I am about to replace my current home network system with one that will rely on pfsense as the router along with Ubiquiti’s switches and wifi access points. All the Roon related devices will be interconnected via ethernet, the wifi is only for remotes…
I read a few times that it is better to use unmanaged switches with Roon, however Ubiquiti gear is pretty much managed, so I wanted to check if people on this forum that are running their Roon system with either ubiquiti have any feedback about this?
Trivial matter on UB/Edge devices as they are built to handle system management and workloads. It will make no performance difference if you do not use the monitoring or vlan features.
I prefer managed myself as I can tweak performance to offload cpu bound tasks to nvram and configure link aggregation for servers and NAS. In most cases a managed device will have more memory and better processing capability for heavier workloads. YMMV depending which models but UB devices are generally higher tier performers.
Great! That’s what I thought… I had some issues using my cheapo tp-link switch before I realized I had to turn Jumo Frame on and after that never had a network issue with Roon, streaming services is another story, Qobuz and Tidal are patchy but I suppose that depends on so many external factors, many of which are outside my network.
I have an Opnsense router (check opnsense.org for a DEC series) connected to Aruba Instant On 48 port L2 managed switch (check arubainstanton.com) and Aruba wifi since years without troubles and low latency for Roon (Rock NUC)
Slightly off-topic here, but can anyone here recommend best practices for getting the best of Roon on a Unifi network? General advice is most welcome! Happy to post elsewhere too.
Not much to do really it just works well without much tinkering but here’s what I have setup and is rock solid.
I have a usg3, connected to a usw-16 Poe which is my main switch that then allows me to power most other things so reduces psus everywhere, this connects and powers a cloud key gen2 for management. This switch then feeds and powers the rest of the network. 2 us8’s and two aps in the main house, I then run a feed to another powered usw8 in my office at back of garden which uses its Poe to feed and power another ap, two security cameras and my work pc.
I have enabled mDNS and IGMP snooping and my Chromecast devices live on a different subnet as per Unifi best practice. I have Roon on its own vlan, general Wi-Fi stuff on an other vlan and another for iot. They are setup as corporate networks so they will talk to each other, I have ring fenced iot so it can’t talk to the rest but the rest can talk to it. Turned off most functions on the switches apart from spanning tree and Igmp snooping. I do use port profiles to set ports to operate on the vlan I want the device to be on.
Aps have fast roaming, band steering, UAPSD, bss transition, and multicast enhancement enabled. Each ap is on its own channel as not to overlap and chosen ones which get best reception. 2.4ghz is on 20mhz and low power so I get better overlap and devices roam better, 5ghz is on 80mhz and medium power for same reasons but this may be very different in each property.
Roons remote works across any of the vlans without issue but is normally connected to the general vlan on phones and pcs. Roon will see Chromecast or AirPlay devices across the vlans. Roon core and Roon Ready devices or bridges, my Sonos and a pi running extension manager are on the Roon vlan. Two main rigs are wired off t he us8 in each room, rest all use Wi-Fi and have no issues. Infact my Fiio M11 Plus is most used device for Roon and is so stable over Wi-Fi it’s shocking.
I like the separation as it just makes my life easier for management and it did make cc devices work better overall.
Not had any issues and it just ticks along nicely. My aps give great throughout, devices roam well and everyone in the house is happy it just works and we get no horrid bandwidth drops(isp issues aside) whole house can stream 4k at same time and not drop a frame over Wi-Fi. Overall have about 25 -30 devices the majority of them being Wi-Fi. Best investment I made over standard stuff they sell for home use.
I’ve used Ubiquiti gear for a lot f years. I moved to the UniFi like some years back and am currently on a UDM Pro, a bunch of access points (all IW-HD), a few security cameras (recording to the UDM Pro), and a bunch of L2 switches. It all runs very well.
I use 3 vlans - main, roon, iot.
Main is limited to my NAS, which has all of our photos and personal documents, and our high-trust client Macs, phones and PCs. Roon is everything Roon related including wried and wireless endpoints, and things like the Raspberry Pis that I use for rooDial/rooNuimo. IoT is everything else including Home Assistant and the many random automation and convenience devices we have. I’m sort of an automation hobbyist, so there’s a lot on IoT.
My Roon core is on a NUC running Ubuntu. The box has two network interfaces - one on the main vlan, one on the Roon vlan. This allows it work with control devices on the main vlan and playback devices on the roon vlan. It’s not an explicitly supported topology but it works.
I have many traffic management rules configured to control everything.
Setting up vlans and traffic management can be tricky and non obvious. I really like this video on it - I consider it essential watching for anyone considering this approach. There’s a good reason it has over 200,000 views:
