Roon, you're messing with my mojo (not my DAC)

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To those who easily chime in here and say it’s fine for me, stop, read below first. We all see countless support requests for what does feel the same week in and week out issues. I also do appreciate Roon’s, not as regular as I’d like, updates to wanting to fix these.

Dear Team Roon

Another disappointed user here (again). I have tried and tried again to remain positive with all things Roon and repeatedly return to using it after using other options. I’m beggining to think why do I!.

EDIT: I feel it’s becoming a 50/50 chance whether users I will have issues from one day to another. On occasion things have been fantastic for me, and then just a disappointment.

Although Roon and Arc work fairly well currently, things like search are still flaky as hell. It’s just not right that a basic function like search fails for some and not for others.

Currently I am using Arc and search is shocking. Timing out on ‘The The’ and repeated searches fail and are warming my phone up.

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PlexAmp is instant without hitting enter.

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Search ‘Baby’ as in Baby Metal (yes I am a fan), returns :arrow_down:

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I have two albums in my local library :grin:

Whilst similar support threads have the potential of multiple different causes, things like endpoints disappearing after an update should not be happening, ever! Roon clients not finding the Roon Server should not be happening, ever!

Design the product to work for all and not what seems to appear to those who are lucky enough to have all the planets in the galaxy in alignment.

A good number of support threads have come in since this week’s update. There just never seems to be a quiet period of stability. You gotta really work on this.

Yes other softwares/platforms have their own issues but this is Roon. Roon to me is meant to be the flagship of music playback softwares.

It’s becoming less so and it’s a shame. I once would have recommend Roon above anything else. Not so now. I use to show it off to folks at work, now I say stick with Spotify to them.

I don’t want to be a caretaker of my Roon experience. I want you guys to do that by providing a software that’s near bulletproof to all.

I’m not putting my toys back in my pram until Roon truly responds to these types of feedback posts.

A good number of active Roon users, not posting on here much, are exploring other options and I believe may stop subscribing to Roon. Longterm users they are.

Being that I made the active choice to go lifer a few years ago, that’s a learning curve for me to not do so again.

As one user wrote on another platform;

I have no doubt that Roon’s search functionality is hampered by deep-lying design or software architecture constraints, as are other unsurmountable shortcomings we have discussed here before…

And

By the way, speaking of favourite shortcomings: since the last update, I’ve been having longer pauses between tracks again when I listen to music on my two Sonos speakers in the office… Restarting the Roon server helps briefly, then the pause length increases continuously. This cr@p also happens from time to time. Buffering has been a big problem since years as well. And it’s not addressed.

And

Again and again the sad truth is that Roon is really not more than a superficial proof-of-concept realization of some quite seductive design goals. From then on, it’s clever marketing and hyperbole, and a community only too willing to let themselves getting screwed…

Come on Team Roon

And yes, Roon may work flawlessly for some, but when some users experience issue after issue and not always the same, it becomes tiresome.

The foundations of Roon are old and crumbling. Building more upon them is making things unstable.

Patching things up with fixes is just a sticking plaster on a broken leg.

Roon 3.0 is needed and it needs a full new build.

Right, I’ve got to go fix someone’s air-conditioning. Don’t worry, I have plenty of plasters (band-aids).

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P.S. give Arc the function to sort by release date on the New Releases screen for Qobuz/Tidal.

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I personally find it hard to argue with this thinking, and it would mean we would all have to patiently wait for a new version to be build and debugged over time. You are probably looking at a couple of years. If Roon doesn’t want to become the next Sonos of the industry then I for one would forgo half baked new toys on a bi-monthly basis for a true shiny new toy at the end of this process that is fit for purpose and likely to meet current and future customer needs.

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Would it be naive of Roon to not be doing R&D, early development on a new platform for the future? :man_shrugging:

Eggs in one basket approach isn’t the norm.

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Well ARC was apparently built as a completely separate project to the Roon Client, and look how that turned out.
Oh I can’t as I deleted it due to regular failures over 2 plus years :frowning_face:
(sadly Snark mode is fully enganged and stuck there now so I will stop posting)

I stand by my comment that a fully rebuilt Roon server and Client would deliver long term benefits to everyone at the cost of short term new toys.
Having seen two long term power users and contributors here deciding to go to the Open Source LMS for stability and reliability I can’t see another easy fix for this as it has been coming for a while

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I have read these two contributors thoughts with real interest as they are both stalwarts of the forum and Always have interesting things to say.

However, i may be an outlier, but my experience is only getting better; having invested a small fortune on equipment and infrastructure, i am knocked out by how good my systems (three + ARC) sound.

So, im not challenging others views, i’m just relating my experiences to date.

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I have been a Roon user for 5 years with a Nucleus and multiple lifetime subscriptions. I have no issues and no complaints. I don’t know why except that I don’t have a local library except 47 tracks I rarely listen to.

EDITED out comment about requiring a Nucleus because some took it seriously. Actually, Roon works for me on Nucleus, Mac Mini, and Dell. My Nucleus suggestion was really about removing confusion and support requirements. Make Roon more like a radio.

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If this was so, the forum would look very different

Except, of course, if there’s some kind of network related problem (and if it’s just firewall settings) and that’s the majority of cases.

I know it helps nobody who is affected, but I have not had a single critical issue (bugs and niggles, yes) for all my 3 years of Roon, and sometimes it’s worth mentioning because those people don’t post about problems. I basically have a 100% chance of not having issues from one day to another. And I am not at all doing anything special except having a sane configuration and not dropping 750K tracks into Roon and praying for the best.

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@Glimmer thank you for you kind words :+1:

@Jim_F buying a nucleus, based on what’s come through the forum, may not be the best thing to recommended. A fair few devices failures so far.

The benchmark for search is ‘The The’. A search should not do this.

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Occasionally my Roon Remote becomes unresponsive during this search. Sometimes a force close of the app is required.

PlexAmp

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Wasn’t easy getting the last screenshot as Plex search is rapid. Yes, it’s local search but this was from my phone on mobile data. When I have had Tidal integrated it’s similar results.

My RAM use is all Roon. Normally sits at 2gb. So something happening there, maybe.

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I don’t think this would help, users get into trouble with these, too. I mean, we see it all the time on the forum. (I’d even wager more frequently because it is a particular population). I am also pretty convinced it would kill Roon if you can’t try it out.

What would help is moving all RoonServer stuff into a cloud instance and have pros manage it. But 1) the cloud is still not there yet, and 2) people would complain about the always-online requirement again

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Oh, and as usual I resent this “if you don’t have problems you are clearly a gullible idiot” claim. (I know you didn’t say it). I’ve tried other solutions before Roon and there’s no contest, for me.

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That pretty much is what happens at my end, just with more cores all maxed out :grinning: :rofl:

As to my comments about Roon being a complex product, it’s real and that is why different people have different experiences on the same hardware. My Home experience with Roon is excellent, with a decent server to manage my 70k+ local library and another 20k in Tidal and Qobuz. I sometimes see Roon doing crazy stuff with the processor because I can do that.

I was one of the people who were effected by the last.fm issues that was causing the Roon server to just completely crash, and everyone said it wasn’t an issue until Roon tracked it down after many months of regular Roon crashes. Complex products have complex interactions and dependencies depending on what options have been selected.

The comment that it works for me is not helpful, especially when many here know how to manage a system and a network and can make all other music servers sing a perfect song.

And @Jim_F I love your Roon story and it is heartening to watch your story grow over the last 5 years, but a Nuclues running Roon OS is not a fix for that many users, but it is great when it works for people. When there is an issue it is one of the worst solutions as it is a black box closed off to all users including Roon. They can get logs but cannot sit and watch what the processor is doing which is what many of us like to do.

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It was said in earnest by some people in the past :slight_smile:

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I’m not sure if this was in response to my comment, but I think it is important for balance to include positive experiences when they are genuine.

Possibly, I invested in my equipment and ISP after I experienced Roon and was lucky in my FTTP and choice of gear in that they suited my needs and Roon’s requirements.

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I suppose this is in response to me. I said I know it isn’t helpful for people who have issues. However, it’s also not helpful to claim that 50% of users have constant issues, and in this context I think a bit of balance is allowed.

Of course, there can be Roon issues that are not caused by system/network problems. But when looking at those numbers, we do have to subtract all the cases that are, and there’s a lot of those on the forum.

I believe it was in response to me :slight_smile:

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No it was to Jim, and I named him, but these threads are pointless as they go round and around with the same thing and Roon staff never chime in.

I would never claim that 50% of users have issues, if I was to guess I would suggest it would be closer to 1-2% but we cannot know that. I agree that the forums make it seems that Roon software is useless and I have never claimed that.

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No Glimmer I thought I was clear that I was speaking to Jim, but clearly I was not clear enough :man_facepalming:.

I love it when Roon works perfectly, but it does not do all that for all of us all of the time.

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My apologies Michael, i wasn’t trying to be contentious. I have been rather single minded in making my systems bend to the requirements of Roon and that might have been my saving grace.

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I’m not sure @Michael_Harris was replying to you.

A general reply to a number of folk, myself included in that in the past.

I’m not a networking guru, but my managed Unifi network which I’m using currently is very stable and robust. My Roon machine runs DietPi and I’m self taught in the best practices of setting it up.

For 2 years or more I was fairly trouble free.

Similar to Michaels last.fm saga, I wasn’t affected and then that Sonos saga with Roon, I was also unaffected.

Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason to why some have some issues and other don’t, or do but are different issues…

The only common thing in play is Roon.

Maybe too easy to blame Roon, however for those with a ‘above’ average knowledge in computers may confidentiality say there network and equipment isn’t causing the issue.

Even after the Roon Remote freeze ups fix being released I have seen on occasion my Roon server max out on CPU cores and the remote app becomes unresponsive.

Yes, use case and how we use may also differ from one another. I basically put music on a hard drive, plug it in, add the drive to Roon. Normally no active DSP, other than volume levelling. I select and album and press play. Similar with Arc.

In the last week I’ve had Roon max out my cores for no apparent reason. Arc hasn’t been too reliable in terms of search, playback and Android Auto with Arc being hit and miss.

The search issue raised today just pushed me to writing this feedback thread.

Maybe folk can post what works for them and what is seemingly not working for them.

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The comment that “it works for me” is very pertinent. Not only that, but we are free to say that if it is true. The fact that Roon works perfectly for most users proves that the problems some people experience are not necessarily inherent to Roon alone. They are due to the total setup a person is using including Roon, hardware, network, and use case. It is up to Roon to figure out what the issue is and how to resolve. It is pertinent to them that many people do not have that particular problem.

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