ROON

[ssfas]

I was participating in an interesting discussion about Roon on the Devialet site. I know people are passionate about Roon, even if I'm not. The only music supplier it is fully integrated with is Tidal and as I use another service (with all the metadata I need) and don't have multi-platform music at home, it does not suit me.

I was having a look at it from a business perspective, noting that in the UK there are three leading hi-end digital brands and none of them have Roon (Naim, Linn and Chord). Why?

Apparently Naim are in the process, but I doubt they are averse. Their original streaming platform was third party software anyway (from DigiFi in London).

Chord only have Roon in a small bolt-on device, but not in their main streamer product line (only upnp/DNLA, which Roon say is rubbish and the reason for developing RAAT).

Linn/Roon has been a 2-year fiasco, because Linn wanted Roon (who originally agreed) to adopt their Songcast protocol, and now Roon insist on Linn implementing RAAT. The top people from Linn and Roon have explained on page 4 here:
http://forums.linn.co.uk/bb/showthread.p...pid=410571

Of perhaps more significance, Roon insist on a standardised licensing and certification agreements for their software. There is no license cost, but Linn made the valid point that it holds them to ransom for certification and changes to the agreement. Without going into the legal issues, they have a point. They also say, correctly, that whilst these issues may not be a major problem for other Roon partners for whom streaming devices are only part of their range, for Linn streaming is core, as is the case for Devialet.

Also bear in mind that Roon is own by a New York registered LLC. The last thing Linn, or anyone, would want is to get into an IP dispute in New York.
Roon also imply that they don't have much spare cash (if any) and are reliant on manufacturing partners for their marketing.

So basically Roon want their partners to adopt the Roon non-standard RAAT platform and all Roon functionality in its entirety, no tweaks, nothing left out, agree to a licensing agreement that effectively gives Roon a veto, pay for the technical development, and then Roon have a free marketing platform. Roon may have some nice software, but for a 2-year-old start-up with little cash (no external investors) that's a pretty aggressive approach.

The manufacturers who have implemented Roon seem to have done so in separate streamer devices. Bryston have simply put a Raspberry Pi in a nice case and slapped a $1,300 price tag on it. Some of the Roon "partners" don't yet actually have any products supporting Roon, Meitner and Audionet for example (I only looked at a few).

Implementing Roon is way more demanding than the various upnp streaming services. For Linn the multi-platform service was the main issue, because it was incompatible with Linn's Songplay protocol. As Devialet Expert and Linn DS have many similarities, I suspect Devialet would run into exactly the same technical and licensing issues with Roon as did Linn.

Devialet's intentions are to develop a major software offering. Committing a product line to a small start-up software company with very limited funds just makes no sense to me.

Expert is Devialet's sole high-end component audio product line, an integrated product from source to speaker output. Many people are asking that product line, representing a significant investment, to have a commercial tie-in with Roon. That would be fine if Roon is a long-term success, but there is no guarantee. For example, what if Roon decided to partner with a major Asian manufacturer like Onkyo or TEAC, which would establish Roon globally, but for a 50% share in the business. Roon have no such major partners yet. Then the other partners are at the whim of that shareholder, who would first thing change the licensing. That would seem to be why I cannot see that any established brand has committed to implement Roon throughout its product range, Linn being the perfect example. This is my best guess at Devialet's thinking and why I think Roon implementation in Expert is unlikely, but you never know.