The Future of Roon

I don’t have this album in my library…

@Bauer My apologies I was certain that it was your pick as I enjoyed a great deal of your selections as well as @Matz

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No apology necessary @Singleton

I’m delighted to hear that :smiley:

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I’m not opposed to voluntary sharing per se, if it were implemented bug free.
As we are all in different time zones, a “listening now” feature would have limited value, a list of the last 100 tracks maybe more so .

An issue I foresee would be if someone listens to a track that Roon doesn’t recognise, I listen to bootleg recordings occasionally, Roon cannot identify them and you can’t play them.

Then what if I listen to an original press cd rip and Roon carries only different remasters on Tidal or Qobuz? It needs processing power to find the match and people already complain of a slow experience.

Lastfm already exists and allows me to find people, not just Roon users, who listen to the same music, they are matched according to compatibility and I can scroll their library and play via streaming services or copy the release name into any app.
Lastfm also recommends similar albums much like Roon does.

There’s a thread somewhere to share your lastfm profile but I can’t find it right now in the android app.

I found particularly Qobuz very useful just to provide back catalogues, discographies and recording lists. So even if I would never listen to a single track from Qobuz I would still need the integration. For me, roon feels incomplete without it.

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I was one of a number of users having Room becoming unstable while having Metadata updates kicking off and consuming 150% CPU for long periods.
For a few of them removing Qobuz in particular proved to help, and as I had recently set up LMS and integrated both Qobuz and Tidal I thought it would slightly force my hand to use it more.

You are absolutely correct that Roon is better with music services integrated, but I am mostly happy with my 76k local track’s at this point. I am about 50/50 split between using Roon and LMS and if I was starting again and didn’t already have a Roon lifetime license, I think I would choose LMS as my music playback system of choice. It’s an excellent and flexible music service and whilst not as pretty as Roon it only uses 10% of the resources at best.

But with PlexAmp as well, three is definitely more and better than one and choice is great

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I actually followed many users from that thread as well as the BandCamp thread.
The BandCamp thread in particular has been great for getting recommendations from what other’s have bought coming directly into my email and sampling more music

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I was going to mention the Bandcamp thread, thanks.
I know it’s not as slick as having it in Roon, but it does actually show what people have bought and not just listened too
One assumes a person likes it if they bought it usually, although I know some people buy before listening or just buy all the “Name Your Price” releases for free or little money. So it’s not fool proof.
This and the Lastfm integration is all I need tbh.

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Pretty much the same for me (along with some good music friends and this forum)

I know some people add any free albums, but I only buy and add music I will like and listen to multiple times.

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I started getting vinyl(bought by parents) at 6 , into hi-fi from about 14.

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It’s useful as a source to try out stuff for me only these days, and some albums I fancy listening to but have no inclination to own. I found deleting the whole favourites very therapeutic and Roon is better without the clutter and constant maintenance they add. Two years on now and I have not missed having a virtual library at all and over all I use Qobuz very little now except mainly on Fridays to sample new releases and to purchase ones I like. Not sure if stop subscribing as I like the option but the whole library integration for me is no longer necessary.

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I don’t need or want any kind of sharing or ‘social’ feature adding to Roon. I buy way more downloads and CD’s than is good for my finances and that’s just through my own research. I have absolutely no interest in what others are listening to. To be honest if I was aware that any particular album / song was popular I’d probably avoid it anyway.

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At their peril! Many many moons ago, I was a purist and eschewed the very notion of DSP.

When you properly take a dive into DSP and appreciate what it can do not only in the frequency domain, but more importantly, in the time domain, the results are quite staggering.

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One problem I see with Roon is the necessary learning curve for new users. This is a real obstacle to attract new users. PC plus networking plus other new stuff gets overwhelming quite fast. And the lack of fast help and assistance leads to frustration. Setting up ARC is no slouch neither for many. Even older and experienced users complain thread after thread their frustrations with Roon.
A positive user experience is very necessary for future growth. Harman should invest in a positiver user experience.

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I just hate the idea that just because something is popular it must be good. Generally, for me, popularity more often than not indicates that I won’t like it. Not always, but usually.:slightly_smiling_face:

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Agreed. George Bernard Shaw said something similar.

I don’t think it’s that bad.

My take was that the user experience would grow with you. For example, I was encouraged to upload my digital collection and then use Roon to have it fleshed out with suggestions (by definition, from the streamer integration). It was a little generic at first (not uninteresting, mind) but I’m a believer in Valence possessing a library signature which manifests itself in Radio (when I run it on occasion).

Maybe down the road I’d consider two enabled amplifiers, but that doesn’t interest me personally… yet this flexibility floats plenty of boats from what I read. ARC would be nice, and were Harman to invest in this application I’d suspect they could push to rebuild from scratch. It would integrate very well with car audio were it to work out of the box.

My worry with Roon’s future isn’t their user experience, it’s if the streamers they play with have no future. Even my mid-sized library can get stale. Right now discovery is one of my prime hobbies: hasn’t always been.

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If I leave streaming out, then Roon isn’t that much more useful compared to JRiver. The only plus would be that I have access outside my home to my local music collection through Roon ARC.

I’m subbed to both Qobuz and Tidal (again). Tidal is laying off another large chunck of their workforce. No idea about Qobuz. But I do know that Qobuz is a small company. If they were to keel over. Roon becomes far less useful. I’d still use it since I have a lifetime sub on it.

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It looks like you have an open mind. For me, I’d have to take a punt. My daughter is a booster for her collection, and she does have good taste, but if I’m unwilling to take a punt on the taste of someone that I deeply care about and respect, I don’t see much hope for relative strangers’.

The neighbourhoods that last.fm retrieve would be as close to a good idea as is possible: not so close that you’d offend a person if it wasn’t your bag; not so random that it’d be a complete punt.

I think this is off this particular thread’s topic, but worthy all the same.

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