Trying to justify spending $1,500 on a nucleus over a less expensive desktop computer?
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I’m trying out Roon on my apple mini Mac, working well.
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That’s all you need then.
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I could justify spending your money all day long. What I can’t justify is spending my own money on something that won’t improve sq over my Mac mini.
Do a search there are loads of threads.
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I was hoping someone could give a good reason to spend the extra money
Having too much money would be one.
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Looks cool?
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Ok as I have a few minutes.
It’s purely designed for ROON and once you have it you will convince yourself that you need to play your music all over again as you keep hearing little things you never heard before.
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Well, the best answer I’ve heard so far is it looks cool
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If the MacMini works, there is no reason to buy a Nucleus. It will not make a difference in SQ. It’s a computer.
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You could also put your Mac mini inside McIntosh’s empty box.
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Nice link!
I appreciate every bodies input. I really wanted to have one. But had that feeling it was not really necessary. I’m not wealthy but love music and Roon is awesome. Apple Mini Mac is here to stay. Bummer…
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Buy that on the money you saved.
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One of its markets is for those who can only cope with an on/off button.
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Genuinely curious: how many buttons are on the Mac mini?
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So, you really do want the Nucleus? 
It is silent, so can take centre place in your setup.
Or have the next best thing: ROCK running on a Nuc.
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None, I set it up to keep network live during sleep mode and screen saver, tell drive to not go to sleep and I haven’t touched it in days. I can access Roon 24 hours a day . Quick response, no delays.
Cost 699.00
Main reasons I see for Nucleus: 1) It’s fanless, so you can have it in your listening area without risk of fan noise. Fanless computers powerful enough to run Roon without thermal throttling are not cheap, which in part explains the Nucleus price. 2) It does just one thing, Roon, simplifying upkeep compared with a general-purpose box.
If you are comfortable with managing your own general server, and you are OK with occasional fan noise, the Mac Mini seems a great choice. I use a Mini M1 as one of my HQPplayer servers and it doesn’t seem to need the fan much even though it’s sometimes running at 70% flat out for hours. I also use fanless Zotac Intel servers for my Roon servers, running Ubuntu Server, they do the job well but they need some regular software updates. But if I was not as comfortable with maintaining systems as I am from working with macOS and Linux professionally for decades, a Nucleus would be a very good alternative.
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