I use Roon Nucleus and just updated to Build 923. Since your Build 913 followed by Build 918, you managed to hit such a sweet-spot that the sonics were very-very natural and helluva like analog. But once again, it changed in your Build 923. Maybe, 923 uses more resource as compared to 913 or 918 and hence could be the reason.
Is there anyway I can revert to Build 918 from now 923 ? Will greatly appreciate it.
Thank you!
Haha! I know what you Roon guys will say ⌠you canât. Lemme see if I have a backup that Iâll use to get back to 918.
Updating to New roll ups can be suicidal
Nope, nothing there could account for it. Is it possible youâre imagining the difference? The reason I ask is that Roon is, and always has been, a mechanism to deliver bit perfect data from one place to another. Not bit-perfecter, or bit-not-quite-so-perfect, just bit-perfect, i.e. an exact copy. Itâs hard to imagine that the minimal changes between recent builds could have any significant impact, but not so hard to imagine that somebody else could imagine they could.
It doesnât take long for a listener (whoâs also a musician) and a highend audiophile for over 35 years to figure out sonic differences between builds. When Build 913 rolled out, I had the same question as to what has Roon done to make it sound so good and once again, same answer ⌠we donât know bâcoz we havenât done a thing that could influence sonic quality. But it did ⌠not only I heard it but I have a handful of other audiophiles who too immediately felt it. Many went on to say it may be using much less resources hence sound better. But who knows.
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Your post is interesting because what you write is both true but also not so true.
It could be true if your Core is âcloseâ to the analog side of your playback system. USB directly connected from Core to DAC being the most susceptible to SQ by software changes.
Itâs not true if your Core is isolated from your playback system (streamer, DAC, etc).
These two things are a choice and what I often donât see posted, when someone says âthe sound changedâ, is a description of what camp, isolated or not, their setup is in. If someone believes that how busy their Core is impacts sound quality then they would be well deserved to isolate that as a variable.
Personally, I donât hear a difference between Roon upgrades any more often than I hear difference when I reboot my Core, streamer, switch or some other bit of gear in the chain. Sometimes I think I hear a difference but mostly not and it goes away after a listening session or two. Iâm not even all that well âisolatedâ either but Iâve tried to keep things separated as possible.
Roon Labs have been doing this a long time. I do believe they take an interest in sound quality of Roon. But, they also have a good understanding of why Core is not influencing sound quality.
I really canât let you get away with insulting Audiophiles & professionals in the community because they donât share your views. Many have audio/HiFi industry experience that extends far beyond your â20 years of foolingâŚâ
If contributors canât present a rational debate & accept that others have different opinions thereâs no point, or benefit, in commenting. Treat others with the same respect you seem to demand then you wonât find the alternative views so offensive.
The help offered by Roon professionals & community members is very supportive & unique, in my 50+ years of experience, hopefully youâll learn to treat them with the respect they deserve even when you disagree with them.
Before doing any downgrading, clear the cache, reinstall the latest version, then clear the cache again.
I find sometimes the install can be a bit buggy.
Well, thatâs the thing, Roon doesnât sound like anything. There are plenty of components in a hifi chain that can change the sound, but Roon isnât one of them, unless, as @ipeverywhere mentioned, a) your core is hooked up directly to your DAC, and b) your DAC is poorly constructed.
I have no experience with differences in sound quality between different versions of Roon but just saying bit perfect is bit perfect is wrong (at least to me). It took me two years of trials and testing before I eventually bought a lifetime license of Roon around 4-5 years ago. I used JRiver before and the biggest reason it took me so long to decide was that JRiver sounded better/different than Roon. I compared them on many occasions during that time. Both output bit perfect digital signal to my Mutec MC-3+ USB bridge but still, there was clear difference in sound quality. JRiver sounded smoother with little bit punchier and fuller sound when Roon had little bit brighter and clearer sound. My setup then matched better with the former. I canât explain what caused this but the difference was constant every time I compared them during that time period. Eventually I couldnât live without the superior UI of Roon so I switched to it and decided to forget the difference.
These posts make my head hurtâŚ
Hey @ARUP_GOSWAMI1,
Thank you for getting in touch to share your feedback about Build 923. As others have mentioned, there werenât any changes in this update that would impact what youâre hearing sonically. If there had been we would detail those in the release notes and provide information on what was changed, and why.
I donât want to speculate on your observations but I think oftentimes our expectations and interpretations can be influenced by our awareness that a change has taken place. That awareness triggers a different type of critical listening. We search for differences, and because of that, we often find them. Audiophiles are more prone to search for those differences, itâs just how we are! 
While not wanting to appear unsympathetic to your request, as a general rule, we donât provide a means for rolling back to previous builds. Weâve had quite a bit of experience with customers who forget to upgrade or avoid upgrading, and they always run into problems sooner than those who roll with the changes. We encourage you to spend some time with 923, the audio differences you hear now will likely diminish and new builds are being released on a 2-3 week cycle.
Hey @Sgr,
While we welcome and encourage you to share your thoughts about the new build, we ask that you not make blanket assumptions about Roonâs motivations or attitudes. The same goes when speaking about other customers.
Presuming to know the intent of others is risky; generally, assumptions say much more about the person speaking than those who are spoken about. Nobody has attacked @ARUP_GOSWAMI1 for sharing his opinion, in turn please donât bemoan our Community for fostering behavior that hasnât manifested. We appreciate your cooperation. Thanks.
What cache do you mean? Image cache in settings?
Hi @jamie ,
Thank you for writing to me. Indeed - upgrading is something I would always seek to do, this time unfortunately it didnât work in my favor. We âlong-term audiophiles with reference systemsâ can hear minute and subtle changes thru our systems and the undesired change occurred immediately upon moving from Build 918 to 923 hence one can only deduce its got to do something with the software and nothing else. And âbits being bitsâ is also true, the undue additional loading of resources to the hardware seems to affect sonics that we hear.
Iâm hoping and awaiting for another build to break thro and hopefully restore the sound I was seeking.
Thank you!
Bit of a blanket statement that assumes a lotâŚ.
These guys must have a secret handshake and sacrifice their first-bornâŚ
This sounds contradictory to me, since the hardware resource Roon uses are all in the digital domain. Regardless, if Roonâs use of resources affected SQ, then every change Roon makes that is completely unrelated to the transport (e.g. in UI, search etc.) could affect SQ, any OS update could do the same, and the whole streaming experience would just be a big gamble. I donât think any software player development would be sustainable under these assumptions.