Current quality of Rune

“Is it reliable? Good sound quality?

@sls883

The answer to your query, YES! Roon got the best UI (user interface) and streaming SQ greatly varies on the choice of hardware used as an endpoint (render) and server.

The preference between Audirvana vs Roon is clearly dominated by end user experience. You will find people in both camps swearing by its superiority, based on their experience. In both instances, the bottom line is implementation and choice of hardware. Both software are capable of good sound quality. I would suggest that you focus on your choice of hardware and allow yourself to get fully acclimated to Roon. There is a bit of learning curve with Roon, once you do familiarize yourself with Roon, you won’t be disappointed.

IME, Roon offers the best streaming experience! 

@sls883 

Innuos + Sense App provides a very good streaming experience. Sense app is well laid out but lacks the bells and whistles of Roon. I don’t think you loose much of sound quality streaming through Sense + Innuos but once you implement Roon properly you will not like anything else. So take your time exploring options with Roon hardware.

Good luck and enjoy your journey! 

@sls883 

Running Roon on a laptop is what I consider a basic set up. A good way to determine if you can get used Roon app interface and its features. If you like the Roon user interface (UI) then you can look into commercially successful hardware to take full advantage of its potential. I would read up on @sns posts. He has pretty much laid out the road map for anyone who wants to learn, build a SOTA streaming experience using Roon. 

Some folks will make their case that running Roon render and server separately will yield the best SQ. That’s not my experIence. To my earlier comment, the devil is in the details. If you pick a component that has managed to carefully execute both functionalities (end point + server) in one box then running a Roon server remotely is not necessary and would also keep things simple. 

I am using a one box purpose Roon render/server + DAC that allows me to take full advantage of Roon features and renders amazing sound quality. 

“I could swear it's a little softer sounding than my Innuos streamer.”
@sls883 

Rightfully so…your Innuos is a purpose built streamer designed to sound best with its proprietary Sense app. Just like Aurender is designed to sound best with its proprietary Conductor app. Roon functionality with Innuos, Aurender and Lumin is an added convenience. In contrast, if you listen to Grimm, Merging, Pink Faun, Taiko which are optimized for Roon experience, you will find Roon is anything but soft or recessed. My Merging Roon player competes favorably with any $50K Vinyl front end.