Aurender is finally Roon Ready?!

That’s a cool album @tvad !

Thanks for sharing the settings! 

@tvad I streamed DSD and on the N200 display it showed as 32/352.8khz

I guess with the N200 implementation they limited streamed bitrate to above whereas on the N30S it’s a straight shot despite the settings that appear to limit it to DSD128. could just be a bug.
DSD isn’t even in a dropdown for the device settings in roon for N200.

One thing I can add is that I never listen to vanilla Roon. In every case, there are things that can be done with the DSP to make the sound better (to my ears) including application of convolution filters for specific headphone models, room correction, correction for listening position, and various parametic EQ tweaks to make things sound just right to me (and clearly different from default "flat" DSP) in each case. I use Roon in 6 rooms, on 3 systems, and with 4 different models of headphones. Each of these sound way different without Roon DSP. Now they all sound a lot more similar and "better" to my ears. I target a flat response initially then tweak to personal preference from there. In the case of my good sounding yet highly compromised (on the grand scale of things) desktop system I also invert phase.

I will include my roon device settings…

Fixed Volume, Volume Leveling Off, Clock Priority 1(Highest), MQA disabled. 
DSP disabled. 

@mapman When you use the Conductor app the data stream flows thru the Aurender proprietary processing of the data stream that includes a large SSD cache where the final music files are stored for playback (around 250gb).
This is similar to playing back physical media except it’s even better - there are no moving parts. End result is a digital signal that is as clean as possible that is sent to the external DAC.
Using Roon turns the Aurender into a Roon end point and bypasses all Aurender processing done by the OS. I have heard similar differences when I owned Auralic streamer. The Auralic LDS sounded better than Roon. Auralic also uses caching, just not to the same extent as Aurender.
The difference isn’t difficult to hear, as I mentioned.

Here’s another downside, not for me but will be for some…if you have DSD files in your Roon library, they will be downsampled for the Aurender. Not an issue for me since I mounted the library on SSD inside the N200. Just wanted to bring that up.

Once again though, this is an awesome addition despite the slight degradation in sound quality.

So what is it about the Aurender sound that is better? With digital, pretty much anything is possible. What’s the secret sauce? Is it a particular house sound? Is it better in every way? Any tradeoffs? Has anyone attempted to apply Roon DSP to see how things compare then? DSP is one of Roon’s standout features that gives one total control of how things sound. I currently have 15 different custom DSP presets I created in Roon that I use to tweak the sound for each room, listening position, headphone, etc. DSP aside, just having volume leveling on for example makes a big difference in the resulting sound. Many settings in Roon including DSP that can come into play with the sound. Obviously, both are now running on the same hardware so that is the same in both cases.

Playing devil’s advocate, I tend to think any maker of a distinguished high end proprietary system would hesitate to provide an open alternative on their platform that sounds as good or better. Lots of ways to handle that in the software. Just saying. Roon on Aurender is an interesting development for sure. Definitely provides a path to Aurender for existing Roon customers so smart move there.

It’s exactly what I thought it would be. I was hoping to be pleasantly surprised.
It isn’t difficult to hear at all that the Room is inferior to Aurender processing. It took me all of 10 seconds of a well known track to know. Roon is a nice to have here and will be relegated to casual listening and new music exploration duties to avoid unnecessarily cluttering the queue. It’s definitely a very welcome addition!

Doing it now as I type!  System update in progress. 

I just updated my N200 and it is Roon ready!

I know there must be more members trying Roon with their N30SA or N20.  Hoping to hear more comments comparing sound with Roon to Conductor.

Agree, Doshi electronics with Joseph speakers seems like a recipe that would be flattering to almost any streaming device. 

My personal experience is that it varies whether Roon is the best option or whether some other choice is best. Some devices have multiple to choose from and it's probably best you try them all in your system to see what happens.

I love Roon and will tend to use it most times unless there is another mode which sounds clearly superior. Curious to know how it plays out with Aurender. Also curious about whether this will impact their other models, of which there are quite a few by now.

Is there a streamer that doesn’t sound fantastic with Joseph Audio?  

Heard the N30 SA at Axpona w/ Doshi electronics and Joseph Audio new Flagship speakers. Sounded fantastic. 

Thanks for the timely info guys.  I was waiting for this.

@audphile1 Indeed, I am using MConnect now, sounds good but is quite limited. Besides, regularly it stops in the middle of a track and jumps to the next one. Very annoying. So that is another reason to try Audirvana at some point.

@lalitk yes I’m super excited about it. Hopefully it’s a matter of days now before it rolls out to N200. Need to try and set up roon to read the SSD mounted inside my N200 when Roon rolls out. I was able to do this with the Auralic I had before. Should be awesome. 

@stievus does Metronome come with an app? If not, then you’re limited to Audirvana, Roon and may be Mconnect. Out of the 3, only the Mconnect doesn’t require a computer to run on…it’s UPnP and is just a control app. Unfortunately it never sounded very good to me in my system and I preferred Roon over it. Besides, the Mconnect is just a super basic UI. Not even close to Roon. 
As to Audirvana, I tried and didn’t like it but that was long ago. 

@audphile1

I got the notification too and had extended talk with Aurender head guy at AXPONA. They don’t see Roon as a competition and quite excited to roll out Roon. What I am hoping for Conductor to be the final arbiter with Roon UI..kinda like HQPlayer integration with Roon. And that’s what appears to be the case in Step 3 of the Roon Integration, best of both worlds, isn’t it :-)

And BTW, I was also using Roon for casual listening and Conductor for serious listening 😊

@audphile1 My new Métronome DSS is Roon ready, though the designer in France recommend to try Audirvana instead because of, according to him, better sound quality. So I will try that first, I think. What I like less about Audirvana and Roon, is that the software should be installed on a computer that needs be running while playing music, and not directly on an Android device which is aso used as the remote control.

Use Roon for non-critical listening, using its world leading music discovery algorithm, then once a song requires that last (you pick the percentage increase in sq) flip over to a different app, in my case squeeze, to hear it in all its glory.

HuZactly!  Roon most of the time, find a tune you really want max out on then swap over to, MPD on a Bryston for me, to get that last little bit.  

Its like having a N2O tank on a Hot Rod car. 

@carlsbad2 the discussion we’re having here is specific to Aurender Roon integration. You must have missed this. 
I’ve used Roon for years with great results with several streamers and with others I found the native processing to sound better. So the Roon sound quality can and does vary depending on Roon integration implementation in certain streamers.

Don’t put words in my mouth. 

"For casual listening Roon should be awesome." LOL.

Not lol. I’ll second that. This is exactly what I have been doing with my streamer.

Use Roon for non-critical listening, using its world leading music discovery algorithm, then once a song requires that last (you pick the percentage increase in sq) flip over to a different app, in my case squeeze, to hear it in all its glory.

But importantly I think it is a given by now that Roon is not the same listening experience in all streamers. Saying Roon is the same Grimm or Taiko as it is on Aurender or Antipodes is apples to oranges (from what I have read).

@audphile1 I don't think the words around your statement change anything.  I interpret this as your opinion is that Roon is inferior wrt sound quality.  Is that correct?

@tvad 

I have owned or extensively auditioned Innuos Pulse, Antipodes K50, Rockna WaveDreamNET, Auralic G2.1, and a few other Roon streamers

Some of those were Roon Core devices (Antipodes and Rockna…I can’t recall if the Pulse is a Roon Core), and highly regarded.

None come close in sound to an Aurender N30SA. Furthermore, the Aurender N30SA controlled by Aurender’s OEM Conductor 4 app sounds superior to the N30SA controlled by Roon. It’s not hard to discern the difference.

If you are calling Antipodes a "roon" streamer I take it you did not try Squeeze with it? 

@carlsbad2 don’t take what I said out of context. 

"For casual listening Roon should be awesome."  LOL.  

I am excited for Aurender and Roon.  I have been contemplating an N30 but want the Roon option.  I love Roon, but if Conductor sounds better I can use either.  I also hope this partnership with Aurender pushes the sound quality of Roon higher.

@stievus first of all it doesn’t work with Aurender and second you don’t need it there. The Conductor app is really good. Roon ready capability is a good feature set expansion. If you bypass the aurender queue processing there’s most likely a compromise in sound quality but it rids you of having to manage the queue. So for more casual listening Roon should be awesome.

Has anyone considered Audirvana instead of Roon?

Having the ROON CORE separate is a feature and not a bug for me. ROON READY support on the Aurrender makes it a contender for me. If they could put a Fibre Optic input on the Aurrender then that would really elevate the Aurrender.

I meant the internal processing. Sorry for the confusion. 

@tvad I assumed that the conductor processing will most likely be superior to Roon but was hoping to be wrong. 

Interesting.  My understanding is that Aurender saw Roon as a competitor to their Conductor ap.  I guess they realized they were losing business from guys like me.  I never even considered Aurender.  I have an Innuos and a Grimm.  When I started shopping for a streamer aurender was the first one I googled and dismissed promptly.

Jerry

I have a roon core. I do realize the Aurender is only an end point. 

Yes but its an endpoint only not a core, so you still need a core as well

Factor In The cost and a 432evo or Innous is still a far beter deal one device core and endpoint in one.

Dave and Troy

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