Calling all ROON users, current and former

[Willmax]

The aim of this poll is to try and get an insight from the Stereonet community of those who use OR have used ROON platform. To help people like me, who are considering the long term viability of using such platform for overall music enjoyment.

 

I've been on the fence about Roon for a while, the ongoing cost is probably the main reason for me to have stayed away until now. 

At the same time I cannot dismiss the appeal of the platform for people who enjoy listening to music and learning more about their favourite artists and the people involved in the music production chain.

Edited October 15, 2023 by Willmax

[Yamaha_man]

I bought a lifetime membership around a year or two ago but haven’t used it at all. I’ll get around to it one day. 

[buddyev]

I have had an annual sub to Roon for 18 months- using mainly my own files, but also qobuz.
It’s a reliable player as far as I can tell - a way better interface and  much more imformation rich than Audivarna which I used before. 
But the great benefit of Roon is the ability to use digital convolution filters - this alone is equal to a major component upgrade. 

[powerav]

It’s simple, it’s just a must have.

[Willmax]

Thanks to all who responded and participated in the poll so far. Please keep the answers coming as it is painting an interesting picture of ROON users experience 

[sir sanders zingmore]

I bought a lifetime subscription very early on. I think I 'd still buy one now even though it's much more expensive. Roon gets used every day

 

[POV]

Lifetime subscriber here, but I still think it represents excellent value at current day pricing.  For me, Roon is an essential ingredient in my music listening experience and I would not want to live without it.  I love how it integrates all my equipment, seemlessly integrates stored music and streamed music into a cohesive library, provides a brilliant internet radio platform, incorporates useful DSP, and makes listening to an artist, album, or playlist a whole experience of discovery.  I have learnt so much about artists that I love from Roon, and discovered countless new albums and artists thanks to the magic of Roon Radio.

 

People say that it's when you take a component out of your system that you will often really appreciate what it was bringing.  Recently spent a month away at a holiday house where I did not have Roon operational and tried to go back to the alternatives (streaming services direct, listening to CDs, Tunein) and honestly the whole experience was not even comparable.  Roon is the go!

[Assisi]

I was a very early subscriber.  Initially I only used it to play from a NAS.  It took me awhile to even consider Tidal or Qobuz.  Now I would not even consider anything but ROON.  To me is a total a bargain even at today’s sub costs. How else would you have the music adventure or the availability of so much info about the tracks, performers and others etc?

 

Take a month subs and try it.  Simple.  Where is the risk?

 

John

[Guest]

I tried Roon but did not fit with the way I consumed music.  Exploring new music, finding more information is not my thing.

 

The thing that turned me away was the sound quality, a little behind my setup.  I now refrain from expanding further because I got jumped upon.  There are quite a few who have the same opinion, but are equally reluctant to say so, let alone post here.

 

I also know 2 or 3 Roon users who acknowledge this, but they enjoy the rich information. That trumps any drop in SQ.  

 

Hope this helps with your decision...

[buddyev]

19 minutes ago, Snoopy8 said:

I tried Roon but did not fit with the way I consumed music.  Exploring new music, finding more information is not my thing.

 

The thing that turned me away was the sound quality, a little behind my setup.  I now refrain from expanding further because I got jumped upon.  There are quite a few who have the same opinion, but are equally reluctant to say so, let alone post here.

 

I also know 2 or 3 Roon users who acknowledge this, but they enjoy the rich information. That trumps any drop in SQ.  

 

Hope this helps with your decision...

 I don’t really use it for the info or exploration very much - though it’s there and is nice to have. I mainly use my own music files and i listen to long form music - albums not tracks - in fact the same way Ive always listened to CDs and vinyl.
I do like Roon for the SQ so I’d be interested to hear an alternative opinion and recommendation. 
 Hadn’t realised Roon was so controversial that people feel cowed to express an opinion. 
 

[March Audio]

58 minutes ago, buddyev said:

I do like Roon for the SQ so I’d be interested to hear an alternative opinion

 

Roon is proven bit perfect capable.  RME dacs have a special test function that allows  you to play a check file which confirms this. 

 

Have no concerns about audio quality if using wasapi or asio.  It delivers exactly the data that's in the audio file - unless you choose to use some of the extensive dsp functionality.

 

My opinion fwiw is that no other replay software comes close to Roon.  I also thoroughly enjoy the way the additional artist information sends you on journeys exploring new, similar, related music.

Edited October 15, 2023 by March Audio

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, buddyev said:

 Hadn’t realised Roon was so controversial that people feel cowed to express an opinion. 

Have you wondered why most threads asking about Roon get only good feedback?  The frequent posters are enthusiasts who fit the Roon profile.  Those who post less tend not to use Roon but I suspect quite a few have tried but not taken it up.  By their nature, they are not posting their findings, so we will never know how many tried, nor their reasons for not going ahead.

 

I was prompted by the poll that allowed for some negative sentiment (kudos to OP!).  Previously, when I mentioned SQ differences, I was jumped upon with doubts about my gear being set up properly, that I was using the wrong version, it was my imagination etc. etc.  Alas, the last is happening again.   

 

And I heard the differences across a few setups of friends, who actually agreed, but they loved Roon too much to let this small difference matter.  As I said earlier, Roon does not work for me, and hence SQ became the deciding factor against.  I did not realise this was controversial then, and still is for some...

[eostre23]

Lifetime - Love it - Thanks

[POV]

9 hours ago, Snoopy8 said:

Have you wondered why most threads asking about Roon get only good feedback?  The frequent posters are enthusiasts who fit the Roon profile.  Those who post less tend not to use Roon but I suspect quite a few have tried but not taken it up.  By their nature, they are not posting their findings, so we will never know how many tried, nor their reasons for not going ahead.

It’s possible isn’t it that the majority of users could have a positive experience though?  It’s interesting hearing your sound quality observations, we have trialled extensively and found it very difficult to discern the difference (with all Roon DSP disengaged) between CD and streamed copy via Roon.

 

One of my general thoughts with Roon is it is a fair bit to get your head around and I found in practice it took me probably 6 months to fully appreciate the broad benefits and potential.  I do caution people to be careful with short trials of a product as broad as Roon.

 

I never really understand this notion of being afraid to post opinion here, it would be much more useful to the community if the range of experiences were discussed.

[Assisi]

1 hour ago, POV said:

I never really understand this notion of being afraid to post opinion here, it would be much more useful to the community if the range of experiences were discussed.

Does the above comment apply only to opinions in this thread or generally across all threads.  I assume that the implementation of the  revised website guidelines was to ensure that the treatment of experience based opinions was always respectful.

John

[Guest]

49 minutes ago, POV said:

It’s possible isn’t it that the majority of users could have a positive experience though?  

I have never questioned the positive experiences and am happy for all you.  Sorry that I have not made that clear earlier.

 

But the zeal of a few did not allow for someone to say that Roon was not necessarily the best!  And it was not isolated to a thread nor to an individual.  Note that this happened a while ago and I have not posted since. 

 

Time to move on, with no more from me.  I hope that OP now has a better appreciation of Roon.

[POV]

3 minutes ago, Assisi said:

Does the above comment apply only to opinions in this thread or generally across all threads.  I assume that the implementation of the  revised website guidelines was to ensure that the treatment of experience based opinions was always respectful.

John

It’s a general observation John, but I never really understood it before the revised guidelines either.   I never really saw many examples of posters being shouted down, and can always just skip over anything don’t want to respond to anyways.  Anyways…back to Roon.

[Willmax]

Looking at all of the responses in this thread so far, is giving me the incentive I needed to give ROON a go and start a trial, hopefully very soon.  

I am very encouraged by the number of people using ROON to play their own files (32%) and not necessarily having to have a Qobuz or Tidal account. It is also interesting to see the relatively large number of members (53%) with a lifetime vs monthly sub. Even more interesting is the very small number of members no longer interested in the ROON platform (6%). So all things considered, ROON is looking like a very good option.

[March Audio]

It's a free trial, so nothing to lose.

 

You also have features like the multiroom and ARC that let's you play your collection away from home.  Such as in your car, or as I was today in the airport on the wY to the Melbourne show.

[powerav]

Arc is incredible, to have full on HiFi anytime, anywhere is brilliant. 

[March Audio]

19 minutes ago, Willmax said:

I am very encouraged by the number of people using ROON to play their own files (32%) and not necessarily having to have a Qobuz or Tidal account.

 

It takes a bit of getting used to not buying music, but if you do enjoy exploring new music having Qobuz or Tidal soon becomes a very economically sensible way to do so.

 

You can add albums you like on Tidal/qobuz into your Roon library, so it's fairly transparent to being local or streamed, no real difference (small delay in starting to play).

Edited October 18, 2023 by March Audio

[eostre23]

I sold all my vinyl in the 00's 

I used to collect Punk, Post punk , Indie, Dub, Industrial, Power Electronics, Experimental etc! 

From 1977 - 90. Albums for a 3-5 GBP

 

I use Roon extensively with my now digitalized collection and have replaced all my vinyl one way or the other 

 

You can get PBTHAL & equivalent vinyl rips of decent quality of many albums and decent punk 7"s & esoteric musiks can be found on the net and the you can check the Flacs with lossless checkers, TLH and DROffline MkII etc!

 

This money then can be put into a better Hi-Fi system.

 

The physicality of the album experience is missing but is made up for in many other ways. and vinyl is so expensive now!

 

I have Qobuz and Tidal streaming platforms, but prefer the quality of the Qobuz stream

 

 

[Willmax]

3 hours ago, March Audio said:

It takes a bit of getting used to not buying music, but if you do enjoy exploring new music having Qobuz or Tidal soon becomes a very economically sensible way to do so.

Yeah I know what you mean, I've had Tidal on and off over the years, but also went without it for long periods and just used my own music collection during those times. It is great though to be able to explore and find new music with convenience that the streaming services allow us to have. 

[The Mad Scientist]

I started with the Roon trial, then immediatey did another trial using my business email account. The initial trial period was really too short to get a proper handle on it, even with a lot of time spent on the Roon Community.

 

After the second trial, I subscribed.

 

Last year, I went for a lifetime subscription, before the price increases.

 

Besides the extensive library and metadata stuff, the artist info stuff, Roon radio (which plays similar stuff to your listening tastes and introduces you to a whole load of new music), having local music, Tidal and Qobuz all in the same place, it also has extensive DSP capabilities. My main system's REW and Rephase corrections are applied as impulse responses within Roon's Muse DSP engine's convolution filters.

 

I also have various headphone correction convolution filters too.

 

For me, the DSP alone would make the lifetime subscription worth the cost.

 

Now there's also Roon ARC, which gives you most of Roon's functionality on the move.

 

After three years of use, I can't imagine life without it.

[POV]

11 hours ago, Willmax said:

Yeah I know what you mean, I've had Tidal on and off over the years, but also went without it for long periods and just used my own music collection during those times. It is great though to be able to explore and find new music with convenience that the streaming services allow us to have. 

 

One thing that's really important consideration (IMO) for having a streaming service enabled is Roon Playlists and the magic of Roon Radio.  I have discovered countless new tracks/albums/artists through these mediums some of which I now consider to be in my top favourite artists (like Leprous as an example).  The way I play it is that for albums that I discover through streaming services that I really love I order either the CD (and rip it into my Roon library) or the LP or both.  Having Qobuz integrated into Roon is an essential ingredient.

 

My tip with the trial is to give it a few months, to give yourself a chance to fully appreciate everything Roon has to offer.  I really doubt this is possible in a one month trial.

Edited October 18, 2023 by POV