Roon and Naim Streamers (Choices and Problems)

Yep I also tried it to see, but I did not spend a massive amount on one and given your results as well I am thankful I didn’t.

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Interestingly some tend to “hear” a difference…
Placebo effect? Most certainly :wink:

To bad I’m not a “placebo guy” that could have justified the expense… :rofl:

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Hi @CrystalGipsy, (apologies for a small thread diversion…) have just ordered a miniDSP usb mic in preparation for using REW to create convolution filters…and tips or tricks you can share, or any external resource that you found most helpful?

I would look at HomeAudioFidelity as Thierry will create really good filters based on your readings and the price is not expensive and he will tweak until your fully happy. You only need the base service unless you want to eliminate crosstalk. If you contact him he will provide a sweep file that can be used in Roon and will automatically trigger a reading , you need 9 readings in total around your listening area. I would get a cheap floorstanding mic stand as well for better positioning of the mic. He basically follows Dirac’s model for taking readings. You provide readings and a wav of a song you know well. He will.then apply the filter to it and return it to you to hear. You then decide to use his service or not at no cost at this stage. If you want it then you pay him and he will send first set. You then can iterate them if you want.changes. Google homeaudiofidelty and you will find his site.

If you want to do it all yourself then there is a good thread on Roons forum by Magnus guiding you through it. Even he recommends to use HAF though after taking readings. Magnus method is different at taking readings as he uses RTA method.

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Thanks!

Another thing you will likely need to do is either reduce the headroom using the control in the DSP settings to stop any clipping or turn on volume levelling. If making them yourself you can reduce the overall volume to compensate instead.

I definitely got better results using a microphone stand. I’ve been using HomeAudioFidelity as well after trying REW to do it myself with mixed results.

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@CrystalGipsy are you using ROCK for roon? I have built my convolution filters but there seems to be no way to get them over to my Nuc running roon ROCK, all the info I have seen on the roon forums suggests that the convolution filters can only be loaded into roon from a pc (or mac). Will go read up more, but thought I’d ask you the question…

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Yes I use ROCK, you can’t load anything into ROCK without Roon remote UI. So you use the DSP engine section from the Roon remote on a pc. Add a convolution filter and point it to the zip file of your filter. Then make sure you add some headroom management to stop any clipping or you can use volume leveling, which ever works better for you.

Happy listening. Let us know how you get on.

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How did you get on with your filters?

Hi there, got the initial set installed and working, so happy now I know the process. Wasn’t that happy with end result, vocals were quite repressed, but am sure that is user error. Will set aside some time to make more measurements this week, and will likely use HAF based on your recommendation once I am confident measurements are ok.

Which method did you use for measurements, I found doing it myself ended up being a bit meh to. Once done
right vocals will be clear and very present as they should be.

Thierry will tell you if your measurements are good or not. If you follow his instructions on the site then it’s fairly straightforward, just drop him an email, saying your doing it through Roon and he’ll send over the sweep file that autotriggers the readings in REW he needs 9 from different positions around you sweetspot. Similar to Dirac’s method. Then send him your readings and Wav of your favourite track you know well and he’ll get back to you in day or so with the filter applied to it so you can hear the difference yourself before paying him. If at that point you don’t want to go forward with it just let him know. If you do and I think you will then pay up and then you get the filters and can then work.on tayloring them if you need to at no extra charge.

The change can be quite dramatic depending on how much the room plays a part mine was but all for the better. It’s takes a few days for your brain to adjust to it. I can’t listen to it without now in my digital side. Which is leading me to go for a Dirac option for the analogue side.

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I am looking at setting up a similar configuration. I am going to get a Qnap 251 (4gb) however. I would like to ask how you put Roon on to the NAS and separated the database onto the SSZD drive?

Doesn’t Roon specify 8GB as the required RAM for the software to run properly?

Installing Roon is just like installing any other application on a QNAP.

Open the App Center
Search for Roon
Click Install

Once installed qou can select the database location on the QNAP.

4gb should be OK. You may find it a bit slow, it depends on how busy your QNAP is and how large your library is. Try to minimize anything else that is running. I switched from a TS-453pro (8gb) with an SSD based library to an Intel NUC 8th generation i3 and the performance is far better.

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The Roonlabs Knowledge Base website has instructions for configuring a QNAP for Roon. I have found the guides there to be very helpful. They walked me through every step of standing up ROCK on my NUC.

8 GB is not required, but recommended for larger databases. Roonlabs say 2 GB is the minimum for QNAP.

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4gb is minimum

Thank you CG & JDP. So 8GB is the recommended rather than the minimum.

Yes, for regular computers, and 2 GBs for NAS, according to Roonlabs KB.

Unless you have a very large library, 4 GB should do just fine.

I built a NUC with 16 GB, but that’s way overkill and I did that mostly because it wasn’t expensive, and future proofs it for other uses if I decide to repurpose it later.