[Zuman]

My primary source is a NAD M50.2 vault/player which has BluOS as its built-in and default operating and music management system. It's also a Roon endpoint.
I bought a Roon lifetime license years ago when it first came out and I used it on a home-built music server, but never set it up with the NAD until this week when I updated to Roon 1.8. At that point I decided to compare my system's sound with both.
I'm finding that Roon sounds consistently "dryer," more analytical, and - I think - more transparent. I'd characterize the BluOS sound as fuller, more "romantic" sounding. It's kinda like a high-end solid state sound with Roon, and a tube-like sound with BluOS. I'm not using any DSP/EQ.
Anyone else?

[fittebd]

Not sure how it would be different.  Diff clocks?  If its the same source material, why would it be different coming out of the same unit.

[Mike-48]

For what it's worth, I tried Roon for a year. I could hear no difference between Roon and DLNA on my home-networked setup, using the Auralic Aries as the stream renderer (to a Classé CP-800 DAC-preamp).
So this seems to be specific to the particular setup, as with so many things.
Happy listening!

[Docere]

My experience on the low-powered Antipodes DX, relative to LMS, Roon tends to homogenise music - there is less contrast, less sense of touch... less expression; music sounded more "easy listening" or background. I didn't notice tonal differences between the two players. I suspect is a matter of resolution and dynamics. Not what I expected or wanted.

Roon was once the preferred player for Antipodes servers but I believe that has changed.

[newzooreview]

Roon likes pared-down Linux boxes dedicated to Roon. I had an Auralic Aries G2.1 and their implementation of Roon is terrible. They have a big bloated operating system tuned to work with their badly designed smartphone apps. Their implemenation of Roon is an afterthought, and it did not sound good.

I switched to an Allo DigiOne Signature running Ropieee (an extremely pared Linux purely dedicated to Roon) and a Roon ROCK server on an Intel NUC (following Roon's excellent instructions to put it together) and my system sounds amazing. Very very detailed, huge 3D soundstage, wonderful tonality, and bass tone and texture that has been a revelation.

I just moved from a Benchmark DAC3 to a Holo May KTE DAC and the improvement is fantastic. Roon is not limiting my ability to improve the sound in my system at all.

I think the problem is that Roon has done such a good job of making Roon work on bloated non-Linux systems and Swiss army knife Linux systems (like the various embedded players in stuff like the Auralic) with sloppy implementation that the bits-are-bits crowd assumes that anything that runs Roon will run Roon equally well. Roon is designed for pared-down Linux. It sounds incredible running on these tiny, free Linux distributions (Roon ROCK and RoPieee). The Roon Nucleus that Roon sells as the canonical Roon server is just an Intel NUC running Roon ROCK in a very nice fanless case. For half the cost you can put your own together.

Here are measurements of Roon feeding various endpoints and DACs, for those curious abou the measurement side of the story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jvu_doQfAI0

[Rusty Jefferson]

So, you're running the Roon Core on a NUC on your network? Since your NAD is Roon Ready you don't want to be using bridge software.

[thrak76]

I’ve had such a great time with Roon, and it’s SQ has been a great catalyst in my recent bout of upgrade-itis.

I have not gotten into standalone DACs, and instead rely on my processors. However, I was inspired to move into separates by the discovery of Roon - well, indirectly… I was headed towards separates eventually. So my SQ game has gotten much better lately, with a great contribution from Roon.

I especially love it’s dynamic range analyzation that allows you to volume level your library. This is so great for all-day listening with different family members picking music as the mood strikes them.

[rollo]

  In our experience Roon is dry and Hi Fi sounding. We prefer iPeng for sound quality. We have conducted side by side comparison.


charles

[Nick B]

  In our experience Roon is dry and Hi Fi sounding. We prefer iPeng for sound quality. We have conducted side by side comparison.


charles

Charles,
Can iPeng integrate Tidal and Qobuz like Roon does?
Nick

[Housteau]

I have very good results running Roon core on my Mac Mini and streaming to a complete SOtM set-up, streamer, USB conditioner, power supply, battery operated Dac and modified network switch.  The ethernet is also passed through a Sonore Optical Module just before the streamer.  The SOtM streamer has the built in option to use HQ Player as an input instead of Roon.  So, in this set-up HQ Player becomes an end point for Roon.  HQ Player runs on my Mac Mini along with the Roon core and within it's preferences you just select the SOtM streamer for playback.  You end up with all the functionality of Roon, but with the sound of HQ Player.  It remains in the background and once the parameters are set, you can forget it is there.

HQ Player is an outstanding and highly versatile digital player/upsampler.  It has been compared to the Hugo M-Scaler in performance, falling just slightly short of it.  I noticed an improvement over using just Roon alone right away.  The difference is not subtle and it is fully adjustable through the many settings possible.  For me there is no going back to using Roon on it's own. 

[Nick B]

I have very good results running Roon core on my Mac Mini and streaming to a complete SOtM set-up, streamer, USB conditioner, power supply, battery operated Dac and modified network switch.  The ethernet is also passed through a Sonore Optical Module just before the streamer.  The SOtM streamer has the built in option to use HQ Player as an input instead of Roon.  So, in this set-up HQ Player becomes an end point for Roon.  HQ Player runs on my Mac Mini along with the Roon core and within it's preferences you just select the SOtM streamer for playback.  You end up with all the functionality of Roon, but with the sound of HQ Player.  It remains in the background and once the parameters are set, you can forget it is there.

HQ Player is an outstanding and highly versatile digital player/upsampler.  It has been compared to the Hugo M-Scaler in performance, falling just slightly short of it.  I noticed an improvement over using just Roon alone right away.  The difference is not subtle and it is fully adjustable through the many settings possible.  For me there is no going back to using Roon on it's own.

I followed some of what you said, but can you elaborate/explain again re your setup vs mine? My current system is an Auralic Mini streamer, an nos Border Patrol SEi dac with SPDIF only, the Roon core is on my iMac desktop and Roon remote apps on my iPhone and iPad… I’ve always avoided anything to do with computers as far as music. Thanks

[Housteau]

I followed some of what you said, but can you elaborate/explain again re your setup vs mine? My current system is an Auralic Mini streamer, an nos Border Patrol SEi dac with SPDIF only, the Roon core is on my iMac desktop and Roon remote apps on my iPhone and iPad… I’ve always avoided anything to do with computers as far as music. Thanks

At it's core we are both doing the same thing, streaming from the Mac (Roon core) to our streamers and out to the Dac.  My system just has a few more pieces inline to and from my streamer.  First, I am using an Optical Module which converts ethernet to fiber and then back to ethernet before plugging into my streamer.  Then, I am using a USB conditioner before going to the Dac.  These are for isolation and noise removal.

I also have a trial version of HQPlayer installed on my Mac Mini which becomes an endpoint for Roon.  My streamer has special software which allows it to work easier with Roon, HQPlayer and several others.  I just need to select which one I want to use through that software.  Then, using the preferences in HQPlayer I can select that streamer.  So, I can use Roon as normal, but when playing music it first goes to HQPlayer and then to the streamer.

In your situation you would need to download HQPlayer as a trial version on your Mac.  Then, see if under preferences in HQPlayer your streamer is shown as a choice.  It will need a built in network adapter for HQPlayer, which it may not have.  If you are able to get it to show up then you will be good to go.  All you need to do then is to activate HQPlayer within Roon so it will show up as an endpoint to choose.

[Nick B]

At it's core we are both doing the same thing, streaming from the Mac (Roon core) to our streamers and out to the Dac.  My system just has a few more pieces inline to and from my streamer.  First, I am using an Optical Module which converts ethernet to fiber and then back to ethernet before plugging into my streamer.  Then, I am using a USB conditioner before going to the Dac.  These are for isolation and noise removal.

I also have a trial version of HQPlayer installed on my Mac Mini which becomes an endpoint for Roon.  My streamer has special software which allows it to work easier with Roon, HQPlayer and several others.  I just need to select which one I want to use through that software.  Then, using the preferences in HQPlayer I can select that streamer.  So, I can use Roon as normal, but when playing music it first goes to HQPlayer and then to the streamer.

In your situation you would need to download HQPlayer as a trial version on your Mac.  Then, see if under preferences in HQPlayer your streamer is shown as a choice.  It will need a built in network adapter for HQPlayer, which it may not have.  If you are able to get it to show up then you will be good to go.  All you need to do then is to activate HQPlayer within Roon so it will show up as an endpoint to choose.

Thanks, that’s a very helpful explanation  I understand quite a bit more now. I looked at the HQ website and noted the dacs listed under the recommended hardware section. At some point if I change dacs, it would be fun to try out. I did find the cost and it was $266, which seems reasonable for what it does

[thrak76]

[…]

So, I can use Roon as normal, but when playing music it first goes to HQPlayer and then to the streamer.

Do you then also have access to the volume normalization DSP feature of Roon, or is there a comparable feature on HQ Player? I am aware of Replay Gain, but I much more prefer Roon’s hands-off approach.

[Housteau]

Do you then also have access to the volume normalization DSP feature of Roon, or is there a comparable feature on HQ Player? I am aware of Replay Gain, but I much more prefer Roon’s hands-off approach.

 

I do not use that myself, but you should be able to use all of the features of Roon as normal.  The trial version of HQplayer runs for 30 minutes, then you need to reset it for the next 30 minutes.  That is the only difference between it and the full version.

[rollo]

Charles,
Can iPeng integrate Tidal and Qobuz like Roon does?
Nick

 Yes it can.

charles

[rollo]

At it's core we are both doing the same thing, streaming from the Mac (Roon core) to our streamers and out to the Dac.  My system just has a few more pieces inline to and from my streamer.  First, I am using an Optical Module which converts ethernet to fiber and then back to ethernet before plugging into my streamer.  Then, I am using a USB conditioner before going to the Dac.  These are for isolation and noise removal.

I also have a trial version of HQPlayer installed on my Mac Mini which becomes an endpoint for Roon.  My streamer has special software which allows it to work easier with Roon, HQPlayer and several others.  I just need to select which one I want to use through that software.  Then, using the preferences in HQPlayer I can select that streamer.  So, I can use Roon as normal, but when playing music it first goes to HQPlayer and then to the streamer.

In your situation you would need to download HQPlayer as a trial version on your Mac.  Then, see if under preferences in HQPlayer your streamer is shown as a choice.  It will need a built in network adapter for HQPlayer, which it may not have.  If you are able to get it to show up then you will be good to go.  All you need to do then is to activate HQPlayer within Roon so it will show up as an endpoint to choose.

 Ask Gary Dews of Border Patrol which HE prefers. iPeng it is.

charles

[newzooreview]

iPeng appears not to be actively developed. No updates on the site (blog or software) for 15 months. That kind of situation often prefaces an announcement that the developer has moved on, can't support the software any more, goodbye and good luck. I haven't tried it and don't dispute that it's good, but I would strongly hesitate to build a system around something moribund.

[TomS]

  In our experience Roon is dry and Hi Fi sounding. We prefer iPeng for sound quality. We have conducted side by side comparison.


charles

iPeng is a control point (remote), not a music player. LMS can function as a player, or you can use any LMS compatible player, such as Innuos, Squeezebox, etc.

[thrak76]

I do not use that myself, but you should be able to use all of the features of Roon as normal.  The trial version of HQplayer runs for 30 minutes, then you need to reset it for the next 30 minutes.  That is the only difference between it and the full version.

My intuition tells me that if you're not using Roon's audio player for playback, then the DSP options would not be available. Can you confirm by checking your Zone options and seeing if the Volume Leveling option is still available?

I'm interested in trying the HQ Player to see if I can gain any fidelity, but I won't even attempt if I have to use Replay Gain.