1. Home
  2. digital
  3. 197310-187969

Roon vs Qobuz Connect

Yes the title is misleading because Qobuz is a server and Roon is an aggregator. But this question is for all those who stream Qobuz via Roon, or via Qobuz Connect (QC).

There is little doubt that QC sounds significantly better than Roon streaming Qobuz. Admittedly a subjective opinion, but for all of those who agree:

The advantages of Roon in integrating personal and external sources are obvious. To counter this, I can run a small local server and access my personal collection via Qobuz. But the aggregation sucks overall. 

What can I do to have my QC cake and eat it too? I’d love to hear about any clever tweaks to imitate Roon’s capabilities, while keeping QC quality. 

debrajray
rbstehno
1,647 posts
 

Audiophile1-your post doesn’t make sense. I use the same audio hardware and cables for both roon or Qobuz connections. There is no way that people are going to buy specific cables for roon and other cables for QC. I bypass my Linux roon server when using QC, but use every other piece of audio equipment. I have all the settings set as described above, Roon on a Linux (best sounding OS), with many high powered cores and 64g ram, and QC sounds better, to me, to my audio friends, but the interface is in the dark ages compared to Roon.

The last time I demoed Audirvana, it also sounded better than Roon, but again the interface can’t compete with Roon

rivinyl
213 posts
 

What about the server?  Has anyone epxerienced better sonics with "better" servers?

jji666
666 posts
 

 Has anyone experienced better sonics with "better" servers?

Not better sound, but Roon can need a pretty beefy server to reduce unreliability.  Roon server software can run tons of processes, need lots of memory, and grinds itself silly updating metadata sometimes.  A better machine can mitigate those effects. This all depends on size and nature of your Roon library, including unidentified albums and usage of lots of tags.

This is one reason I favor the 2-machine server-streamer configuration.  You can have a super beefy machine and still have a quiet endpoint serving to the DAC. 

This doesn't impact audio quality however...it is reliability...

dwette
573 posts
 

I think if one is going to be serious about using Roon the best bet is to use it on a dedicated appliance, either running it on a Roon Nucleus (~$600) or building your own using a NUC with ROCK OS (which is what I did). I don't want to run Roon server on a computer – not optimized for it – that I use for other stuff, even if it's a more capable computer (like  my Mac Mini M4 Pro).

jbhiller's avatar
jbhiller
1,458 posts
 

My subjective perception is, yes, Qobuz connect via a Wiim Ultra to my Linear Tube Audio Aero DAC sounds better than Roon nucleus to my LTA Aero DAC. 

No clue why. I'm convinced there's just more clarity. Of course, I could be wrong.  I don't care. I hear it so, therefore, it is!

More to discover