Strange Audio Issues w/ Ventura [Roon Investigating; Known Apple Issues w/ Ventura System Audio]

Roon Core Machine

2021 iMac, M1 Processor, 16gb ram

Networking Gear & Setup Details

Just using Roon on my iMac with my Verizon Fios connected via an Ethernet cable.

Connected Audio Devices

iMac, Schiit Modi 3, Schiit Asgard 3

Number of Tracks in Library

~30,000

Description of Issue

So, since switching to Ventura, I’ve come upon a strange glitch. I generally listen to everything on my iMac with my headphone rig, as described above.

So, if Im watching a YouTube video w/ sound coming via my Modi DAC and then switch to a song on Roon without stopping playback of the video, all of my audio shuts down. I can’t switch back to my Mac’s audio and Roon stops recognizing any of my audio zones, and various apps become unresponsive.

Before, on Monterey, if I turned on a song in Roon, the rest of my iMac simply switches to the Macs internal DAC for any audio, while Roon is utilizing my Schiit Modi.

The only thing that seems to fix this is restarting my computer. This is super inconvenient. I’ve had to downgrade to Monterey to avoid this problem. However, since I’m an Adobe subscriber, the latest iteration of Adobe Bridge is malfunctioning on Monterey.

Basically, this sucks.

Anyone else encountering a similar situation?

So, nobody has had this issue?

I’m experiencing something that may be similar. I don’t have time to describe it now. I’ll aim to come back here tomorrow with some details.

Thank you.

So, I’ve had some rather weird behaviour with my Mac over the past week or two and it has surfaced since I upgraded to Ventura. I have a Mac Studio with a Mac Studio Display. The weird behaviour has taken two forms.

The easiest to describe relates to the Studio Display’s camera. When I initiate a FaceTime call, the person I’m calling can’t see me on their device even though I can see on my screen that the camera’s working. If my friend calls me back, they can see me without a problem.

The second issue relates to sound. I play sound, whatever the source (Roon, web browser, etc) through the Studio Display speakers. Recently, this stopped working. Here are some things I noticed:

  • Streaming was impossible, whether from Qobuz or Live Radio.

  • I couldn’t even play music from my own music library. In both cases, when I clicked the Play button, nothing happened and then after a few seconds the Stop/Pause button returned to being the Play button.

  • In Roon’s Audio Settings, The Mac Studio and Studio Display speakers had disappeared (I had the option to enable them via AirPlay, an option I haven’t tried). Other options on my network such as my sound system downstairs were still available.

I then widened my investigation and found that:

  • The problem was not confined to Roon – I could play music from Apple Music or from a web browser.

  • The Sound “preferences pane” was not available under System Settings.

So I restarted the Mac. Problem persisted.

I then unplugged the Studio Display, left it like that for a minute or two, then plugged it back in. That seemed to solve the audio problem.

But since then the problem has returned. I’ve had to go through a series of Shut Downs and Restarts on the Mac Studio and unplugging and plugging back in the Studio Display to get things working again.

So what I’m thinking right now is:

  • The problem is likely to recur.

  • It doesn’t seem to be Roon-specific.

  • Could it be to do with the lead that links the Mac Studio to the Studio Display? That might account for the FaceTime issue.

  • If/when the problem recurs, I may well call Apple Support to see if I can get help in resolving it.

@Daniel_Bykhovsky, do you think our experiences are related? I’m just not sure.

Well, I haven’t used my iMac for FaceTime since upgrading to Ventura, so I can’t comment on that.

I’ve definitely had the sound issues you are mentioning. For me, it only occurred as I described: watching a video on Youtube, then without turning off the video, turning on Roon and trying to play a track…after that audio goes haywire, much like you described.

Yes, the Sound Preferences pane becomes unavailable.

For me restarting the Mac fixes it, but what am I going to do? Restart my Mac 10+ times a day?

No, so I downgraded back to Monterey (which is now causing problems with Adobe Bridge).

So, since I’ve only encountered this issue with the audio when trying to play a track via Roon, my inclination is to think that it’s a Roon issue.

Maybe Roon isn’t completely Ventura-ready?

Interesting. I think we’re both struggling to identify the source of the problem. I’m inclined to see it as a more general issue that affects Roon but goes beyond it. Let’s keep in touch. If I manage to get my system sorted, I’ll let you know what I discovered.

I’ll do the same.

I can assure you that my problem disappears as soon as I reverted back to Monterey.

So, yes, I can’t be sure that it’s a Ventura or a Roon issue, but given that Roon (with all of its wonderful features) is a very buggy piece of software…

If you want to verify my findings, you can always do a Time Machine backup and go through the process of going back to Monterey (it will take a little less than an hour to do that, depending on how much you need to backup, etc.)

I hope Roon can resolve this soon.

As an additional piece of information, I also have Audirvana Origin 2.0, which also takes over the system audio when you play a track. No issues with Audirvana.

Again, this seems like a Roon issue.

Just a quick update, @Daniel_Bykhovsky. The issues recurred this morning – all of them. FaceTime not working, audio not working. For me, the issues are not confined to Roon. I’ve just had a long call with Apple Support and sent them a huge diagnostics file. They’ve scheduled a follow-up call for Sunday. I’ll let you know what they discover. In the meanwhile, unplugging and restarting my Mac and display have returned things to normal.

Thanks, Philip. That’s interesting. I had a strange glitch where the date and time didn’t appear in the top right corner, but other than that, I haven’t had any major issues since I switched back to Audirvana.

Playing a track on Roon is out of the question at this moment, because everything goes haywire immediately.

I’ve cancelled my Roon membership auto renewal until this issue is resolved. Roon’s great but there are bugs and glitches practically all the time.

I don’t understand why having a stable piece of software is such a low priority for them.

I have to say that, luckily for me, my experience with Roon has been very different from yours. It’s been very stable and well behaved. I’m struggling to remember having had any problems with it until now – apart from configuring it to work with Roon ARC, which was quite tricky but I got it done eventually.

I mean, I haven’t had major issues. Just minor little things that are fixed by closing and reopening the app. Those aren’t a big deal, but they happen enough times that you wonder why do all of my other apps just work.

Hopefully this will get resolved, because for now it’s unusable.

Fingers crossed.

@Philip_Gibson Not a peep from the folks at Roon on this topic. What a great company. And, on top of that, we get to pay even more for an app that we can’t use starting in January.

Hi @Daniel_Bykhovsky,

Thank you for your patience and I’m sorry to hear that these audio issues on Ventura have rendered Roon unusable to the point of pausing your subscription. We’ve been unable to reproduce your report internally, but several details in your report suggest the issue may be within the OS system mixer rather than Roon’s RAAT protocol, the Schitt outputs, or Roon database.

Knowing more details of your system’s audio routing would illuminate what might be causing this symtpom. Are you able to supply the tech support team with the following screenshots?

  1. The Audio Midi setup screen on your iMac (Applications → Utilities → Audio Midi Setup). See below for example.

  2. The Sound tab in System Preferences.

Ventura contains an Accessibility update that allows for different configurations of voiceover and background sound. This places a new layer in the System Mixer when engaged, and I’m curious if you’re relying on these features in Ventura. Please also share the following, if possible:

  1. A screenshot of the Audio configuration in Accessibility, also in System Preferences

Additionally, do you experience issues like you’ve described when using any Browser, or is this limited to Chrome?

Once we have additional information, we can try our best to troubleshoot the system settings. With your Roon account deactivated, however, we’re unable to pull automatic diagnostics from your account. If you’re interested, I can flag our @accounts team to discuss options for a free trial we can use during troubleshooting.

@Connor Hi Connor. Well, I guess late is better than never. I reactivated my account.

Here are the 3 requested screenshots. Also, I’ve reactivated my account (I have 11 days left). I really love Roon, so if this issue can be resolved, I’ll gladly continue my subscription.



I’m experiencing the Browser issue with both browsers and the audio completely turns off for the entire Mac until I restart it.

Thanks.

Yes, it would be great if the @accounts team could extend my subscription. If anything, I feel like giving me a free month is only fair considering I haven’t been able to use a service I’m paying for through no fault of my own for coming up on 2 weeks.

Hey @Daniel_Bykhovsky,

I am so glad to hear that you’re up for working with Connor (and our technical team) to get to the bottom of this. Thank you.

Please, check your account page for your extension :relaxed:

@beka That’s great. Thanks very much. I do hope we can get Roon working. This app really has a lot of wonderful features. As my stereo system expands over time, I hope to get even more use out of it.

Now hopefully, @Connor and company can figure out this pesky issue that’s preventing me from using the app at all.

All the best.

1 Like

Hi @Daniel_Bykhovsky,

We’ve reproduced the issue internally and have escalated to QA/development. I’ll report back as soon as I have a fruitful next step. In the meantime, unfortunately, the only relief I’ve found is by taking one of the following steps:

  1. Restarting the Mac
  2. Using terminal to reset Core Audio on the Mac. Go to Applications → Utilities → Terminal . Type in “sudo killall coreaudiod” and press Enter . This should reset your Core Audio daemon.

I’ll report back shortly.

@Connor That’s great(?)! Look forward to getting this problem resolved. Thanks for your efforts.