Sound quality of Roon

@troidelover1499 To add to my post above, I guess I should ask - is there a particular unit you are looking to use that would act as a Roon core? I would suggest refraining from using an existing laptop or computer as they typically introduce noise into the equation. And you should not need to invest in a tablet if you have a capable smartphone that the Roon app can run on. 

I am sad I am this late to the game on this thread. It’s been a busy week for me. I agree with many individual points I read through this thread, but I thought it might be helpful to summarize it all into a single stream of thoughts.

I whole-heartedly agree that Roon as a software platform is not “supposed” to have a sound. But everything does. That said, it’s sound is indescribable because as others say it is coupled with the hardware and software architectures that are used to run it.

Just as any other interface, Roon has its own memory requirements. Unlike other installable platforms, it requires some more modern capabilities like graphics with OpenGL, and if you plan to use HQPlayer in partnership to upsample your files through Roon (a fairly popular direction for many), then the hardware requirements become even more intensive. When processing increases, it will “generally” introduce more noise into the system. But not in all cases. This will be a major argument for people who opt against Roon - that it is process-hungry, and that it is easier to reach an outcome with Roon that is noisier than other platforms. I often find myself in this boat, but there are some very good solutions that implement Roon properly, including servers like the Grimm MU1 and the Pink Faun 2.16 Ultra, both of which reside north of $10K. But what does that say? Nothing more than the total outcome with Roon depends on the surrounding hardware and software architectures as mentioned above.

The question could then become “How does Roon sound at certain price points”? This allows us to look past just Roon and into the remainder of the streamer/server solution. Too many times Roon is paired with less than optimal hardware which then results in a weaker performance overall. Roon’s own servers, ROCKs and NUCs do not provide the same level of performance as the units mentioned higher above. But do they sound bad? It’s all relative. They will still sound CONSIDERABLY better than the streamer / server inside the Bluesound Node N130 or Bluesound Vault, but they will likely not replace a mid-high-end vinyl rig for many (though it might if convenience is more important than sound quality). But with some units, Roon is good enough to be the primary vehicle for delivering a source.

Yes, Roon’s user interface and smooth experience are a big benefit to it as no other proprietary softwares are as easy to use or sexy to look at. But I do believe there are many excellent options offered where a manufacturer’s software platform is tightly coupled with the hardware that it is designed to run on, while also requiring less processing power overall to run. I also don’t think a subscription should be necessary to pay for the experience. This is why I’ve chosen the Aurender N30SA as my personal reference, and why when I started a high end audio business in April I became an authorized dealer for them.

There is not one “best” solution on the streaming/serving market, and luckily there are many good to great ones!

Roon works great for me. Using with Qobuz through my Moon 680D with Mind2. Perfect.

Roon's database is quite a problem due to its size. For my library of 8TB files, Roon database was 50-60 GB. Jriver is a fraction of that, as well as Minimserver. With a Lumïn U1, the best results were with the native app and Minimserver as the front end, I'm putting down to less processing by the Win10 LTSC  file server.

Roon has artwork embedded in the database as well as metadata for music which it thought better than what you entered and some work, usually to correct this behaviour was tedious and annoying.  Box sets are a drama with Roon, do collectively,  with other annoyances,  in particular the attitude of management at Roon, was the nail in the coffin, Roon and I divorced.

Not long after , Roon encouraged members to submit artwork to consolidate Roon's metadata,  which in some respects short circuited work that Roon was supposed to do in the first place.

I've been Roonless for close to three years, don't miss it at all. 

My belief is that people subliminally convince themselves that the money they spent was worth it.

@tony1954

You’re right that often some of us swoon over our latest purchase or improvement because of our internal biases (untill we don’t).

On this roon SQ discussion I have a different take away.

@jjss49 is spot on saying

it seems that the emerging answer is no, not if implemented correctly and with all the needed ancillaries required... the ’trade’ is more relating to the fairly substantial monetary cost and time to learn and optimize its use, quite above and well beyond what one sees as the initial cost of implementing (or trying) roon on an extra computer laying around

I too had to dive in and up my game resulting in SQ on par with CD and shy of a vinyl system costing deep into five digits (not including the rest of a system).

Also my mate could care less and she thinks the sound excellent. Nothing subliminal about it from her  

Many roon users prefer a core not on a laptop or computer outputing via USB. I used an old lap top at first and quit roon for two years. Then I happened to hear Roon on a sytem with a nucleus and you can guess the rest.

@tony1954 Do you use roon and if so what’s your set up? The blue prints are to be found here on many levels of setup.

to me the streaming front end, streaming services, roon and competitors (embedded in hardware or software only) is an area that should see continuing change and advancement for the next several years as pertaining to high end audio

streaming has come a long long way, and will continue to evolve, many good comments about roon here

i think the spirit of the op’s query is that many if not most folks can appreciate what conveniences and features roon brings to a user... especially one with both local and streamed media sources... in how it organizes and accesses it all seamlessly, provides useful meta data, reviews, photos, and recommendations...but in light of this, he is wonderful if one necessarily faces some sacrifices in sonic quality as part of the trade to get those conveniences

it seems that the emerging answer is no, not if implemented correctly and with all the needed ancillaries required... the ’trade’ is more relating to the fairly substantial monetary cost and time to learn and optimize its use, quite above and well beyond what one sees as the initial cost of implementing (or trying) roon on an extra computer laying around...

I have a fairly simple setup.  Microsoft surface as a core and a sonore roon player feeding an audio gd dac with usb.  The speakers, amplifier, and speaker cable are the same I auditioned with using a lumin streamer and Aqua audio dac.  Plan was to purchase the dac and streamer when funds replenished.  In my system, the sq is just as good, if not better at present.  What surprised me was Amazon hd music with an android tablet and a chromecast audio streamer via a budget toslink cable. Perhaps a little less detail than room, but excellent sound.  My thought is how the dac isolates, caches, and converts the data is primary

@grannyring yep I disable Roon when I flip over to Sense.  I was going to aske if you were running Squeezebox experimental mode!  Because without it I would say Sense sounds better than Roon.  But things get more dimensional for me running Roon in Squeezebox mode, vs Sense.  I do get the sense that mids and vocals move back in the mix.  Or rather, everything else expands closer and further around vocals and acoustic guitars, creating a more 3D sound, if that makes sense.  
 

Again, thank know I’m the odd one out with my experience!  Not sure why though…

In my system I just use Roon’s software via a Roon Nucleus music server to pick music from either Tidal or Qobuz without the DSP or any other EQ features available being engaged. I do this because I wanted to keep the signal path in my setup as simple as possible as it goes thru my Roon endpoint, an Audiowise SRC.DX, on its way to a Chord M Scaler, Chord TT2 DAC, a Woo WA22 hp amplifier, and a pair of Focal Utopia headphones. 

I have used Roon/Tidal for 5 years. Problem with discussing "Roon sound quality" is that Roon is not a box you can take home and assess over a few hours. You should run it (preferably ROCK variant) on a custom server such as Nucleus. You should follow Roon's advice to use good LAN endpoints to drive your DACs or buy a Roon ready LAN DAC. You should have a dedicated audio LAN and decent power supplies to power everything. You should go through every setting (including DSP) to find what works best for your system and taste (DACs sound different at different sampling rates). The cost is quite high and it takes months of your time but the reward is sublime sound in the main system, music all around the house and easy browsing and discovery of new music.

After a decade or so of budget experimenting with computer audio and using low end devices (Olive, NativVita and laptops) along with a couple of DAC’s that still see use, I purchased a Nucleus (which comes with a year of Roon- which delays the inevitable). Considered the Innous, but was put off by their no-return policy; in contrast to the Nucleus 30 day trial period. The Nucleus/Roon sounded a little more detailed going through the USB Burson DAC. My digital audio epiphany came when I bought a Bricasti M1 MDX with a network card last month. Roon manages output to my main system with the Bricasti as a Roon end connected by ethernet- I’m listening more to that than to my turntable. The Nucleus then went upstairs to serve as core and with output via USB to my Burson DAC as a Roon end. That combo is a bit too "sharp/digital" to my liking but it’s a secondary system in a difficult room. There was a learning curve with Roon as software. It seems to like Windows more than Mac for CD file transfers after ripping to a hard drive. Attaching a hard drive to the Nucleus for CD ripping is slow and glitchy. Qobuz is glitchy also. But with the right DAC, Roon can sound REALLY good. And for synching rooms to the same music output, accross different sound systems, it’s impressive software.

For most of this millennium I played with different music management software. I had been in IT for over 30 years. Overall, I didn’t find much different in the way they sounded… mostly dependent on the DAC and equipment used. I have had my CDs ripped for more than a dozen years.

I finally bought a dedicated high end streamer, Aurlic Aries G2 and happily removed the computer from my audio system. The Aurlic software was easy to use and left the feeling of having a computer in the loop gone. I was ecstatic. It found my files, and consolidated everything. I went on to find Aurender, a superior sounding streamer… I now own two.

I am really happy to leave my computers in my office and have my audio components perform like self contained audio components. Also, while I recognize this might be a strange criticism given one of my streamers cost $22K (a good deal for the sound quality in my opinion)… $24.99 / month for Ron? It only cost $14.99 for a Qobuz subscription for access to millions of albums. Then there is the fact that you can be sure that in ten years the landscape will be completely changed and Roon is either going to be replaced or embedded in devices.

Anyway, for me. I am really happy to have nothing to do with any software… other than the user interface presented by Aurender. But that is me. I get it if folks like using stuff like roon, I once did.

Do you disable Roon before going back into Sense? I did the A/B again and Roon just sounds more rough around the edges and not as refined and pure. Interesting.

Ha! Do you use your Innuos as both core and end point? I also use Roon Squeezelite experimental mode for best sound out of Roon. 

@grannyring , I know I am the outlier with my experience but the way you describe Sense over Roon is precisely the inverse of what I hear on my system.  Roon is far more nuanced and detailed and Sense sounds flat by comparison.  I have the Zenith 3, Innuos PhoenixUSB reclocker (feeding my Diablo 300 GRYPHON DAC module), and also a PhoenixNET isolation switch.  If there is a way to make Sense sound better than Roon, I’d love to figure that out!

We agree. I purchased Innuos as a one box solution. It rips, stores, streams and is both the Roon core and endpoint. When used as intended, Sense simply sounds better in my system. That is all I am sharing. This is intended to help those who own Innuos or are thinking of buying Innuos. I found no sonic gains with my Innuos by housing Roon core on another computer. However, I don’t use DSP and have an NOS dac. I am not taxing the Innuos with my use of Roon and that may be why housing Roon elsewhere on my network had no sonic benefit.

I understand we each have unique digital front ends, systems, ears and preferences. No broad brush realities for all is possible in this passion/hobby. I simply share my findings and hope it can help others with “similar” set ups experiment for themselves.

One hears the sound of Roon when using Innuos gear vs the Innuos Sense software. Roon sounds different vs Sense on Innuos gear. Obvious and easily heard with a resolving system.

My digital front end consists of: Innuos Zenith 3... - Tron Atlantic Signature dac. 

But that is not a fair test.  The Innuous software is developed to run and feed right to the DAC; it's far more lightweight than Roon.  Roon drives your gear like a stock car driver and is very resource-heavy.  Their solution is to isolate that by feeding the pure PCM stream over the network to a different endpoint that is doing nothing but streaming the data. 

I understand you can A/B Roon on these single server/streamer combo units.  What I'm saying is that since it's not the way Roon recommends using their software, if you want a fair scientific comparison, you gotta stream to a separate, very quiet endpoint. 

It might still sound worse.  But that's the fair test.

OP--There are many confusing statements in the comments to your post--and many off topic responses such as which DAC/streamer to buy or why vinyl is better or worse.  Bottom line:  Roon was not originally intended to add or subtract from SQ--it was purely software that organized your music library and the libraries of whichever streaming service (Tidal & later Quobuz) that you were using.  Roon later added SQ features such as DSP if  you wanted to use it--i never have but have heard both positive and negative--all room dependent.  The software has evolved over time to overcome bugs that would cause songs to suddenly drop or files to be lost--i love Roon purely for its metadata approach.  You already have Tidal so why not try Roon and see if can tell the difference between streaming directly from Tidal vs streaming Tidal through Roon--i hear absolutely no difference with my DAC.  But be sure you're comparing apples to apples by implementing it the same way (ie via ethernet or USB) you do now for directly streaming Tidal.

One hears the sound of Roon when using Innuos gear vs the Innuos Sense software. Roon sounds different vs Sense on Innuos gear. Obvious and easily heard with a resolving system.

My digital front end consists of:

Netgear modem/router powered by Keces LPS with my high end DC power cable - Network Acoustics Muon Ethernet cable - Network Acoustics Rubicon switch powered by a Keces LPS with high end DC power cable - Ethernet Acoustics Muon filter to Innuos Zenith 3 with power supply upgrades - Tron Atlantic Signature dac. All plugged unto a Puritan 156 conditioner with the additional Puritan Groundmaster grounding system.

Sense sounds far more nuanced and resolute in my system compared to Roon. So much better that I can only use Roon for background music. I much prefer the inner detail and realism of Sense. Roon sounds muffled and flat in comparison. I repeat, this IS ONLY with my Innuos server and front end digital system. I have heard Roon sound great with Merging Technologies gear.

I do not use any of Roon’s DSP capabilities as an FYI. Also, the better my front end becomes with products such as Network Acoustics, the more obvious Roon’s subpar sonic performance becomes on my Innuos server based front end. Without the NA products and my LPSs the difference between Roon and Sense was far less obvious.

Hi! Tested Roon for a month as a replacement / plan B for BlueSound OS and to connect with my T+A MP3100HV streamer. Upgraded to life time, bought a NUC using their excellent user fora and never looked back. I'm streaming in flac from my basement, I love the additional info and it made me rediscover some music as well. 

@jji666

I would suggest that if commenters want to be specific about their Roon experience with SQ, it’s necessary to state expressly whether the endpoint DAC is (or is connected to) a separate networked streamer or directly to the core machine.

this is a good point, which i would broaden

meaningless for someone to talk about how they feel roon sounds, unless they clearly state how it is implemented, from how the system receives its internet feed, to what core machine is used, to how the music feed is then extracted, filtered and sent to streamer and dac (and which streamer and dac are used and how they are connected)...

one doesn't simply hear the 'sound of roon' - one hears the result of everything above sent to their dac, which then reconstructs the analog music that is played by the system downstream of it

I would suggest that if commenters want to be specific about their Roon experience with SQ, it's necessary to state expressly whether the endpoint DAC is (or is connected to) a separate networked streamer or directly to the core machine.

Not that there is necessarily a difference as connected to every core machine, but Roon is designed such that it's optimal to use a separate streamer for the audio endpoint.  Roon is so taxing on the core that there's a very good chance the DAC won't sound best if connected directly to it, even if it's one of those fancy purpose built audio servers.  

The only way to truly gauge Roon's quality relative to others is by streaming from the Roon core to a separate networked endpoint. If you then really hear a difference between software, it's an interesting discussion as to why, since both are supposed to be bit perfect!

@past This sounds right to me, makes sense and backs up what many experts have told me during my research, the DAC makes the biggest difference to SQ.

@troidelover1499 There's a lot of great insights on here. This topic has been on my mind for the last couple of weeks for other reasons. Here are a couple of thoughts:

1.) I currently use Roon streamed from a dedicated Mac Mini (M1). My current digital setup consists of Roon --> HQPlayer (non-upsampling) --> Curious Cable USB --> Denafrip Hermes DDC --> AudioQuest Carbon HDMI I2S --> Denafrips Terminator II.

2.) Roon is a product that is generalized to work all kinds of different hardware, virtually none of which is optimized for digital audio playback. Jitter is a constant negative variable in digital audio SQ, and many hardware manufacturers (like Apple) aren't necessarily concerned with digital audio playback. Personally, I think the Mac M1 chips sound better than the older Intel chips. 

3.) Jitter IS a problem that virtually all DAC manufacturers address and mitigate with varying degrees of success. Digital-to-Digital converters from manufacturers like iFi and Denafrips can help mitigate that issue a little more. A DDC is something that I think can help improve the SQ of a Roon music player. 

4.) It is true that some streamer manufacturers may focus their hardware on the elimination of jitter and producing a clean audio stream for the DAC, and thus higher sound quality. However, I suspect that most of those manufacturers focus their efforts first on the user experience (since it is the most visible), and second on the hardware. I also think there are fewer manufacturers that put a great deal of effort into both of those things, and can produce streamers with better SQ results than Roon. 

5.) For me, Roon and HQPlayer on an M1 Mac platform give a lot of flexibility. I currently use HQPlayer as the transport of sorts (without upsampling, which I know is weird) between Roon and my DDC because I think it sounds better. I'm somewhat conflicted on upsampling right now, but at a minimum what I can say is that it can give a few more "flavors" of sound to choose from. That said, many of those kinds of options are just out of the question with a dedicated streamer.

For now, this setup works really well for me, but I'm always on the lookout for something better. Best of luck. 

After reading the comments on this post, one thing has become clear.

There is no consensus on the benefits of Roon, in fact, it seems to me that people hear what they want to hear.

My belief is that people subliminally convince themselves that the money they spent was worth it.

I'm not saying that there was or wasn't an improvement. What I am saying is that the person paying for it "wants" to feel that it was money well spent.

I believe that the reality of the situation is that there are a lot of components that are excellent, but looked at individually, aren't significantly better than what the other guy bought.

Think about it.

Every time an OP asks for recommendations for a component, there are dozens of responses from Audiogoners extolling the virtues of component X, Y or Z. To me this is proof that the differences between components is minimal once a certain level is achieved.

I must say that I agree with Grannyring, I have tried Roon for many years and it is the best music mgmt software yet available. That said, however, I believe it falls short of the mark as it relates to SQ. Not bad but certainly not setting any benchmarks. That's a shame, because I believe that Roon is capable of making significant improvements in SQ but for whatever reason has not made this a high priority. Now that I said that, let me explain my experience with my system and other high end systems that I listen to frequently from my audiophile friends. My system consists for an Innuos Zenth Mk II SE, Innuos Phoenix reclocker, Optical Module, Etheregen, Ansuz C2 power distribution and cables etc. I have used Roon, Ipeng9, Euphony, Audiavarna (not all on my server) but on other very high end servers with high end LPS. My experience has been that the Innuos OS sounds significantly better than Roon on my server and Euphony sounded better as well on other high end servers I have done critical listing on. The great thing about Innuos as a company, is that they are very committed to continued improvement of their software and hardware; specifically as it relates to function, features and in particular, sound quality. Their customer service is excellent as well. I am pleased with the investment I have made and continue to increase my enjoyment and satisfaction with every new update. I should have mentioned previously, that I am not a dealer, nor have any financial interest in any way with Innuos. I hope this was helpful.

Roon is definitely the best overall.  Yes, quirky and unstable with limited support resources, but no doubt an amazing experience when working properly.

the thing is it takes a long time to optimize sound quality with Roon.  And when you benchmark sound quality, you need to use Roon with a streamer.

Comparing to ripped cd's, local files certainly is good way to ascertain sound quality.

Not sure I believe these music players don't have unique sound quality, many  report they do. I recall hearing unique sound qualities when I initially switched from Audirvana to Roon.

Roon has a free trial and you can run the core on your PC or Mac for a trial. I personally love Roon, I have found it to be the best interface to listen to Tidal and Qobuz for sound quality as well as the numerous features Roon gives you access to.

I ran it on my Mac for the first few months and then invested in a $600 Intel NUC. Besides the maintenance of blowing out any dust in the NUC every few months, it has worked perfectly.

You have a terrific multiband Parametric Equalizer built into the software and with an investment of some time, you will find you can use it to equalize for your speaker environment or your headphones.

There are multiple filters as well as crossfeed, convolution, and more if desired. It's scalable so if you just want to use it for its capabilities to upsample music or just its Wiki type click for a veritable encyclopedia of music, the various versions which have the best resolution. Too much for a reply. No cost to try but it's worth the $12 to give it a fair shake, Either incorporate your music library or just use Tidal and or Qobuz.

Nothing to lose and a world of enhancements to gain. I have nothing invested in Roon, I can't see any negatives except the cost, If you have a good pair of headphones, you will notice the enhancements in SQ. Try it out nothing to lose- I am obviously a fan and using the NUC you can have multiple people in your home listen to multiple devices- an iPad, iPhone, Android, PC, or Mac. It's all good and the NUC is definitely a great way to go if you are comfortable installing an OS and have some technical acumen. I have no noise with my NUC- you still need a DAC and AMP. My 2¢

According to the CEO of Roon in a livestream interview, Roon does not have its own sound. It is pulling information directly from the streaming services... unless you are using its built in parametric EQ or other DSP functions. 

@nyev To me Sense sounds slightly too bloated or “filled-in” to me, with all of the space and air around vocals and instruments removed when compared with Roon.

I think you are the only person that likes Roon over Sense on a Zenith.  Just kidding 🤣!

It’s not that I dislike Roon by any means, I do listen to Roon on my main system sometimes.  I find the Sense sound “fuller” for sure, and Sense sounds a little “sweeter’ as well. 

My Roon core is running on a Mac-Mini, which sits in my upstairs office.  I’m still using the stock Mac power cord.  I’ve thought about getting a LPS for the Mac, but since I use it primarily for whole house stereo to Airplay speakers, I’m not sure I’d notice the difference.  

I’m using a Netgear Pro switch between the Orbi router in my office and my basement listening room.  The Mac-Mini plugs directly into the router.  I have considered getting a better switch, and an EtherREGEN for the listening room, but I’m not convinced the improvement would be worth the cost.  

There is nothing wrong with the sound quality of Roon, on the contrary, when comparing the sound to Bluesound I prefer Roon. I’ve had Auralic G1, Lumin U1 and Bluesound Node and Bluesound in the NAD M12 as comparison. Always found Roon sounding the best. I’ve used a Raspberry PI with HifiBerry hat with great results provided both powered seperately with high end power supplies. Then I had a Metrum Ambre and loved its musicality and ease of use. It sounded way better than Lumin U1, the U1 was too dark in my system. Now I use SOtM sMS-200ultra neo and recently made it sound even better with tx-USBultra reclocker. Roon is just sounding better as streaming solutions improve. Adding a good switch in the chain like Melco S100 or Uptone EtherREGEN makes it even better. Yes there is better but only if you move way up the streamer line to top end Pink Faun or Taiko Extreme streamers, but that’s out of my price range.

@grannyring ​​@oldschool1948 , I think I am the ONLY person who has said they prefer Roon on an Innuos product to Sense, in terms of sound quality.  I have a fully updated Zenith Mk 3.  To me Sense sounds slightly too bloated or “filled-in” to me, with all of the space and air around vocals and instruments removed when compared with Roon.

Maybe I have a setup issue but I’ve tried messing with settings.

When I first starting messing with Roon, I compared it to what I was using - JRiver hosted on my Win10 PC.  And the difference surprised me.  So I let my trial for Roon expire.  But bugs and tons of stupid DLNA issues with JRiver drove me batty.  It wouldn't find my Bridge every other time I tried to use it.  Songs would skip sections, others would cut off the final 30-60 seconds and start up another track after a 5-7 second delay.  But when it worked, JR sounded fantastic.  So I bit the bullet and purchased Roon Lifetime.  And after buying a new i10 NUC (not fanless but powered by a LPS), I went crazy on isolation to get rid of the garbage in the stream.  That eventually led me to a full LAN makeover from copper to fiber.  And I started putting in LPS's on the router, switches and fiber media converters (I run video streamers as well with awesome results).  Things sounded great after finally ridding the system of junk, so I just happily lived with it for many moons.  About a month ago, I decided to compare it to JRiver again (with it running on my Win10 PC).  I drug my feet with doing this because I knew I was going to like JR better and feel remorse for buying Roon.  Well it didn't happen that way at all.  They were virtually identical in sound now.  I say virtually because by the time I switched from one to the other, I was not able to discern any differences.  A stark contrast to how things were in the beginning.  So I am completely happy with Roon now :)  But everyone's journey is different and best you, or anyone can do is get a free trial and have a listen for yourself.  

I tried to love Roon. The UI is unquestionably superior to native Tidal and Spotify, and better than Lightning DS and the laggard, Aurender Conductor. But the platform is terribly unstable. Sudden crashes plagued all 3 of my systems (2 different cores, a homemade Nuc and a MacBook Pro.) Never found an SQ difference that would recommend Roon either. 

itsjustme servers do sound different

we have sold and tested most major servers and streamers 

we have over 10 years of experience with these devices, 

we startred with mac minis and jriver

then aurender these sounded better 

we then went  to innous  these sounded far better 

we tried an sotm windows based server before this

then we found the 432Evo servers from belgium 

the 432EVO sounded even better and had the added advantage of being a modular and upgradable design.

differences in sound quality included sound staging midrange warmth low level detailing 

Dave and Troy

Audio intellect NJ

US. importers 432EVO Music servers 

I liked Roon. There are many advantages if you can afford it.

In my opinion 1. The Roon interface is great.  2. There are many options it offers if you want to take advantage of them. 3. Ease of operation. 4. Nice gui interface. 5. Nice Digital EQ if needed for slight room compensation or music quality adjustment.

That being said. Due to my budget I cancelled Roon and using the lesser advanced interface for the Innuos which was recently released. As far as sound. Roon is great! Also the bluesound node 2i with a better DAC (Bifrost) is very good. Good enough for me.

Go with the Cary Audio DMS600, DMS650, DMS700 or the mighty Pro Series DMS800 streamer DAC with a Roon Nucleus. Very hard to beat the sound quality and the ease of use with the apps. I’ve never looked back since I have made the move. They sync beautifully. 

Somebody suggested that Roon sounds like the systems it's implemented with.  That sounds about right.  If anyone tells you Roon does not sound good, try to find out how they're implementing it.  Not just the electronic components, but also the content they're playing, the resolution, and any DSP they've applied.  

WIthout having a well-equipped test lab, I suggest you test Roon's SQ by comparing a file streamed through Roon with the same track played directly from a NAS/hard drive through all the same equipment, with equalized volume. If you find that the locally stored file sounds better, then you have to ask yourself if the difference is big enough that you'd want to forego all the advantages of a service like Roon.  I've tried some of the alternatives (Audirvana, Apple Music, the Tidal app, the Bluesound app, the Matrix Audio app).  IMO none of them measure up to Roon for functionality. Even if you use Roon  mainly to discover new music, you can always store favorite, HiRes tracks locally and listen to them in sessions without Roon.

The wadax server was in 1 of the worst sounding rooms at axpona this year by multiple reviewers. I didn’t believe any of the wadax server review in TAS either.

I went from using iTunes over 15 years ago, then using Pure Music and Audirvana for years, then going the dedicated server route using the Auralic Aries system running Lightning DS and Lumin software on it (superior to Aurender at that time).

The converted back to running Roon on a dedicated server. These servers over the years have ranged from a $50k Linux enterprise server using enterprise ssd technology to using a dedicated M1 Mac. Also tried new release of Audirvana but kept Roon.

The biggest advantage of all this was to get a quality dac that used Ethernet and i2s and place the server in a different room than my dedicated audio room. USB was the main cause of the sq degradation no matter what gimmicks/tweaks I purchased to increase sq.

Overall, I prefer Roon, then Audirvana, then Lightning DS, then Lumin in that order.

One of the unexpected benefits I discovered of ROON is that Old SONOS Zone players work as ROON endpoints. These are being aged out by SONOS and don’t work with their new eco system so they can be picked up for cheap. I have seen them on Craigs for a little as $50. I even saw one that had been moded by Wired4Sound for cheap. Of course this is midfi gear but they work great for spinning up systems in a garage, workshop etc. They only handle redbook CD quality but ROON will step the bit rate down if you are streaming higher resolution. Somebody gave me one that didn't work.  I discovered it was the network card was bad but worked fine if hard wired. Ran optical out to a Schiit Modi then to a pair of Audio Engine powered speakers and bad boom descent sounding music for non critical listening pleasure. 

I did not expect Roon to sound great during a trial.  I just wanted it to be responsive, so prior to my trial I installed a 10th gen i7/ssd NUC.  I'm now on the path to approach the listening experience of vinyl.  So, money sump, care with the little stuff..especially anything that reduces power and ethernet noise and improves the timing of the signal feeding my DAC.  Not an easy task when on a budget.  

I agree with previous poster, do a trial of Roon.  It's what I did.  You got the BS Node and it can be an endpoint.  Just make sure you got all the piece parts in place so you can eval without having to mess with hardware config during eval period. 

Thanks for the additional comments. I am slowly feeling my way through this to figure out what is the best way to try Roon.

@jjs49 your comments were really helpful to my understanding, as always.  I am wondering if you wouldn't mind saying if you were to start now with Roon knowing what you know, and were trying to do it well, meaning good sound, and easy to use, but at lowest cost possible, how would you start?

Some people here seem to post without reading what’s been said earlier. I guess this topic is getting kinda long.

OP, you should try a free Roon trial and see how it sounds for you.  I now use a combo of Roon and Tidal via my iMac, through an Audioquest Carbon USB wire into my Michi X3.  

First started out with a Roon Core running on an iMAC and using a Bryston BDP as endpoint then into my DAC. Bryston Manic Moose uses MPD and it sounded better than Roon when I took Roon out of the system. Then I moved the Core to a SGC ST and hard wired that to a Velop Mesh node as well as the Bryston. Also upgraded the network cables now the Roon/Qobuz combo are so close to the Bryston/Qobuz combo I just run Roon. If I really want to listen critically I switch the Bryston to MPD mode but most of the time now I can not discern a difference. Same with playing FLAC files off attached storage on the BDP.  Its nice having an endpoint that can quickly switch between native and Roon ready.  BDP MPD switch is a snap.

I would not trust TAS to carry my lunch let alone evaluate something. 

@theaudiomaniac Fair point. 

I would not trust TAS to carry my lunch let alone evaluate something. That said, I don't remember anything negative about Amazon, just that he does not like Amazon (and others) as a company.  If he truly tested it, lets see the bit comparisons.

Amazon is not the culprit- just the delivery method.

@zgas-music No, Amazon’s not doing you any favors either. Steve Stone did a comparison of the major streaming services in TAS not all that long ago, and let’s just say Amazon did not fare well. Qobuz is your friend for sound quality.