I stopped as well after losing them a few times over the years when the db went kaput. Playlists are the most basic rudimentary thing in Roon. Zero change to them in all these years, no new sort options (the 3 they have are of no use to me)…disappointing they spend all this effort on a nearly purely visual makeover and next to nothing on functionality.
The Octave team can learn a bunch from what not to do, IMO, by observing Roon blunders.
That said, of course I still use it as a front end, there is nothing else that aggregates streaming and manages disparate endpoints as well - at least not that I’m aware of.
I can hear Johnny Cash earlier in the chorus with Mother MayBelle Carter. Usually he does not overwhelm the other choral singers until later. I hear him immediately.
Didn’t someone once say the best thing that ever happened to Mac was Windows 8? I don’t think this is Roon’s “Windows 8” but it could happen… someone needs to be ready to capitalize.
That was the first thing I noticed (and commented on in a Roon FB group). I had been endlessly annoyed that my iPad had to be used in landscape orientation when I used Roon.
As for your test track, what’s the source? Your own digital file, or a streaming service?
Roon radio is interesting, and useful for times when a playlist finishes and I’m not at hand to start something else. But in my limited use, it seems to populate entirely based on the genre of the last song I was playing. My playlists tend to be pretty eclectic, and often contain everything from rock and pop to jazz and even bluegrass. And every time I’ve let Roon radio run, it’s based every one of its selections on just the last track.
Right now I’m 5 songs into a radio stream that followed one of my playlists. The only bluegrass song in the whole list was the last one. But so far, all 5 songs from the “radio” have been bluegrass.
I believe that the last (or only) track played is what drives the radio selections. You can manually accept or reject songs in the auto generated radio list and it will alter future selections based on your “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” to selections .
Having used the thumbs up or down in other steaming services then losing any variety. I have avoided this and only hit song forward.
I wonder if Roon algorithms sacrifice variety forever? Given that the database stability has been an issue in the past and having to do a clean sheet. I guess one would not need worry.
I have also noted an improvement in the sound with 1.8. I’d be interested in what set up Paul heard Roon through a while back, as sound quality has a lot to do with the set up.
I haven’t used radio on 1.8 yet but in the past it doesn’t seem like variety was reduced by past choices. I seem to listen to a widely varied of seed songs / performers / genres for radio so maybe it doesn’t apply here. I have noticed that there is a finite amount of artists during any particular radio playlist but that may be what Roon deems to be part of the seeded list. Overall I like to use it.
Laugh out loud! Of course I let these run when I get something new and mostly overnight out in the shop where I can’t hear it play but it sure skews the stats.
There’s definitely a learning curve with 1.8 as they’ve changed the UI substantially. But a few days in I’m convinced that there has been a reworked process because it does sound better than 1.7.
With a network isolated core this shouldn’t make much difference. I would imagine much more so if directly connected to Core via USB to DAC.
My DAC is in the shop so I can’t hear any difference at all.
Audio stack improvements
The audio pipeline in the Roon Core has been optimized to reduce memory traffic and CPU usage. We have also improved the efficiency and mathematical accuracy of the dithering algorithm used for DSP.
Does headroom/volume leveling cause a conversion or dither? I wouldn’t think it would.
I only use Vol leveling, for both headroom and to not be shocked with a 10dB higher track, no other DSP in Roon.
For now, I’m listening via MacBook Pro 16" which on ones lap really sounds good for a laptop. They made some massive improvements over previous models and have the space to do so in the 16". No, it’s not comparable to my ‘big rig’ but it’s keeping me sane.
My temporary DAC is a iPhone 7 feeding BHK pre - making no judgements on sound quality here. At least it’s running on battery power! I sure do miss convolution and bass management.
I just remembered I’ve got a Pi4 that I can run Roon Bridge. DAC probably isn’t any better than iPhone but…
