Aurender vs. Roon

I want to feed my MSB Renderer with the best sounding Ethernet feed possible. I am looking at the isolated Ethernet approach used in the Aurender ACS10 and the Zenith MK3.

Based strictly on sound over isolated ethernet, which of these three are best:

• Aurender ACS10
  
• Zenith MK3 using Innuos’s software
• Zenith MK3 using Roon

Thanks.

Paul

If all I care about is sound quality (not interface) and I am looking to feed a MSB Renderer (no DSP use) overt ethernet, would people recommend Roon run on Innuos Zenith MK3 with isolated ethernet or the new Aurender ACS10 with double isolated ethernet?

Again the application is a server with ethernet output to Dac Renderer with no DSP where sound quality is only criteria.

Thanks!

I had an old NUC around I hadn't been using - about a year ago I bought a Macbook Pro and the need for a windows based system is no longer needed.  Today I updated the BIOS, formatted the drive and made the NUC into a Room Rock.  I have the Room Rock connected to a Synology NAS drive, 2 4TB drives used exclusively for music.   The library is slow to analyze and I have had to squelch the library processes to improve performance, but other than that I have had no issues with streaming.  

I have integrated my Sonos Connects  and will use those in secondary listening areas.  For my main listening room I haven't completely figured that out.  I have a resolution cantata that is not Room compliant, but that doesn't mean it won't work - just not tested.   I will experiment with that and see if I can integrate.  

My initial thought after 1 day is it is a lot of $ for the info Roon provides. It definitely improves upon the streaming experience, but it is still streaming and I find myself putting the music on and not using Roon's features.  

I suppose streaming will never be as intimate as vinyl where I consciously grab a record, choose side A or B, look at the cover art, read the liners and then either flip, put away, or chose a new record in 15-20 minutes. 

I spoke to soon - After 4 hours of streaming I get a message similar to , "Roon lost control of the audio device". I simply hit play 
again and music started to stream.  Doing a quick google search this seems to occur quite often. I have 13 more days to analyze, but will not keep if Roon is at all fiddly.

In case anyone is interested, I was able to integrate Sonos connects without issue after messing with for a couple of days.  In short, connects should run wireless and not share the same router  (wired) as the Rock.  I am not sure why that is, but I found this piece of advice on another forum.   Also I changed the wireless channel of the connects.  Once those 2 steps occurred I have not had any issues.  IN fact, the queuing up of music is extremely fast, much faster than Sonos UI.  

Thus far I really like Roon.  

Now the dilemma of if I should get a  MQA/DSD capable DAC.  

My experience comparing the Roon to Aurender N10.

The Sound
I tried the Roon on a 2018 MBP, ethernet to Gigabit switch, then ethernet to an Ayre QX-5. Then RCA out to a Marantz AV7704 (I used the 7.1 Channel in to avoid the Marantz DAC) Speakers were B&W 803D3 and amps were Classe Sigma 2Amps. It sounded ok, not bad but not any better then running the MBP directly to the Ayre. It just allowed you to use an iPad interface vs the MBP.

Aurender N10 test. Then I transferred the same songs - ALAC & MP3s to the Aurender. Used it's USB out (Also tried the AES/EBU and COAX) The difference was immediate. Got an immediate thumbs up from the wife. More depth and much larger soundstage. The notes just seemed to carry better. And the bass was deeper. For me it clearly sounded better.

Winner - Aurender.

The Apps.
Roon. We (wife, myself & 2 teenagers too) felt the Roon app was to cluttered and suffered from info overload. It reminds me of apps that i'v tried on my phone that were great in the beginning (clean and simple) and then transformed into a method for advertisers to push products onto you - going from a pull technology to a push technology. 

Aurender N10.
We much preferred the interface of the Conductor App - clean, simple, no distracting links and articles. Just realize that you need good metadata so it sorts the way you want in the Conductor App.

Winner - None - They are just different. It really depends on what experience you are looking for.

Practical considerations.
Our computers are upstairs in the office. The listening room is downstairs. We listened to music by going upstairs turning on the computer (Make sure Home Share is on and set computer to not go to sleep or log out). Then turn on the stereo and Apple TV (connect to the computer and stream music from there to the Apple TV) then via HDMI to the Marantz. What a pain in the *%&. We could leave everything on but would still have to suffer with the Apple TV interface.

That's why we looked at Roon. But you need to leave everything on - iTunes opened, Roon opened, computer set to not sleep. Or you get a NAS and set it up downstairs. Based on this and our tests we did not feel that Roon was for us.

The Aurender - transfer your library there, update it once a week?, and you're done. You can turn everything on from downstairs and you get great sound. No messing with computers. Just need an iPad and WIFI.

Cost? Yes the Aurender costs more. But we all make choices.

Lastly - If you have bad source material. The Aurender with the Ayre cleaned up a lot better than Roon through the Ayre. We tried a few old mp3s we had from the early days of the internet ;-)