Roon set-up: Wifi enabled MacBook or wired dedicated NAS

I’ve used Roon on a MacBook Pro, and it works fine over WiFi into an Airport Extreme, although from there, the connection to my streamer is wired. No issues with dropouts etc. I did think that sound quality was a bit better when I used a wired Ethernet connection for the Mac, though. 

In your setup, I think I would want an always on device to run Roon, and if you don’t use things like it’s DSP settings too heavily, you may find that a relatively modest NAS is sufficient. I would be a little wary of using a NAS, especially a high powered one, very close to the HiFi, especially if it’s on the same mains circuit. The same would apply with a Mac Mini. 

Not sure that a USB connection would be for on a Mac Mini? Is that for external USB storage? 

Finally, get a man with a drill to come round and put in a network cable, then you can site all this potentially noisy computer junk well away from the HiFi. ????

Iver van de Zand posted:

Dear all,

Now that my NDX-2 is in, I consider Roon. I struggle with the ideal set-up given I want to control the investment a little bit. My current setup is as follows:

• 282/250Dr/NapSc/HiCapDr/NDX-2/XPSDr are all wired to a Netgear Switch next to my system
• a QNAP NAS is Wired next to my system
• The Netgear switch has a wired connection to an Airport Express that delivers the Internet signal
• The Airport Express has a bridged Wifi connection to an Airport Extreme that is in another part of my house next to where the Internet enters my home

If I'd go for Roon, I consider following set-ups but struggle which one is the preferred one as it comes to sound quality:

1. I could replace my QNAP NAS by a more powerful model with an embedded SSD running Roon plus my to existing WD disks that I could swap. Advantage is that this new NAS would be wired into the switch, plus I replace just the NAS and do not add new devices. Has anybody done this by the way? Any advice what QNAP model to choose (I consider the 471)
2. I have an existing MacBook Pro with I7, 16gb RAM and 500Gb SSD. I could install Roon Core on that one. The downside is that I can/want only use the MacBook in Wifi, and not wired to the switch. Would that work well? For example: will a music-file "physically" pass the RoonCore on the macBook, or is the RoonCore just "instructing" the NAS and NDX-2 to play a certain file? If the file physically passes the MacBook, I doubt whether the wifi isn't a barrier? If that's the case, I maybe need to invest in a stronger/faster Wifi bridge with solutions from 
3. I could buy a second hand MacMini and connect it wired to the Switch. Downside is that I need to invest in a decent USB cable and maybe something for noise-cancellation on USB

 

I know there are many other options with NUC's etc, but then I immediately am in an investment of 1500€++ . I think that my question basically comes down to: can I use a Wifi-driven Roon Core while still respecting performance and sound quality? How have others set-up Roon.

In my consideration above, I might have missed good options. If anyone has a suggestion, I am eager to know

Cheers

Iver

As a first step, I would try to move the current QNAP from the Airport Express to the Airport Extreme and even try to get rid of the Airport Express and of the Netgear Switch: the NDX 2 has finally a wireless interface.

If this improves the sound quality in your system,  I would run the Roon Core on a small headless computer connected to the Airport Extreme. You do not need to invest 1500 EUR for that, something like a fitlet2 should be enough, just check the Roon forum and minidis.nl.

If it turns out that a wireless connection between the NDX 2 and the Airport Extreme is not a viable option, I would leave everything as it is and just connect something like a fitlet2 running the Roon Core to the Netgear Switch.

Caveat: I do not have any first hand experience with Roon, NDX 2 and QNAP devices!

Hi NBPF,

Thanks for your replay. Apart from the advice on Roon (thanks for that !! I did not knwo the Fitlet2), are you suggesting to use the NDX-2 complety wireless? I am not going to do that; I have a lot of Hi-Res with massive data-volumes and am pretty convinced a wired connection is still the preferable one. 

Anyway, thanks for the tip in Fitlet2

Cheers

Iver

Iver van de Zand posted:

Hi NBPF,

Thanks for your replay. Apart from the advice on Roon (thanks for that !! I did not knwo the Fitlet2), are you suggesting to use the NDX-2 complety wireless? I am not going to do that; I have a lot of Hi-Res with massive data-volumes and am pretty convinced a wired connection is still the preferable one. 

...

Yes, it does not cost you anything to give it a try and if it works fine you can very much simplify your system. Most importantly, you can move devices that can potentially radiate electric noise away from your NDX-2.

If you like Naim's UPnP server and your music collection is reasonably sized, you could also try to get rid of the QNAP altogether: simply connect a SSD drive to the rear USB port of the NDX-2 and have the device act as a UPnP server.

This will prevent any data transfer through your (wired or wireless) network except for the communication between the Naim app and the NDX-2. This only involves sending simple controls, the high resolution data would flow from the SSD into the NDX-2's internal memory. The NDX-2 is a very flexible device, thus there are many ways to use it!

I think it depends where you keep your audio files - if they are on the Qnap then Roon on your MBP  would pull the audio from there over wi-fi , process it or not, and send it to the NDX 2 over wi-fi - while this might work fine there's a chance that the reliance on pulling data from the NAS first might cause issues.

I run my Roon Core on a Mac Mini but so far have tended to use audio files on a connected external USB drive as the Mini is on wi-fi.

I may try to see what happens if I add a networked storage location to Roon - one thing to remember is that as Roon analyses the audio when it finds it first this could lead to lots of network traffic until it completes this task.

I don't think Roon will see audio on your Qnap automatically via UPnP either - you would need to configure Roon to see the audio files on a network share - you can use multiple file locations eg internal, external, networked storage.

I run Roon Core on an Intel NUC 5i3, with 8GB and a 240GB SSD, basically, the lowest spec NUC supported by ROCK. But also very close to that used by Roon's own Nucleus product (not the Nucleus+ product)

These are not expensive, nor the RAM or SSD, as they are off-the-shelf commodity IT products. In fact, as they are 'older' probably on offer somewhere. You can also buy one fully configured with RAM and SSD.

No need to worry about 'older' kit here - it is just a headless unit, running a lean embedded Linux based OS.
I have a library of just over 6,000 albums of which 60% are HiRes, stored on a ReadyNAS unit - the ROCK unit scans them all in under a minute, and any new additional material is added quickly, and without fuss.
The NUCs with an i3 processor only have a TPW of 15W, so little power consumption, and therefore little heat generation, so no need to worry about fans in the case - serving music, 'as is' to the Endpoint, they are just ticking over.

Installing ROCK is easy, there are good instructions on the Roon Community forum - just a case of getting the build onto a USB stick, and letting the NUC boot up against it - that's it.

Run it physically next to your NAS, i.e. out of the clean 'frontend' environment, and let the Roon Endpoint stream over your existing network. No need to change NAS, buy a dedicated Roon server or worry about fanless cases and all that.

Simon.

Alley Cat posted:

 

...

I may try to see what happens if I add a networked storage location to Roon - one thing to remember is that as Roon analyses the audio when it finds it first this could lead to lots of network traffic until it completes this task.

....

 

In fact it seems to handle this pretty well - no glitches playing hi-res or CD rips from my NAS using an SMB network share on Mac Mini on wi-fi.

I'd give the Room software a demo.

simes_pep posted:

I run Roon Core on an Intel NUC 5i3, with 8GB and a 240GB SSD, basically, the lowest spec NUC supported by ROCK. But also very close to that used by Roon's own Nucleus product (not the Nucleus+ product)

These are not expensive, nor the RAM or SSD, as they are off-the-shelf commodity IT products. In fact, as they are 'older' probably on offer somewhere. You can also buy one fully configured with RAM and SSD.

No need to worry about 'older' kit here - it is just a headless unit, running a lean embedded Linux based OS.
I have a library of just over 6,000 albums of which 60% are HiRes, stored on a ReadyNAS unit - the ROCK unit scans them all in under a minute, and any new additional material is added quickly, and without fuss.
The NUCs with an i3 processor only have a TPW of 15W, so little power consumption, and therefore little heat generation, so no need to worry about fans in the case - serving music, 'as is' to the Endpoint, they are just ticking over.

Installing ROCK is easy, there are good instructions on the Roon Community forum - just a case of getting the build onto a USB stick, and letting the NUC boot up against it - that's it.

Run it physically next to your NAS, i.e. out of the clean 'frontend' environment, and let the Roon Endpoint stream over your existing network. No need to change NAS, buy a dedicated Roon server or worry about fanless cases and all that.

Simon.

Hwo exactly is the NUC connected to the NDX-2? Is that through the swith they are both connected too via UTP, or directly from the NUC via a usb cable?

All network connected - the Roon Core, your NAS and NDX-2, as file source -> Roon server -> Roon Endpoint

Roon has its own protocol, based on TCP/IP, but it doesn't matter, the Endpoint sees the Roon Core, the Roon Core scans the library, and that's it.

Also, no conversion of a packet based stream to asynchronous USB or S/PDIF - it stays in data packets, until the Roon Endpoint unpacks and converts into an I2S data stream internally, which is what the Naim Network Players have been optimized to do, with the SHARC based processing.

The Roon Endpoint also can be any 'Roon Ready' equipment, from Sonus players in the kitchen, AppleTVs, any Chromecast devices, to RPis with HATs for SPDIF output/DACs etc., so makes so very easy multi-zone system - a lot stress fuss or stress than the 'Room' discovery that Naim has been troubled by, and I see that Naim based Multi-room is broken again already!

thanks Simes, I think the the Intel NUC is indeed a good solution. Was installing Roon (boot through USB stick) easy or tricky ?

Simes pointed you in the right direction. But to get started use the MacBook. That’s what I did. It gets you started while you build or buy a dedicated bit of hardware such as a nuc. I ended up buying a ROON Nucleus. I keep my music on the same QNAP nas I was running Asset on. Just install ROON on that Mac and get started. 

Iver van de Zand posted:

thanks Simes, I think the the Intel NUC is indeed a good solution. Was installing Roon (boot through USB stick) easy or tricky ?

Very easy. I have installed ROCK on two NUCs now, this NUC5i3 and an earlier i3 NUC, and once you get the boot image on the stick, it’s easy. Roon has good instructions on their site to install ROCK.

simes_pep posted:

Very easy. I have installed ROCK on two NUCs now, this NUC5i3 and an earlier i3 NUC, and once you get the boot image on the stick, it’s easy. Roon has good instructions on their site to install ROCK.

Hi [@mention:29865740417128064] : I am about to place an order for an Intel NUC with I7, 256Gb SSD and 8gb RAM aiming at installing Rock. I have seen the detailed documenttation with the Image on an USB. Question is as follows: The NUC is pre-installed with a Windows 10 version. So I could either install Roon Server "on top of" Windows 10, or install Rock using the Image USB. IS the latter the better option?

The NUC will be wired to my Netgear switch that has also wired connections to NAS, NDX-2 and TV Box

Well if you install Roon Server on a Windows machine you still have to manage the Windows OS, apply updates & monitor Anti-virus etc. But you can run other applications in addition to Roon, and perform low-level admin functions on the Wondow environment.

If you go down the ROCK path, it becomes a dedicated single use environment, just to run the Roon Optimised Core Kit - other than a few lines of text, there is no access to the hardware, the OS etc. There is just a web based admin page. Notifications of updates and product releases are through the Roon Remote interfaces and any required updates pushed onto the NUC and managed direcrly.

I run Roon Core on an SSD plugged into my QNAP TS251 NAS and it's absolutely fine if you don't want to do any intensive DSP. The NUC based suggestions are all good but they mean yet another device always needs to be on whereas your NAS is going to be on anyway, also no worries about keping another device up to date.

simes_pep posted:

Well if you install Roon Server on a Windows machine you still have to manage the Windows OS, apply updates & monitor Anti-virus etc. But you can run other applications in addition to Roon, and perform low-level admin functions on the Wondow environment.

If you go down the ROCK path, it becomes a dedicated single use environment, just to run the Roon Optimised Core Kit - other than a few lines of text, there is no access to the hardware, the OS etc. There is just a web based admin page. Notifications of updates and product releases are through the Roon Remote interfaces and any required updates pushed onto the NUC and managed direcrly.

Exactly what I thought ... thank you so much [@mention:29865740417128064] ... I think I will than choose for the NUC with Windows 10 and install Roon Server. If I ever want to get rid of Roon, I can use to run Assett, Tidal desktop or somthing else

studied a bit more ..... Running Roon Server on top of Windows 10 would unnecessarily rund tasks on the NUC that I do not need. It uses a lot of resources and I noticed some threads on the Roon Forum about those tasks affecting SQ. So in the end I purchased a I5 8Gb 120gb SSD NUC and will install Roon Rock .. there are very good installation guides on Youtube