Roon 1.6 ... with Qobuz

[Sailor4W]

Another tip is, try supra cat8 :-)

The house is wired with Cat 7a Ethernet, never heard of supra Cat 8. Will check, though.

https://audiobacon.net/2017/05/31/supra-...ience/amp/

Interesting, thanks!

[Damon]

All,

Quick question on the radio aspect of the update. Is this a radio/ learning kind of thing, where is plays music from your library or Tidal or Qobuz that ROON considers to be similar to the artist or song genre that you first select?

Or is it an internet radio tuner, such that I can easily go to various internet radio stations. I had a ROON trial and the lack of useable internet radio was a deal killer for us. That and the Tidal only streaming support. I'm thinking of Simple radio or TuneIn radio as ideal examples of what I need.

Thanks.

[thumb5]

@Damon, Roon has both the things you described.  Support for TuneIn is there in beta form -- from the Internet radio section of the UI:

Roon now includes beta support for your favourite Internet radio stations!  We'll be adding more stations and features soon.  For now, enter the URL or TuneIn page for any station that streams in FLAC, MP3 or AAC formats to get started.

(Most mentions of "radio" feature since the 1.6 update seem to refer to the former: Roon have apparently improved the algorithm used to select tracks.)

[Sailor4W]

All,

Quick question on the radio aspect of the update. Is this a radio/ learning kind of thing, where is plays music from your library or Tidal or Qobuz that ROON considers to be similar to the artist or song genre that you first select?

Or is it an internet radio tuner, such that I can easily go to various internet radio stations. I had a ROON trial and the lack of useable internet radio was a deal killer for us. That and the Tidal only streaming support. I'm thinking of Simple radio or TuneIn radio as ideal examples of what I need.

Thanks.

Roon has two ‚radios‘: Radio refers to what you describe, namely that Roon tries to find music similar to the one that is just playing. While in previous versions, Roon tried to find music within your existing library, it now finds it in your streaming service Tidal and Qobuz (if one has both available).

The second radio is called ‚Internet Radio‘ where you basically enter a URL of your station you want to have streamed. I haven’t played with it yet to see if became more refined than just pasting a URL into the app.

[Greg]

I don’t like roon radio. I don’t use it. I do use dedicated radio apps that I like. Simples!

[Sailor4W]

I don’t like roon radio. I don’t use it. I do use dedicated radio apps that I like. Simples!

I am not a fan of Roon’s Internet Radio either, as a matter of fact, I do not listen to internet stations at all.
Many Roon users complained about having to paste individual URLs, though. Whether the UI improved in the version 1.6, I don’t know and I basically don‘t care. The most important upgrade for me is the inclusion of Qobuz. That is a big leap forward!

[thumb5]

... The most important upgrade for me is the inclusion of Qobuz. That is a big leap forward!

For me, too. And it seems to work very nicely so far.

[Damon]

Thanks all,
Call me spoiled, but I think we're way past pasting URL's into an app to get radio. Not really quite the user experience ROON clearly offers. If TuneIn Radio is being supported, that would be a very big feature for me. I've discovered so much new music through radio streaming that I am certain I never would have found out about. Plus, I like having someone else pick the tunes. I also need to listen to Italian radio and that is super simple on TuneIn.

Qobuz is not available in NA and though it is on the way for the US, it may not come to Canada. I've tried Tidal twice and bailed each time. Still, I hope we do get Qobuz as I understand that it has a better classical library.

I am always distressed that so many expensive streamers only support one or two streaming services. ROON is similar in this regard. Tidal has been nearly dead more than once, and if it goes, what happens to $5k streamers that now only get spotify, if they are lucky. Back to the W4S Sonos Connect, at least for a while.

[Pim]

Brian from Roon says in the 1.6 thread that they've been working on Roon Internet radio for the last nine months. They just didn't get it "pretty enough" to include it in version 1.6 and they didn't want to delay sending 1.6 out. So proper internet radio, where you can seek on station names or genre etc. will probably come as a minor upgrade some time soon-ish.

[Wdw]

All,

Quick question on the radio aspect of the update. Is this a radio/ learning kind of thing, where is plays music from your library or Tidal or Qobuz that ROON considers to be similar to the artist or song genre that you first select?

Or is it an internet radio tuner, such that I can easily go to various internet radio stations. I had a ROON trial and the lack of useable internet radio was a deal killer for us. That and the Tidal only streaming support. I'm thinking of Simple radio or TuneIn radio as ideal examples of what I need.

Thanks.

This new update, as they tell us, has a new “more intelligent, enhanced, AI” feature so using a learning behaviour that will base all the following song selections on the one song you have chosen for the search.  Said to improve over time as you accept or deny the choices proffered.  Perhaps it will finally be telling you f#ck off, sit down, shut the f#ck up and listen...and don’t touch that remote if you want this to work out for you.
You can elect to limit ROON to search from your library only or to also include any streaming services you may subscribe to...in a Canadian environment that is likely to be Tidal until we have Qobuz at hand.  I have often used ROON RADIO to discover some of those buried and forgotten bits in the darker corners of our hard drive.
The internet radio feature is, as you describe, a simple URL subscription service.   Think they imagine that the quality is so crappy that it would be better served listening to this with a desk top Bluetooth thingy.  As we do.