Roon….The Gordon Knot of concierge musical services?

My PC is just slightly under spec based on Roon published platform requirements. It runs fiine most of the time. But the cpu does get pegged from time to time so I am certain an upgrade on my pc running the core would make things run faster and more consistency. As it stands it’s fast and reliable enough. Sometimes access to qobuz lags a bit retrieving metadata but that’s not necessarily Roons fault.

Also there are always apps and services running on Windows that are not needed for Roon alone so shutting those down always helps if needed.

linux is surely a much lighter weight ps for running Roon efficiently but it’s nice that it core runs on windows or Apple ie the computers many people already have.

For the record, I think Roon is the bees knees and the $800 some lifetime cost is very reasonable for a component that does what it does. I went for it when my trial ended. It is music Nirvana for audio people. Especially classical music lovers. The user experience is wonderful. It’s a very well thought out service. Also the steaming engine built into it is very good and can deliver top notch sound with many many devices. Simply wonderful! Maybe a bit complicated but worth getting a handle on

Just run it on a suitable platform with a good network and internet connection and all should be good. Gotta do it right. There are many ways to do it wrong.

PM me if I might be able to help sort through it. 

Roon is pretty cpu and resource intensive in general. Check the documentation for recommended specs running on each platform including windows.

I have noted that Roon seemed most resource intensive when I first ran the core and it had to analyze my ~1tb music library initially. Things settled a bit after that which took a few days. There are parms in system menu that allow you to throttle the library analysis if needed.

Now it runs pretty well. It does get hung and require a restart on occasion.

Use the windows system monitor to monitor cpu usage in particular. Roon can really run that hard. If any of memory cpu disk or network monitors stay pegged at 100% for periods of time you probably need a beefier PC. I will probably need up my PC for Roon eventually but it runs pretty well for now.

Read the docs. Use of dsp is another feature that can be resource intensive.

Running on Roon certified hardware like their nucleus is probably a good bet but perhaps just not the most cost effective way to go.

I also run Plex alongside Roon. Plexamp is a decent alternative to Roon that costs less but you get what you pay for in regards to overall sound quality and user experience. Plex is a great option for headphone listening especially remotely but otherwise Roon is much better.  Plex works with your music library and Tidal only and only up to CD resolution.