To ROON or not to ROON ?

I tried Roon two or three years ago when they had a 30 day free trial. I thought it was nice, but not worth the money.  It didn't really lead me to new music, the auto-generated play lists didn't do much for me, and so on.  I also have Qobuz and really enjoy its weekly new music updates -- that has lead me to more new artists of interest to me than anything Roon did.

OTOH, I know there are a lot of people who absolutely love Roon and think it is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  So, like lots of things, this is one you'll have to decide for yourself.

I have Roon and Qobuz. Coming from years of using JRiver Media Player, Roon is light years ahead in interface & ease of use. Plus Qobuz integrates seamlessly into Roon. I've found a couple new artists through this setup. I can't say whether it's because or Roon or Qobuz, but I liked Roon enough to purchase a lifetime subscription.

I thought about it when choosing a streamer but really don't want another subscription.    In the end I picked an Aurender N200.  It checked all the boxes for me and I think after using  it it was definitely the right choice coming from a Vault, which I still use.   I can actually pull ripped content from the Vault to the Aurender over the network .  So for me a closed ecosystem is best .   If I need music in another room I will just move the Vault over there .

I can definitely see the appeal of Roon.   Just not for me 

I used JRiver for years… and now having switched to Aurrender is like getting computing completely out of the picture. It is great… I was in IT my career. I want my streamer like my preamp, amp… etc… plop it down and listen to music.

While I copied my ripped tunes from my NAS to my two Aurender streamers… I never use them. I just use Qobuz. Better or same sound quality as ripped or CD. So happy to have computers out of it… also the sound quality is now up to the sound quality of my vinyl end.