Roon Labs Version 1.8
Five years ago in 2016 I wrote a review of Roon Labs music player software (version 1.2) when the company was only a year old.
It was a revelation, and I ended my review by stating, ‘I could be wrong, but I am guessing that within another year the majority of audiophiles will be using Roon as their reference. Roon is in a league of its own.’
I turned out to be right. I myself have continued using Roon ever since. But so much has happened in the digital audio arena over the last 5 years that I sensed the need to write a follow-up review. So, when Roon Labs released their major v1.8 upgrade recently on February 9, 2021, and I witnessed significant positive changes in it that would satisfy even a skeptic, the need became a passionate ‘must do’.
Consequently, I reached out to Enno Vandermeer (Founder and CEO of Roon Labs) and he kindly agreed to a video interview that would take place, he in Thailand at 8:00 a.m. and I in New York City at 8:00 p.m. I report here on both what improvements I have discovered in using v1.8 (as I complete writing: Build 783 both Roon Core and Roon Remote, having changed several times beginning with Build 764/Core and 763/Roon Remote), as well as what I learned from Vandermeer through our meeting concerning Roon’s future and of digital audio in general.
What’s new with Roon v1.8 and how I used it in this review
v1.8 is a major upgrade/overhall on several fronts, including very fast processing times; I list five such further significant changes below. It is subscription based as before, but the pricing options now are $120/annual or $12.99/month. Lifetime membership is $699, a price rise of $200 from 2016.
For this review I used an iPad Pro with the Roon Remote App, Roon Core on a Mojo Audio Deja Vu Music Server (ethernet cable in), then USB cable out to a Mojo Audio Evo Pro DAC on to preamp and then amps then speakers. Ethernet and USB cabling by Wireworld. For music: Both Tidal and Qobuz as well as a 1TB internal library on the Deja Vu of my own files.
For headphone use, I used Hifiman HE-R10P as reference connected to a MacBook Air but sent music wirelessly using Wi-Fi (not Bluetooth). This allowed resolution up to 24 bit/384kHz PCM by use of the very tiny Rhodium USB-C DAC/mini-amp by Periodic Audio set up as a Roon Zone. See the screenshot below showing such a Hi-Res signal path confirmed by Roon using a 24/352.8 recorded album Utopias-Radical Interpretations of Iconic Works for Percussion.
1. Visual Presentation. The graphics are beautiful; intense vivid colors with clarity are now used throughout. The `K’ for my name `Karl’ logo is now in green, and the `Play now’ bar is in purple, for example. Larger fonts are used for titles making them more effective. Clicking on my Home Screen button (under Browse) it has `Hi, Karl’ in large bold black at the top left, followed by `New releases for you’ in which album suggestions or singles are presented for your perusal (based on your listening habits). This is followed by `Recent Listening’, with various statistics of what one has been listening to in the last four weeks, with photos and links to explore them further, how long and when, one’s `top artists’ and `top albums’.
Scrolling for larger lists on smart phones and tablets is now vertical making it easier to sift through. When playing a piece of music from an album, if you touch the small album cover displayed at the bottom left, it opens up large to show you lyrics if there is singing. Swiping it causes it to offer interesting (sometimes classic) photos of the musicians involved and swiping again then brings the album cover displayed with all the tracks (see the screenshots of the Holly Cole album, On Temptation, below). Also offered are links to any informational PDF files that come with the album (analogous to an insert on an LP or CD).
When you play an album, under tracks there is a section `More from…’ offering other albums by the same artist or musical ensemble, following are other sections containing `Recommended albums for you’, and `Similar albums’.
2. Credits. You now get a circular photo (or their initials) of each musician (under Performs) or composer (under Composers) with their name, what role they played and/or what tracks they played on. You can play such a track offered or explore more about that person with sections of `Overview’, `Discography’ and `Compositions’, for example. The discography shows you all main albums from that person you have access to (from your own library or streaming services). You can play anything you are shown, or you can continue to investigate. Further information included under credits is Production and Release Information.
3. Search engine. This is now far more detailed and developed, and perhaps it shows its chops most vividly when dealing with one of the most challenging genres: Classical Music. Easy search now under performers, conductors, period, ensembles and so on. You might get offered historical figures in Classical when looking at credits and find yourself exploring old worthy’s like Martin Luther—I did and received a fascinating history lesson.
4. Focus. Now both from your own library but also out of library to Qobuz and Tidal.
5. Roon Radio. It implements use of Artificial IntelligenceI/Machine Learning—drawing upon its own now massive and ever increasing data base from all its own users. It now reaches out to Tidal and Qobuz, too, if you are subscribed making it likely to take you for quite a journey. I will elaborate more on this later in this review.
On a last note: Discovery mode (which I mentioned greatly enjoying in my 2016 review) is not preeminent now because there was no Tidal/Qobuz outreach when they created it; it was for your own internal library. To incorporate out of library streaming services would certainly be a challenge. Perhaps Roon Labs will take a serious crack at this in a future release.
Currently, other Roon options offer ample opportunities to discover, and that is what I did for this review. I was kept busy I assure you—and you will be, too.
Before we focus on my more detailed experience of using Roon 1.8, I offer a brief digression that I think is needed to bring us up to speed.
Changes in the industry in the last 5 years
Five years ago, for those who had a relatively serious home audio system, digital files were almost exclusively kept as a library on one’s own hard drive, and almost exclusively CD rips. High-res files (higher than 16/44.1) were typically bought from companies like HDtracks and Acoustic Sounds (or traded with friends), with 24/96 or 24/192 PCM album files costing $20.00 or more as were some DVD files (trying to gain some traction). Music servers were mainly modified Mac-minis and other desktop/laptop computers (or a NMS) with a player software such as JRiver Media Center (or iTunes if 16/44.1 was your limit). These would connect via USB to a DAC which then sent the analogue out to your system. One had to have ripper software and a CD drive.
Audiophiles discussed (and argued) which music player software sounded best and which ripper software was most accurate. Streaming from the internet from a music provider that was subscription based via connecting your computer to the internet was mainly limited to (say) Spotify that supplied lossy MP3 quality. Tidal was the first one that offered a CD lossless resolution subscription service which was a big deal but it took time before audiophiles were willing to jump on that bandwagon. When I reviewed Roon in 2016, Tidal was not yet supported. Many people did not trust the change, which, was (in words): `Don’t buy, just stream, don’t own it, get a subscription.’
As Vandermeer pointed out to me, to many people ownership is a deeply embedded cultural issue, such as car or home ownership.
When Roon Labs jumped into the arena, the cool thing was its use of the internet together with its knowledge base to supply you in real time active metadata about the music it played or it would make suggestions. You could explore/investigate/research/learn/discover while listening to music supplied by your own sources. One could even stop playing music and continue reading/discovering. Roon is not just a player software—just as an iPhone is not just a phone. And machine learning was part of its game: offering you `intelligent’ suggestions, once it got the hang of your listening habits by studying it (i.e., using it as data to feed its algorithm). It was exciting and fun.
Now, in 2021? My goodness. Look what we have access to:
MQA (master quality authenticated) was made available on Tidal in 2017. It was a big (admittedly controversial) change.
It offered a way to efficiently stream higher-resolution PCM files; not native/totally lossless but using a proprietary method of converting files (folding) to a smaller resolution and unfolding after streaming back up to 24/96 or 24/192.
Then Qobuz (subscription based also) launched in the USA on February 14 of 2019— Valentine’s Day.
They offer native lossless HiRes streaming of PCM files up to 24/192—no MQA and nothing below CD resolution. It has become the main choice of many audiophiles. Both Tidal and Qobuz now have mind boggling, enormous, and continuing to grow, libraries of music in just about any genre you can think of. It is a challenge just to navigate all this opulence. Several other companies including Amazon have moved into the CD resolution or higher offerings and even Spotify is entering the competition (later this year, with Spotify HiFi).
Roon itself now incorporates both Tidal and Qobuz: if you have a subscription you can log in to Tidal or Qobuz from Roon and off you go, they show up on your screen on the left side in the top `Browse’ section, right behind `Live Radio’. Touch one and you have their entire catalog at your fingertips on Roon’s interface along with your own library.
The notion of having library files that you own on a hard drive as a main source is rapidly winding down as the convenience and quality of source files streaming from Qobuz and Tidal has reached a new high; they even allow downloads of their streaming files for use (say) when travelling. There still are those rare occasions when I am made aware of an outstanding recording in digital that is not available via streaming services, and here is such an example: Telemann: 12 Fantasias for Viola da Gamba, Ralph Rousseau, 2019 (24/96 FLAC), TRPTK.
And the hardware available now? Dedicated polished music servers, streamers, and incredible DACs from cheap to astronomical in price are now manufactured and increasingly easy to use. The sound quality has now reached nothing short of stellar. The revolution continues. Roon Labs has been moving along with it even entering the hardware arena with its Nucleus and Nucleus Plus Music Servers.
Most commercial music servers now can accommodate a Roon Core or even come with it onboard, and essentially all DACs will work with Roon even if they are not officially `Roon Ready’.
Roon Radio
Roon Radio is a mode for experimenting and experiencing all that Roon has to offer, so it is here that I will give some examples of journeys that I took. By `journey’ I mean letting Roon choose music for me once I started with my own choice. Although nothing to do with a radio: Once Roon Radio is engaged, Roon chooses tracks for you when the current track you are playing ends.
You can quickly start this mode by selecting `Start Roon Radio’ as a choice when you select a track to be played (the choices are Play from here, Play now, Add next, Queue, and Start Roon Radio).
If you do nothing after that, Roon Radio will forever continue selecting the future for you. But you can (at any time) intervene by inserting a track (or more than 1 track, even an entire playlist or part of) via choosing your own choice and selecting `Play now’ which will result in your choice playing right away, or select `Add next’ which results in your choice played when the current one is finished, and so on. The notion of a queue is inherent, meaning that you are creating a queue of music to be played sequentially and are allowed to modify the queue at any time.
My advice: experiment to learn more, otherwise I’d feel like trying to teach someone how to raise a child by merely reading about it!
To access what Roon Radio is up to (and to End it): Press the small icon to the right of the `next track’ (to play) button at the bottom of the screen. Then you will see and keep a close eye on what is going on, let alone view a complete record of all you have done so far. It also offers a way of enabling Roon Radio and keeping it on: Under `Roon Radio’ choose `yes’ for `Automatically pick music based on your queue’.
As an example, I started playing a 1980s piece by Elvis Costello. Roon led me to reading a biography of Elvis Costello which in turn led to a detour involving his collaboration with Burt Bacharach—and Bill Frisell; I kept reading and listened to such a broad array of music along the way that I never heard before. Among my discoveries (and surprises) was the peaceful and mysterious sounding album The Sweetest Punch 1991; with Brian Blade on drums and Bill Frisell on guitar; an album based on Costello’s previous collaboration with Bacharach, Painted From Memory. I never would have imagined these musicians performing/collaborating all together.
Next, I list some other journeys taken.
Progressive/Classical Rock.
I noticed that Qobuz had Emerson Lake and Palmer albums at 24/96 remastered. I was a big fan of ELP having attended several live concerts in the 1970s at their heyday when I was a teenager.
I started with their first album Emerson Lake and Palmer, playing `Lucky Man’ and then the drum solo `Tank’. Roon Radio proceeded with the Album Trilogy, the track, `From The Beginning’, then onto `Really Don’t Mind/See There a Son is Born’ from Jethro Tull’s album, Thick as a Brick, then the classic `Roundabout’ from the Yes album Fragile, then `Glad’ from the Traffic album John Barleycorn Must Die and finally ‘Nights in White Satin’ by The Moody Blues, then `School’ from Super Tramp’s album Crime Of The Century followed by `One Of These Days’ from Pink Floyd’s Meddle): It had started going too far astray from my preferred progressive/classical rock theme—and I needed to catch my breath. Roon did a fine job overall though, bravo. I could have of course inserted a new track to pull it back to whence it came but I decided to start a new journey with a different theme.
Time For Three.
In 2016 I had been intrigued by the US musical group Time For Three consisting of two violinists, Zachary de Pue, Nick Kendall and one double bassist Ranaan Meyer; in particular I enjoyed the 2014 album Time For Three. A wonderfully creative and energetic threesome that even caught the eye of conductor Sir Simon Rattle, they are classically trained but their music is a playful mix of classical, folk and beyond. At that time, due to Roon, I had discovered that Zachary de Pue had left and was replaced by the Canadian, Nikki Chooi. I had made a mental note to check out the new lineup, but forgot about it. So, I restarted my investigation afresh and discovered by using Roon that Nikki Chooi had been—within one year—offered and had accepted the role of Concert Master for the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra at Lincoln Center in New York City; he thus had been replaced by yet another violinist Charles Yang.
Meanwhile, I searched for more information about Nikki Chooi and discovered a most entertaining Youtube video filmed in Buffalo, NY at Kleinhans Music Hall: Nikki Chooi had moved yet again to become concertmaster for the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra (BPO) in 2019, Time For Three had been invited to give a concert and who comes out to join them in the midst of their performance? Nikki Chooi, in his capacity as concertmaster (and dressed as so). What we get could be called `Time for Four’, a hilarious romp by the four of them. (I am sure you will find it if you do a Google search of Chooi/BPO/Time For Three.)
More comments from Enno Vandermeer
I asked Vandermeer about the future of audio streaming (such as Qobuz, Tidal, etc.) and how he envisioned them 5 years from now. He thought that currently they try to cover everything possible out there, making the user confused and the provider struggling to help; he thought streaming providers will split into smaller niche companies that will focus on a smaller subset of offerings such as genre (jazz, classical): people do have tastes that can be quite intensely focused mainly on one genre or other aspect of music. He also thought that the current pricing models (subscription based access to music or buying files) need more tinkering to ensure that musicians get their fair share and that this could shake up the industry in the next several years.
Related to this we talked about the pandemic and how it has affected streaming and what positive might come of it. After all, the pandemic has brought things out in stark terms: concert halls closing, jazz clubs and other small live music venues shuttering from loss of business. Musicians losing the ability to play/record and earn a living: Live music in general has taken a terrible beating.
He pointed out that the live streaming of music has taken on a role that will most likely continue: allowing people to ‘see and listen live to’ a performance without having to be on location in (say) Carnegie Hall or a famous jazz club. It has helped keep some stay afloat. Can Roon somehow creatively help to support live music streaming? We shall see.
Vandermeer was excited about machine learning and how it has been crucial to Roon. He explained how machine learning technology coupled with Roon’s unique access to its own users' database gave them the ability to cater to individual needs, suggest and offer them the highest quality of music to keep them satisfied, challenged and entertained. The point is that the proprietary Roon user database contains expertise in areas of music; many users are musicians, recording engineers and the like, for example, with keen listening habits and knowledge about such music. You mix that with machine learning, which has advanced and blossomed in recent years, and you get something special. Machine learning is an area of artificial intelligence (AI) that utilizes learning from data (a `training set’) to make decisions. Using this technology for Roon is a beautiful application. If it senses that you have been exploring (say) jazz drumming, it will begin to suggest high quality jazz drumming tracks and albums that it gleamed from its jazz experts. It did so for me.
Summary
If you have not done so already, then trying out Roon 1.8 is a must if you have a serious interest in playing audiophile quality digital music. The sheer number of files and the breadth of genres covered from streaming services such as Tidal and Qobuz is downright staggering. Roon has evolved along with these changes and with update version 1.8 has made a significant effort to confront them—for now. What will happen in the next several years? Your guess is as good as mine, but I think Roon is your best bet if you want to stay ahead of the curve.
Further information: Roon Labs
