Can you address how you will handle importing from Meridian Store/Core? I’m particularly concerned about my carefully groomed metadata.
Do you have plans for dealing with MS200 firmware updates?
Will you support multiple zones from a single computer? (i.e. Source:Five equivalent either from a single multi-output Audio card (like a Delta 1010lt) or multiple USB DAC’s)
Will you be releasing bare endpoint software so that we can implement our own Audio only endpoints?
Will the software run completely standalone without Internet connection other than maybe initial setup / import?
We can’t deliver Meridian firmware updates, as we don’t control those products. They will need to be installed out-of-band using Meridian’s tools.
Absolutely.
We have this currently and it is our plan to release this as an OSX and Windows package. We won’t be doing this at initial launch (too many things on our plate right now), but it’ll come shortly after. We actually use an early version of this in-home for testing right now, and its pretty awesome, especially combined with your previous question of multiple USB DACs!
It can, but you won’t get metadata updates, software updates, or streaming services. Eventually it may have to ping home to confirm that your license is good as well. But for the most part, it will run fine for a long time without internet as long as you have it in the initial setup.
Thanks for the quick and detailed responses.
Will the permanent license option still need to phone home? I was thinking about setting up an(other) independant / non-internet connected network, and populate the system from backups from the internet connected instance (not too worried about streaming on my primary zone)
Not too sure how MS200 / 600 firmware updates will be managed, since these aren’t available or appear to have an installation method outside of the Sooloos infrastructure - presumably non Sooloos owners would need to return endpoints back to a dealer (or a nearby Sooloos core owner) for an update.
I take it Roon will not coexist with a Sooloos system (core) on the same network without disabling Meridian audio endpoint support (at least from previous experience at having to power down / up MS200’s after accidently having more than one core trying to own the endpoint).
The endpoints were designed to support automatic updates in the field over the network. It’s probably just a matter of Meridian releasing an standalone update utility, like they do for some of their USB products, but this is just speculation on my part.
We’ve engineered a scheme that allows for different systems (including Roon and Meridian “cores”) to take or release ownership of individual streaming endpoints cleanly without “fighting” over them. Roon supports this scheme now, and Meridian engineering has everything they need to implement it in their core firmware. We don’t know their status or how this fits into their plans, but we are encouraging them to get this done as soon as possible.
The other (more expensive) option is to keep a Core product tucked away to manage updates, though this will mean waiting for M to push the firmware to it and then letting the Core update the end points before reverting back to Roon.
I own a lot of legacy Sooloos kit including Control:One, Source:Five, Control:10 and Twinstore which I keep in a second remote system.
My current understanding of the Roon system is that the Control:One will have zero functionality under Roon but will continue to act as a Control for Sooloos until such time as M decide to no longer support these units. Given they are still selling the Control:15 this may still be a while. The Source:Five will continue to work as an endpoint. Can I presume that this will be for all five zones in the unit under Roon? I presume my Control:10 will act as a zone, but with zero Control functions available (ie blank screen).
My Twinstore will be able to act as a NAS with the Roon (similarly an MD600 would act as a NAS). If I did use the Twinstore as a NAS, does the Roon system make any changes to the files on the Twinstore that would prevent me reverting it back to a Sooloos system without the need to reimport all my music, or are the Roon metadata held in a database on the NUC without touching the Sooloos metadata files.
If I were to choose to run two Roon systems would I need to manage and groom two separate databases or can I easily allow changes in one be reflected automatically in the other? At present it is relatively trivial to transport a backup between my two Sooloos systems to keep them both identical.
How simple is it for me to transport the NUC running Roon between my two systems, each with their own NAS without creating significant database issues?
My current understanding of the Roon system is that the Control:One will have zero functionality under Roon…The Source:Five will continue to work as an endpoint. Can I presume that this will be for all five zones in the unit under Roon? I presume my Control:10 will act as a zone, but with zero Control functions available
Yes to all. There is nothing stopping Meridian from supporting Roon as an upgrade path to their hardware, but that’s a decision they have to make.
My Twinstore will be able to act as a NAS with the Roon (similarly an MD600 would act as a NAS). If I did use the Twinstore as a NAS, does the Roon system make any changes to the files on the Twinstore that would prevent me reverting it back to a Sooloos system without the need to reimport all my music, or are the Roon metadata held in a database on the NUC without touching the Sooloos metadata files.
Yes, the Twinstore exposes a network share and Roon can watch network shares in a “no touch” mode. Roon manages all metadata in databases tied to the app install, not alongside the media files like in Sooloos.
If I were to choose to run two Roon systems would I need to manage and groom two separate databases or can I easily allow changes in one be reflected automatically in the other?
User data (metadata edits, play history, favorites, and so on) are synced through our servers. Music files are identified via a file signature, so if you import identical files on two installs tied to the same account, edits and user data attached to that content will stay in sync across your installs. This sync feature will not be available at launch, but it will come in a subsequent software update.
All seems very exciting. Especially the relation oriented structure of the metadata. In the past we have build such systems for representing and browsing medical knowledge.
I can’t imagine that Meridian will not have Roon in their Sooloos upgrade path. We have to see how the release of Roon and the release of Sooloos v3 upgrade are synchronised.
So far I am very happy with the clear statements of the Roon people.
Pieter
I’m still a bit confused here. I have a MD600 and multiple MS200s. I also have a MacMini that I could use as a server. Can I use my MD600 as storage in a Roon System? Can my MS200s play back from Roon? I also have numerous Squeezebox Touch and Sonos units. Can these also work with Roon?
Can I use my MD600 as storage in a Roon System?
Yes.
Can my MS200s play back from Roon?
Yes.
I also have numerous Squeezebox Touch and Sonos units. Can these also work with Roon?
Roon will not support these devices at launch, but it’s something we plan to work on soon after.
Surely Brian, it would be wise to add a few provisos here to using Sooloos Stores in a Roon environment??
e.g. Yes, an MD600 can be used for Storage in a Roon system, as long as
a) the Sooloos store was populated with CD’s ripped OUTSIDE of Sooloos, using dbPA or similar [to ensure that the Track ID3 Tags were populated]
b) relying on the SQL data storage methods employed in Sooloos MAY lead to more errors in Album Identification than if a more typical Artist / Album / Track structure is used
I realize that these issues are touched on elsewhere here, but it may be worthwhile mentioning them here again…so that people can make appropriate decisions about what Hardware they may use with their Roon systems in the future
@ronnie_hurley1, you are correct, from Roon’s perspective the MD600 behaves just like any other NAS. There is no special support for reading Meridian databases or interacting with the System Core software that comes with the box.
It’s possible to watch the Sooloos databases in a “no touch” mode, simply because the databases already name the files track01, … and group them into directories reasonably. Some disc sets will fail to clump properly into albums, and some albums will require manual assistance to identify, but it is a reasonable low-effort/low-risk way to try out the software. You’d be surprised how many albums Roon can correctly identify even without tags.
For the best experience, you’ll want to export the content from a Meridian system using the lossless export feature, which produces nicely tagged files in a human readable directory structure. Then import that into Roon.
Also, there’s no SQL in Sooloos. No idea where that came from 
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@briand and @ronnie_hurley1 have answered this already, but I want to make sure you got this right.
- The MD600 and all the other Sooloos storage devices export a SMB share, which can be accessed for read or write, by any program.
- Roon can read or write to the MD600’s shared storage.
- Roon will look at the audio files on that shared storage, as if it was any other NAS, or even a USB harddrive connected locally. It does not treat it in any “special” way.
- After ripping from CD, Sooloos doesn’t seem to touch the files, so all the tag editing or identifications that may have occurred is not written to the music files, but instead held in proprietary files. Roon does not look at these Meridian/Sooloos proprietary files.
- Any music you have on that MD600 will go through a re-identification process, just like any new music you introduce to Roon. In this case, Roon is able to get a very high hit rate on the content here, because of the album based organization of the files.
- Unfortunately, your manually groomed metadata in Sooloos is held in Meridian proprietary files, which Roon does not look at. However, @brian posted a great topic here on why this is much less important than you might be inclined to believe.
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Thanks for your support with the very informative answers.
I am coming from the Meridian word as well.
A few dilettantish questions for you please.
Just wanted to confirm if a high spec mac and a MS200 going straight into DSP Speakers will be enough to run the Roon-based system (no Meridian-produced core).
And in theory this MAC does not have to be plugged into Ethernet but a decent 5GHz WiFi connection would be sufficient? I guess it should given it is higher than the broadband speed anyway? As I am thinking of using my very top spec MacBookPro both as a server (has got 1TB SSD, but planning to mostly stream from Tidal anyway) and a controller with a MS200 as an endpoint.
[quote=“Dmitry, post:34, topic:93”]
Just wanted to confirm if a high spec mac and a MS200 going straight into DSP Speakers will be enough to run the Roon-based system (no Meridian-produced core).
[/quote] You’ll need somewhere to store your music (on that Mac?), but otherwise, yes!
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thanks! I am really thrilled by what the Roon team is about to offer.
A great job being at the front of the newest trends in how people listen to music since 2007 until nowadays and worth a lot of respect.
Sorry if this has been covered, but would the Roon software allow me to stream from a Windows-based NAS to an 861\ID41 with control from an Android\iPad device?
Yes. iPad release will not be in May, but I believe everything else you just asked for will.
Thanks. What about Meridian processor etc volume control from Android\iPad apps? Is that an option?
Meridian volume and zone switch off is supported in all versions.
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