Based on some of the comments, I think I understand where the core issue is:
Roon has a generally hard separation between Tidal and Library. You can have Tidal stuff in your library, but it ‘breaks’ the Tidal link when you do that. This has implications like that artist pages in Library don’t really have any connection to artists in Tidal. Thus you can largely think of it as two largely separate products - one for managing stuff you have added to your library, one that is a Tidal client.
Roon is obviously not for everyone, which is why they offer a free trial! If you have specific questions, this forum is here to help, but there‘s no magic sauce if you don‘t get it. Good luck in your quest.
If I disliked Roon, I would move on to something I liked. For me, it’s the only way to send music from my Roon core device (Dell XPS 15) to my music system using RAAT and my Oppo (Roon endpoint). Roon is worth the price if that was the only benefit.
On the detail page of an album, click on the Versions tab - it will show you all the versions available of the album in both your library, and TIDAL. You can choose which one you want to be the default (primary) version.
Click the Queue icon in the play bar. The Queue will open to the currently playing track at the top. You can scroll up and down this list to reveal what has already been played.
One benefit is Roon Radio. It can combine tracks from your local library and the streaming service. Tidal has a similar feature, but won’t include your local files (as far as I know) and Roon may, or may not, pick better tracks depending on your preferences. Qobuz does not have the feature at all, so Roon is a huge benefit for Qobuz users.
I purchased Roon 4 years ago. At the time I had a large CD music collection ripped to iTunes. Since then I’ve bought only a handful of CDs, relying on Tidal for all my new music. Roon was the first software to seamlessly combine my local media files with a streaming source in a way that made the migration from one music consumption system to another invisible. Whether I’m finding new music from Roon Radio and adding it, navigating to Artists I like and adding their albums to my collection using the Add to Library option beside the Play button, or adding artists from the Related Artist array that appears on the bottom of each artist, I’m able to discover and curate new albums and artists into my collection where only the format indicator is evidence of when I stopped buying physical media. In the case of Kings of Leon, it was somewhere between Mechanical Bull, and Walls:
There is a Discover page that surfaces content I’ve already added to my Library that I may have forgotten about, and I go to the Tidal tab on Fridays when new music comes out to scroll through the new albums.
Discover could be better: I’d love to be notified when someone in my library has released new music, but beyond that I don’t have many complaints. I’m basically a Tidal via the Roon interface user, with access to all my old music from that previous HMV life.
I rely on the Multi Zone capabilities a lot too, with Airplay, Sonos, and RAAT zones scattered throughout the house. Being able to stream to existing hifi equipment, regardless of propriety protocol, is also hugely beneficial.
My advice is to give Roon a good workout during your 14 or 60 day trial, whatever it is. After that, if it’s not for you, delete it and use something else. What is good for some, is not good for all. For me, it’s negating the need to spend thousands of dollars on hardware. I also enjoy, more than I thought I would, reading about the albums and performers I’m listening to.
I’m throughly confused by this discussion, which was brought to my attention in the weekly Roon forum “summary email.” It seems to start with a post that now makes no sense, or at the very least has no context. I’m guessing that because the original poster notes that he has heavily edited his original post, nobody reading the thread after those edits will have a clue what the subsequent responses are referring to. I certainly don’t.
I actually hated Roon when I first tried it. Give it a chance as you become more familiar with it I am fair.ly sure you will learn to appreciate it as you discover how to use it. Not sure if it’s mentioned above but one thing it took me awhile to discover is the need to sign into Tidal within Roon.
