iFi Zen Stream (No USB output in Roon exclusive mode)

I just bought a zen stream as well and have had a lot of challenges setting it up as well with roon.  I use a Black Ice DAC with USB and every time I turn my DAC off I have to go into the iFi app to change it from coax spdif to my DAC so I have to use the All in one setting.  Also, the volume setting also drops most of the time and I have to reset that to hardware otherwise the gain is very low and I have to turn my amp way up.  I have tried opening ticket's with iFi support and they are absolutely worthless and a waste of time.  I have heard that the iFi DACs work well with usb but other brands are glitchy.
I started a thread on low volume with the zen stream as well.  I have decided to live with my zen stream in AIO  mode reseting my DAC/volume with each use.  It does sound very good especially for its price.

Unfortunate to hear that Ifi does not provide better customer support. Have you tried using the exclusive mode with your Zen Stream DAC combo? My Zen Stream app is set to USB out/Chord DAC. Then moment I switch from AIO to Roon exclusive mode, it immediately switches to SPDIF. I read somewhere that the exclusive mode does not work if the Zen Stream is in bridge mode. I don’t quite understand how all that works. I have looked at several threads on this topic, but no real solution that I can find to keep the Zen Stream in USB out. 

Just FYI, my Pi 4 works great as a USB Roon endpoint with Ubuntu.

Recently upgraded to iFi X 5V supply.

Install Ubuntu core and the Bzlib and then follow directions for automatic setup of Roon. 20 minutes.