Roon acquired by Harman International

I have been thinking about Roon but I'll definitely wait to see where this goes. I'm probably not alone in that. That said, I don't know if I really stream enough to make it worthwhile. I don't quite understand how Roon works but if Harman offers up some sort of cheaper Roon server device than is already offered so I don't have to have a computer running all the time, I'd be more apt to buy in.
 
So too does JRiver, though it lacks the cloud subscription streaming service integration, a deal killer for (most?) many.
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Jriver is definitely on my radar.

Regarding cloud subscription integration... Tidal was a total bust for me and not that interested in others besides for car and phone/hiking and other remote use-age. My thinking is to just connect a blutooth source and play from my phone... like free Spotify and Pandora. Maybe not audiophool approved but I think I could live with it. This set up would have no costs, except the upfront $30 to buy JRiver.

JRiver also does video which might be a good thing for me as I love Youtube music video's.
 
airdronian said:
Just came across this at the Roon Community site:

community.roonlabs.com

Roon acquired by Harman International

Roon acquired by Harman International In 2015, our tiny team of Sooloos/Meridian veterans created a one-page website that teased a new way to browse, discover, and listen to music. In nearly nine incredible years since, we’ve introduced ten successive versions of Roon, built the world’s broadest...
community.roonlabs.com community.roonlabs.com
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Harman is owned by Samsung.. also interesting.
 
i've never used Roon or other service. i also don't use streaming but I can get all that I need from Roon, directly through my Innuos Zen streamer, which has an amazing search/ play/ catalog UI that makes services like these, far less interesting for me.
 
Since I use Innuos I have no use for Roon especially because I'm not a fan of the yearly subscription. Innuos Sense if 'free' since it run their hardware.

Might this be a door open for Plex Amp? Meet Plexamp

If you have a NAS it's an excellent alternative. I don't really need to play my files remotely but this allows that option. I use it sparingly, and it works well.
 
JohnVF said:
I have been thinking about Roon but I'll definitely wait to see where this goes. I'm probably not alone in that. That said, I don't know if I really stream enough to make it worthwhile. I don't quite understand how Roon works but if Harman offers up some sort of cheaper Roon server device than is already offered so I don't have to have a computer running all the time, I'd be more apt to buy in.
Click to expand...
If you ever make it back to the mitten state, pop in and I'll give you a tour of it. My entire digital collection is on a server now, and Roon is all I use in the house for digital--primarily my own files, but Qobuz is icing on the cake. I don't mind paying yearly, as it's a small user base and nobody can maintain it or develop new features without funding. (And it's not proprietary to any one product or brand, which is something I've always been strongly against.) It is about the cost of a CD per month. I can deal with that. Building up a small NUC computer is dead simple and once configured, it can run tucked away anywhere on the network. (I use mine for other server processes too, but that's unique to my network.) My hardware is also Roon-ready, so that is another reason I'd prefer to stick with it.

I only hope Harman improves things, and doesn't decide to gut Roon for what they want, and then shut it down. If it became proprietary to Harman, I'd be royally pissed.
 
Rudy said:
If you ever make it back to the mitten state, pop in and I'll give you a tour of it. My entire digital collection is on a server now, and Roon is all I use in the house for digital--primarily my own files, but Qobuz is icing on the cake. I don't mind paying yearly, as it's a small user base and nobody can maintain it or develop new features without funding. (And it's not proprietary to any one product or brand, which is something I've always been strongly against.) It is about the cost of a CD per month. I can deal with that. Building up a small NUC computer is dead simple and once configured, it can run tucked away anywhere on the network. (I use mine for other server processes too, but that's unique to my network.) My hardware is also Roon-ready, so that is another reason I'd prefer to stick with it.

I only hope Harman improves things, and doesn't decide to gut Roon for what they want, and then shut it down. If it became proprietary to Harman, I'd be royally pissed.
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If I make it back I’ll take you up on this. It sounds cool.

I currently don’t stream much despite it being fairly easy to do here. Maybe that would change if the interface was more engaging.
 
JohnVF said:
Maybe that would change if the interface was more engaging.
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It takes a little "training" to discover all the details, but lately all I do is search an artist, tap "discography," then choose the album I want to play. I keep the best-sounding version as the default, and voila, music starts coming out of things.

If features aren't exactly as I like them, they can be changed to an extent. Such as, ordering albums by original release date, sorting artists by last name, etc. I can also tweak the metadata for albums and songs without tampering with the original file (in case I have already tagged those), as the data Roon pulls in does have flaws in it (I think they use MusicBrainz).

But that's like any software. Takes a while to learn everything, but if used daily it becomes second nature, and we learn how to adjust it to our needs. I tried so many others and couldn't live with how they made a "library" of my files (it would have been a monumental task to fix all the metadata to make them work--Roon's presentation is the cleanest of those I've tried). That and they don't have the decentralized approach that Roon uses, where renderer, control, and storage are separate components, and they offer the clearest visual representation of getting "bit perfect" data from server to renderer. In other words, no laptop precariously perched near an audio system like in the old days.

It's probably overkill if one still spins a lot of discs and has only a small collection of files and a Qobuz account, though. It makes the most sense with a library of music primarily stored on a server. That does, however, open up a lot more choices, as music on that server can be combined with Qobuz and then sent to any compatible device in the house.

(I'm not trying to sell it, but Roon did change my mind on how I could get along using files for playback vs. discs, and it's the best solution for my situation.)

And I can still spin rekkids... 😁 That's the fun of it all!
 
Rudy said:
It takes a little "training" to discover all the details, but lately all I do is search an artist, tap "discography," then choose the album I want to play. I keep the best-sounding version as the default, and voila, music starts coming out of things.

If features aren't exactly as I like them, they can be changed to an extent. Such as, ordering albums by original release date, sorting artists by last name, etc. I can also tweak the metadata for albums and songs without tampering with the original file (in case I have already tagged those), as the data Roon pulls in does have flaws in it (I think they use MusicBrainz).

But that's like any software. Takes a while to learn everything, but if used daily it becomes second nature, and we learn how to adjust it to our needs. I tried so many others and couldn't live with how they made a "library" of my files (it would have been a monumental task to fix all the metadata to make them work--Roon's presentation is the cleanest of those I've tried). That and they don't have the decentralized approach that Roon uses, where renderer, control, and storage are separate components, and they offer the clearest visual representation of getting "bit perfect" data from server to renderer. In other words, no laptop precariously perched near an audio system like in the old days.

It's probably overkill if one still spins a lot of discs and has only a small collection of files and a Qobuz account, though. It makes the most sense with a library of music primarily stored on a server. That does, however, open up a lot more choices, as music on that server can be combined with Qobuz and then sent to any compatible device in the house.

(I'm not trying to sell it, but Roon did change my mind on how I could get along using files for playback vs. discs, and it's the best solution for my situation.)

And I can still spin rekkids... 😁 That's the fun of it all!
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I had every one of my CDs stored on a BlueSound Vault2, it took me months to do it. Then I ended up just switching to Qobuz, vinyl, and R2R, and the vault sits in storage. I'm just not into streaming? I have all the Vault data backed up but I don't remember how to convert it over to FLAC. Apparently there's a way but currently it's some proprietary thing. Screw that and screw blues sound for doing that.
 
JohnVF said:
Apparently there's a way but currently it's some proprietary thing. Screw that and screw blues sound for doing that.
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That is why I've always disliked any proprietary ecosystem, for situations like that. If I dump Roon one day, my FLAC, WAV, DSF and MP3 (sorry) files are all intact and untouched. Likewise, I won't buy a system if it won't play my existing files--I am not going to convert a single thing, as the file types I use are the most widely accepted.

I wonder if there is a "third party" way to extract that data...you'd think someone would have a handle on it by now.
 
Rudy said:
That is why I've always disliked any proprietary ecosystem, for situations like that. If I dump Roon one day, my FLAC, WAV, DSF and MP3 (sorry) files are all intact and untouched. Likewise, I won't buy a system if it won't play my existing files--I am not going to convert a single thing, as the file types I use are the most widely accepted.

I wonder if there is a "third party" way to extract that data...you'd think someone would have a handle on it by now.
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There is a way I just have to figure it out. Because I really don't want to rip all of my CDs again. The thing is, I wish I'd not have ripped ALL of them. Just the best ones.

And I also really like high-res over 16/44.1 so I don't really even care that much, to be honest.
 
I went all out when I converted the CDs--I set up the computer with two optical drives, tried adding the laptop for a third drive but three drives at once were too much for me to handle. With two drives simultaneously churning away, I could work through 40-50 an hour, sometimes while still doing other work. DVD-Audio and SACD required different tools.

With high-res, most new albums I'm interested in buying are available as high-res downloads on release day, so there's no sense in buying a CD that I will rip once and store away in a box. I still buy the occasional CD, but it is usually for something that's been out of print for years, and not available through any download or streamer. And I still have CDs with music that has long been out of print, or in a few isolated cases, the CD's mastering has been better than any high-res or vinyl version I've heard, so I still want those in my library as well.

But at least my CD ripping hurdle has been crossed. I still have two boxes to go through and other scattered discs I've found but, since I haven't played them in over a dozen years, there's no rush. But they're on the to-do list eventually.
 
I think I’ve bought one high-res file in my life. I just stream Qobuz, despite having 3 very nice CD players collecting dust. That’s actually not entirely true, I play classical CDs for background.
 
I have a few dozen needle drops at 24/96, so Roon does come in handy for that--I tag the files via Discogs, then I can organize them in the Roon library. Mostly out of print records that never saw a digital release, or better masterings than any digital version I've heard. It's convenient to be able to pick them out of the library and play them over anything in the house or outdoors. Or when I'm having a "bad health day" and don't have the energy to get up and flip records on the big boy pants system.
 
Rudy said:
That is why I've always disliked any proprietary ecosystem, for situations like that. If I dump Roon one day, my FLAC, WAV, DSF and MP3 (sorry) files are all intact and untouched. Likewise, I won't buy a system if it won't play my existing files--I am not going to convert a single thing, as the file types I use are the most widely accepted.

I wonder if there is a "third party" way to extract that data...you'd think someone would have a handle on it by now.
Click to expand...
I'm with you on all accounts. I think ROON is already pilfering,my content. i cant remember what the feature is but it seemed like they were doing something which accessed users library's... maybe something to do with user generated Radio Stations? or maybe it was ROON AR?.
 
doglv said:
I'm with you on all accounts. I think ROON is already pilfering,my content. i cant remember what the feature is but it seemed like they were doing something which accessed users library's... maybe something to do with user generated Radio Stations? or maybe it was ROON AR?.
Click to expand...
Many on Roon's forums, last time I read over there, are always praising how good it is.

Thing is, do they really have any privacy restrictions or policies in place, and are they clearly posted. Maybe that's something the corporate side of the acquisition will handle. I doubt it will ever happen, but there need to be privacy controls in place, that let the end user decide what data they will allow to be shared with Roon. Right now, everyone is entrusting them with the contents of their entire libraries (at least those who chose to upgrade to 2.0....I didn't, as I stayed on 1.8). To get around their inefficient coding on earlier versions, with 2.0, they decided that rather than cleaning up their own cobbled-together code, they would simply offload that processing to their own cloud servers. Even if they don't look at, examine, or analyze individual users' data...how do we know that? Or if they do, or have the potential in the future to do so, how can we opt out of it?

That is why I'm so conflicted about Roon. I like the basic functions of how it works, especially the decentralized system that separates server, renderers, and control points, and getting a (hopefully) bit-perfect signal to the renderers. And the ability to edit library data without affecting the tags on my media files. Yet it's stuff like the privacy issues, and the 24/7/365 bug that prevents users of version 2.0 from accessing their own library, right under their own roofs, if an Internet connection isn't present, that makes me hope someone comes along with a competing product that leaves them behind. (Short version--their coding is so inefficient that they gave up trying to optimize it for typical computers that Roon Server runs on, and offloaded much of that processing to their own cloud servers.)

I just feel as though Harman is going to keep thing status quo for a short time, then start stripping away what they need until it becomes a proprietary system that works only on their own products, and leave the rest of us hanging. It's the Corporate Way.
 
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