Have you successfully located and enabled the UPnP or NAT-PMP settings in your router's web UI?
· I've turned UPnP/ NAT-PMP on and ARC won't connect
Select the Diagnostic Keyword or Text String
· Something else
Don't give up yet.
· I'm stuck. I'd like to create a post to ask Roon Community for help.
Describe the issue
Hey, I'm new to Roon and I'm having trouble connecting ARC. I have a Tplink Deco P9 Mesh Network, I have port forwarding enabled and I added a custom rule for Roon but I still cannot connect.
My ISP is Eir. I logged into their router to see if UPnP is enabled and it is. From there, I have a Tplink Deco P9 Mesh Network. Im using macOS Sonoma as my server.
You have two routers on your local network. One, with your Roon Server connected - presumably the tpLink Deco primary router - providing a 192.168.68.0/24 subnet and the other, the Eir router, providing a 192.168.1.0/24 subnet.
With a local network configured like this, uPnP can not work since uPnP can only configure the router to which the Roon Server is connected.
To get Roon ARC working with port forwarding you have three possible options (depending on router features):
Put the Eir router in to ‘bridge’ or ‘modem only’ mode. This may, or may not be possible depending on the abilities of the router.This will stop it offereing router functionality with all router services (NAT, DHCP, firewall etc) being performed by the TpLink Deco router.
Put the TpLink Deco router into ‘access point’ mode. This will stop it offereing router functionality with all router services (NAT, DHCP, firewall etc) being performed by the Eir router.
Configure explicit port forwarding rules on both routers:
On the Eir Router, configure a port forwarding rule to forward TCP connections on the ARC port to the WAN side ip address of the TPLink DEco router (192.168.1.11).
On the TpLink DEco router configure a port forwarding rule to forward TCP connections on the ARC port to the Roon Server ip address (starting with 192.168.68.). In principle, uPnP could configure this router but in practise it may not work because of the post configuration ip address check that Roon performs. Thus it is better to use explicit port forwarding.
The Roon ARC port is usually 55000 by default but is visible, and can be set, on the Roon ARC settings page from which you got the diagnostics text. The Roon Server ip address can be found on the same settings page.
If you opt for option 3 (or any explicit port forwarding rule), it is best if you also configure a DHCP reservation so that the ip addresses of the devices in question do not change.
If this all seems too much, then you might find it easier to use Tailscale. Other similar VPN services, like wireguard, may also work but Tailscale is the one officially supported by Roon.
Thank you so much for the prompt reply. I think I might try option 3. Should the external and internal ports be the same when setting this up? Also, is there a range of ports I can use for the ARC port?
Lastly, what range of ip addresses should I set for the DHCP reservation?
The external port should be the port set in the ARC settings page. The internal port should be the same but is often left blank (which amounts to the same thing).
There is no point in adding a range of ports. Roon ARC only uses one.
The DHCP reservation is reserving a single ip address for a particular device - usually the ip address that the device has already been allocated. It doesn’t have to be from a separate pool of addresses.
Thanks for reaching out. @Wade_Oram provided some great suggestions here (thanks @Wade_Oram !). After you’ve had a chance to review them and test things out, just let us know if you’re still stuck and we can look over your troubleshooting progress, thanks!
Thanks so much. Unfortunately I am still having trouble. It is still saying Not Ready. I am currently talking to a cyber security friend of mine trying to figure it out. But if you could help, that would be greatly appreciated, thank you…
@Karl_l, one note from my experience with two routers. The port forward IP address from your ISP router to the Deco should probably be the 192.168.68.1 address as the Deco needs to receive the port forwarded connection. Then as @Wade_Oram notes, the Deco needs a port forward rule from it to the IP address of your Roon Server computer, which also should be on the 192.168.68.nnn address space.
Also, be sure to turn off UPnP on both routers, or at least the Deco mesh system. Either port forwarding OR UPnP is needed for ARC, but both port forwarding and UPnP should not be on together.
