local storage on my phone that’d be ideal (my current setup which I then sync back to my phone).
In going through the forum it seems this feature isn’t being developed (or isn’t possible)?
An alternative would being able to sync Roon with another Android app. For example, I use Rocket Player on my phone and if I could sync back my ratings to Roon once in Wifi, that also would work.
If you want mobile it’s currently not for you. It’s a server based system the apps cannot play local music they are a remote to the server and to push it to endpoints. That said they have said that remote access to Roon is something they want and are working on, just as to when nobody knows and they don’t discuss development at all. If it’s important to you right now then Plex is the one you should be looking at as that does everything you want. It’s just not bit perfect or useful for hifi without plugging in a computer to it. But it’s a good side companion for this. I use it for video and mobile access to my own music. But as a home choice it sucks.
Christopher I use Roon and Plex together, but you might want to try Plex on its own first.
I prefer Roon for discovery and media management, but Plex work’s inside and outside of the house, and also work well with Tidal (just lost like Roon)
It’s worth spending time with Plex first to see if it meets your needs on its own. It doesn’t quite fulfill those needs for me as I always pick Roon when insist the house
People have been successful streaming digitized vinyl via a radiostream into room. That seems to work via a PC only. So this could be the start of a gateway for Laptop usage. But currently you need a connection to start Roon as it does not cache authorization offline. I am not sure how much of a timeout it would tolerate.
Sorry Mike but your wrong Plex allows you to sync content to your phone or device for offline play it works without any internet. As long as you have synced material before you have no internet. But the apps function independently when there is no server connection for local content. This is what the op is asking about.
I can push some of my files to local storage on my phone that’d be ideal (my current setup which I then sync back to my phone
You would need to take your RoonCore with you, like, running it on a laptop. Clients do not directly address storage at all, everything runs through the core.
So it seems like Plex is the solution I need - and perhaps then Roon doesn’t make sense at all?
The part I don’t fully understand about Roon and it’s setup through its core, is there an ability to push updates via a solution like Plex back to Roon?
Because I travel so much (and often in remote areas) I will make changes to song information and playlists that I push back to my home computer when I return. As I’m reading about Plex, it seems to accomplish all of this.
So then Roon is “just” for music discovery and playing at home at very high quality?
No you can’t push from Plex to Roon or from Roon to Plex they are seperate systems doing their own thing and have their own metadata databases. It won’t share any information from it. As for Plex you can’t push metadata from local apps, it has to be done via the server side which you need an internet connection to do this away from home. The server can be accessed remotely via plex.tv web app but you can’t make changes on the phone app and push them back to my knowledge. Plex has companion app just for music called PlexAmp this is a much better than the regular Plex app as that’s more geared up for video.
Christopher
At this point yes you have got it correctly, Roon is so good in general use that we live with it’s limitations.
Plex is not even close for music discovery and management, the fact that they both play nicely with Tidal is a bonus (for me at least)
Another option is Tidal or Spotify, Amazon Music or even Apple music. Not sure what you have at home and that may help you decide what will work best for you, if you have something that supports Spotify connect or similar.
Not true. You sync your content to it at times you do have internet it then allows to use Plex app with local content it gives you a seamless experience and you only use one app for home and away.
Syncing can be done anywhere you do have internet you don’t have to be home. It will also compress them if you wish. It works very well out of internet as a player in it own right it’s all using the same metadata and links back up when you have internet again. This is what the op wants. It’s really what Roon should be doing rather than looking at a cloud solution thats taking forever and will be riddled with more problems than they solve. Plex ditched cloudserver access for a reason this works well for peoples out of home access
TL;DR: It’s on the roadmap, Roon 1.8 on iOS only proves it, completely revamped UI for mobile experience. RAAT is a tricky protocol, it takes time to implement things. Additionally guys at the Roon always challenged with radical changes and it’s acceptance. It was a firestorm of complaints when 1.8 was released, can only imagine what it’s gonna be on 2.0 version.
Hopefully its not a faux pas to resurrect this question and ask if there’s been any change on allowing offline access to your Roon library?
I’ve been holding off on making a switch, hoping that Roon implements this functionality. I now need to make a switch, so if Roon hasn’t I guess it’ll be Plex.
It doesn’t seem Roon has done this yet per the comments, but I thought I’d check.
At home, I use Roon on Nucleus with Tidal and Qobuz and AT&T U-Verse internet.
Away from home, I use Roon on laptop with Tidal and Qobuz and Verizon cellular hotspot data. I also use Apple music streaming from iPhone or iPad using unlimited Verizon cellular data when hotspot is used up. I get free Apple Music with my Verizon data plan.
Walking my dog, I use Apple Music on iPhone 11 Pro Max and Verizon cellular data.
I still have Audirvana but don’t use it very often.