The journey from Sooloos to Roon so far

Some thoughts, most likely answered when 1.3 finally is released.

  1. Set up was a little confusing for me with only moderate PC familiarity, mainly due to the variety of items which can be used, each having its own quirks. The good side of that is the wide choice and relatively low cost (compared to Sooloos) as well as its relative simplicity and lower power consumption.

  2. A huge PLUS is the attention developers of Roon are paying to users, something a glaring contrast to Meridian. A corollary of that is this user friendly board.

  3. The database is good but far from perfect for classical items although better than the one used by Meridian. Artists are better recognised (and have uncovered previously undetected duplicate in this collection) and the notes on albums are good although not universal. [Can users somehow contribute to that and pool resources?] Only one completely incorrect album cover discovered so far but I guess future editing will allow for correction.

  4. Most (but not all) massaged album covers done on Sooloos have ported over although there are inconsistencies. I had devised a set of covers for albums for a big set using Sooloos but only some came through to Roon and others were changed.

  5. A few sets are already collated but most are not. Some opera sets appear together but others do not and the album covers are sometimes widely separated, an odd quirk when artist and album name are identical.

Bottom line is that Roon comes across as a user friendly system being adopted by user friendly users and communicative developers. It can never hope to cope with all the complexities and challenges of classical albums but I’m guessing that the editing in 1.3 will allow individuals to groom it to individual tastes. I’m only at the start of what looks like a great journey ahead.

John

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