The Dark Side; Digital audio equipment recommendations and setup.

Nee Lewman said:
I may have some Roon questions. I'm assuming it makes using your library easier?
Click to expand...

Roon is actually where it makes less difference because the roon library creates a metadata catelogue outside of the file that sites as an extra layer on top of your digital collection to allow you to update metadata for streaming and to standardise how you make and organise things. Where I find FLACs in built metadata advantages most prevalent is in other less slick DAPs or music library/playing software.

Roon as a product can do that but to make the investment worthwhile imo you need to be using digital at home through it daily and have a sizeable and often used file collection that you want to use alongside streaming in one library.
 
MikeH said:
It makes things extremely easy to manage and play. Does the BluSound OS not do that? I haven't used BluSound.

IMO, Roon is expensive but worth it if you have TONS of download files + Qobuz favorites. I also use the multi-room audio.

This should give you a 30 day free trial if you wanna mess around with it: ONE FREE MONTH!

Or if somebody else here has Roon and wants a 30 day extension on their sub, chime in. Mine is a lifetime sub so I don't get anything from the referral.
Click to expand...
I don't know, I just started playing with it for files. At this point, I would not describe it as easy. There is netwrork sharing which wanted passwords and stuff, then there was local sharing. I have had some difficulty in getting local sharing to work. I have also just been playing around, have not bothered looking at instructions or anything yet. But it is not intuitive anyhow and it seems like I have to do each release which will drive me bonkers. If I could succesfully hook it up to the music drive and be done with it, then I might not have even looked at Roon.
 
Joe Mac said:
Roon is actually where it makes less difference because the roon library creates a metadata catelogue outside of the file that sites as an extra layer on top of your digital collection to allow you to update metadata for streaming and to standardise how you make and organise things. Where I find FLACs in built metadata advantages most prevalent is in other less slick DAPs or music library/playing software.

Roon as a product can do that but to make the investment worthwhile imo you need to be using digital at home through it daily and have a sizeable and often used file collection that you want to use alongside streaming in one library.
Click to expand...
Playing around with Roon has more to do with I’ve spent thirty minutes trying to figure out how to play files from my computer on the nad with only the new No Format release working. If I can do it easier with roon. I may just pony up for it.
 
Last edited:
Nee Lewman said:
I may have some Roon questions. I'm assuming it makes using your library easier?
Click to expand...
Roon is definitely a luxury item. But the more I use it the more I like it. Provides a streamlined interface for my ripped CD collection and Qobuz subscription. I use it in my main listening rig, but can also use it with the Sonos devices I have around the house. I like the EQ tweaks I can make for headphone listening and I have also become a fan of Roon Arc for listening in the car.
 
Nee Lewman said:
Playing around with Roon has more to do with I’ve spent thirty minutes trying to figure out how to play files from my computer on the nad with only the new No Format release working. If I can do it easier with roon. I may just pony up for it.
Click to expand...

Yeah once you have a roon core, be it a computer or a server device, like a NUC or their own Nucleus, and you have it set up it is very very easy to use. I just couldn’t justify the continued cost for how little I used it.

Plex is worth an investigate too.
 
mindhead1 said:
Plex/Plex amp is a good solution if you are just looking to manage a local library of music.
Click to expand...
Yup, I use Plexamp. Does pretty much what I need. Like Roon it does not overwrite metadata, but unlike Roon it is not as easy to added additional metadata to the indexing library. Never played a WAV in Plexamp but should work fine. I just convert it over to FLAC if I get a WAV file.
 
Another Plexamp user here. At the moment, I just use it as my server/library software, and use the Linn and KEF apps to play what I want. I have saved all my files in folders by alphabet and with artist sub folders, so I tend to use that method to find files. My library is pretty messy, and this is the best method.

To be honest, I need to find a good way to look through my library. I often find it hard to work out what to listen to.
 
Thackeraye said:
Another Plexamp user here. At the moment, I just use it as my server/library software, and use the Linn and KEF apps to play what I want. I have saved all my files in folders by alphabet and with artist sub folders, so I tend to use that method to find files. My library is pretty messy, and this is the best method.

To be honest, I need to find a good way to look through my library. I often find it hard to work out what to listen to.
Click to expand...
I wish Plexamp had a random button like discogs.
 
Another plex/plexamp user here. It's honestly been a great way to manage and play my library, love it.

jamieanderson1968 said:
I wish Plexamp had a random button like discogs.
Click to expand...

Not quite the same but if you go Albums -> three dots in the top right -> Random it will show you a list of random albums you can pick from. Mine I think shows like 9

IMG_4176.png
 
I discovered MediaMonkey, which I've been using to manage my flac library (including all my CDs), can make its own DLNA server that the Wiim can see, so that's become my go-to way to play digital.

Now I'm trying to decide whether to keep the larger, older iTunes library separate, or begin a merge process to only have one copy of each album in whatever the best quality I have is...
 
trickyseven said:
Another plex/plexamp user here. It's honestly been a great way to manage and play my library, love it.



Not quite the same but if you go Albums -> three dots in the top right -> Random it will show you a list of random albums you can pick from. Mine I think shows like 9

View attachment 226522
Click to expand...
Damn that is exactly what I was looking for. It actually gives a huge list but in grid format it shows 9 on the screen at a time which works for picking something that I have not played in a while. Thanks
 
Joe Mac said:
It is really really nice to use. It was just a cost use argument that took me away from it. I think had they kept the $500 lifetime that’s have almost made more sense to me keeping it than the yearly or monthly subs.
Click to expand...
yeah, I figured I go ahead and pay for a year and if I use it as much as I suspect I will, I'll get a dedicated core and buy a lifetime membership.
 
jamieanderson1968 said:
It is definitely worth it if you subscribe to Tidal or Qobuz
Click to expand...
yeah, Qobuz is life dude. I love it so much.

Joe Mac said:
Hit us up if you do decide to build a core. The NUC cores myself and @MikeH vuolt a few years back are great, easy to do, and way cheaper than Roons own nucleus is.
Click to expand...
Will keep that in mind. But, the Nucleus One is pretty, fairly plug & play, and affordable.
 
Nee Lewman said:
yeah, Qobuz is life dude. I love it so much.


Will keep that in mind. But, the Nucleus One is pretty, fairly plug & play, and affordable.
Click to expand...

Hahaha fair enough. Honestly the NuC was almost plug in and play. It flashes the roon rock software from a USB and plugging a couple of hard drives and a couple of bits of ram into a prebuilt computer took minutes. I got a device with 4 times the storage for about half the price of what the nucleus was at the time.

It’s one device where pretty didn’t matter to me, it’s on top of a bookcase in the hallway next to the router, miles from anywhere I’m sitting or regularly looking.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top