johnc2010

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Hi there,

I am looking for some advice. I am currently using an Onkyo A-9010 with some excellent Q acoustics floorstanders, and love the sound they produce.

I have a large collection of high res files which have maxed out the storage on my macbook hard drive, and was considering investing in a NAS. I currently play these via Roon but I also stream using Deezer, both via a Chromecast Audio. Ideally I would like to control both of these using one app / controller.

Wondering what my best options are - investigating NAS drives and upgrades to the chromecast audio led me to music streamers, but that then led me to questioning if I should instead look for an amp with some network features...

I was considering the bluesound node 2i, but then the powernode 2i seems like a more efficient use of space. I really want something with a clean app to control all the inputs, so the Sonos amp seems like a great choice, but it has mixed reviews (and I don't own any other sonos devices).

Looking for some thoughts and advice from some experts!

Thanks
 
If you're happy with Roon and don't need the additional features of a NAS.

Get a used Intel NUC5i5RYH (or newer although the 5i5 has more than enough CPU) and install Roon's own ROCK OS on it. This will be far more stable than running Roon on a NAS. You can then either add an internal or external drive, which the Rock OS will mount on your network as a shared drive. It will also self update and look after itself.

That doesn't solve the Deezer issue though. I guess it depends on how much of a dealbreaker that is. You could use a Raspberry Pi with a DAC Hat as an endpoint which would also add Airplay/Bluetooth/DLNA support as a fall back. Someone posted this the other day which I though was a good intro to Raspberry Pi streamers. Or you could get a Node 2i and use it as a Roon endpoint, although a slightly expensive route to go just for occasional Deezer use.

Having come from Sonos, which I still have a lot of good words to say about. Roon's user interface and music discovery features are night and day better. If you are used to using Roon then some of the apps that come with all-in-one streamers may be a slight shock to you. Add to that the fact you aren't limited to using a single vendors audio devices to play music and it starts to make a lot of sense for multi-room setups. Having used Roon for some time I would now find it frustrating/limiting to go back to using the Sonos app or be tied to one audio hardware manufacturer.
 
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