2024 has been an exhilarating ride at Roon, and we’re only four months in!
We’ve announced two new Nucleus models and certified more new partner products than in the first quarter of any other year. We’ve added dynamic features and customer-requested enhancements to Roon and ARC every few weeks. The $499 Nucleus One crushes our long-standing goal of creating the best budget Roon server ever made. We removed Roon’s continuous internet requirement. And today, we’re doing something we said we’d never do – adding folder browsing to Roon.
Nucleus One pairs high performance with unrivaled affordability, providing a best-in-class streaming experience to Roon users of every budget
NEW YORK — March 19, 2024 — Roon, the world’s most innovative listening experience for music lovers, is excited to announce the release of Nucleus One, the newest addition to the Nucleus music server product line. Nucleus One leverages advances in computer technology, technical design, and manufacturing processes to deliver an attractively priced turn-key device specifically intended for Roon’s library management, music exploration, and multi-room music player software.
There’s no denying the popularity of playlists. Open any streaming service app, and you’ll immediately be presented with proof of their far-reaching appeal. Dig a bit deeper, and you’ll likely discover lists for things you never imagined. It’s not that surprising, really. As music lovers, we can’t help but be drawn in by the captivating power of a well-crafted music set. Playlists make DJs and music directors of us all by delivering a creative outlet that opens new vistas into how we interact with music. That’s what Roon is all about–making your music listening more immersive and engaging.
Last November, Roon Labs was acquired by Harman International. This marks a new beginning for Roon, our industry partners, and our team. Today, we want to discuss what this means for us, for you, and for the future of Roon.
Nucleus Titan melds cutting-edge performance with breathtaking aesthetics, delivering the ultimate platform for Roon music software.
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA (January 9th, 2024) – Roon, the world’s most innovative listening experience for music lovers, in conjunction with Harman International, is thrilled to announce the arrival of Nucleus Titan – its next-generation high-performance Nucleus server at CES 2024. Nucleus Titan maximizes recent advances in CPU and SSD technology, technical design, manufacturing processes, and hardware customization to deliver an unparalleled premium device specifically intended for Roon’s library management, music exploration, and multi-room music player software.
MUSE is the new name for Roon’s sound engine and audio processing suite. And now MUSE has landed in ARC – with bold styling and sound quality never before seen or heard in a mobile music app!
MUSE delivers the precision audio control of Roon when you’re on the go or running a streamlined, portable setup from your phone. It’s also one of the most anticipated and highly requested enhancements to ARC’s feature set. We’re excited to pack even more of Roon into ARC, and we’re confident you’ll enjoy what you see and hear in MUSE.
Roon has always provided an immersive listening experience thanks to its vast library of music knowledge and exceptional sound quality. Throughout Roon’s development, we’ve tried to make that experience as inclusive as possible by letting you explore the software and enjoy content in your preferred language.
Today we’re excited to announce the release of Fluency – a revolutionary new discovery and language feature, available only in Roon. Fluencylets you translate even more Roon content in your preferred language. Now, artist names, album titles, credits, performer roles, and genre names are available in 21 languages!
Recently we announced the release of full CarPlay support for Roon ARC, with the promise of Android Auto coming in hot on its tail. Today, we’re happy to make good on that pledge; Android Auto for Roon ARC has crossed the finish line!
Last September, Roon ARC paved the way to enjoying Roon and all your favorite music outside the home. Now, with Roon ARC for Android Auto within easy reach of the wheel, every road you take is a journey in sound.
Roon ARC has forever changed how and where we enjoy our favorite music by transforming our Roon library into a bespoke streaming service that’s ready to go anywhere our adventures may take us. Today, we’re excited to introduce full CarPlay and Android Auto support for Roon ARC!
Ready to hit the road? Your Roon library is too
As soon as we began work on Roon ARC, we were eager to see Roon’s features come to life on our car’s display screen – and so were all of you. Now, just a few months into ARC’s existence, that day has arrived.
Nothing makes the road more exciting than our favorite music. CarPlay and Android Auto fully integrate Roon’s browsing and discovery features into your car’s controls for safe and easy playback.
Now you can cruise your Roon library, dig into your daily mixes as you drive, check out featured playlists, explore new releases, hit repeat on recently played favs, and much more just by tapping a few buttons from your car’s controls. With Roon along for the ride, every car trip drops right into the groove.
How to use Roon ARC in CarPlay
We’ve made accessing Roon ARC in CarPlay as easy as possible so you can focus on the road while Roon provides the soundtrack.
If you’re an Android user, you’ll find similar setup tips in our dedicated Android Auto blog.
To begin, make sure you have Roon ARC. Visit the App Store to download the app.
Once CarPlay is set up and your phone is synced to your vehicle’s interface, you’ll see the Roon ARC app on your display.
Just tap the Roon ARC icon, and you’re on your way.
Explore a new road to music discovery
CarPlay and Android Auto support has maintained the pole position of most requested feature since we waved the starting flag on Roon ARC.
This release reflects our commitment to listening to your needs and delivering the features that matter most to our customers. We can’t wait for CarPlay and Android Auto for Roon ARC to transform your driver’s seat into your new favorite listening chair.
To enjoy CarPlay and Android Auto for Roon ARC, you first need to download the app. Download it now from the App Store or Play Store.
The Roon team has been working on improving the search engine throughout 2022, and last week, we rolled out a whole new architecture for search.
It’s been just about a year since I last wrote about search, so I figured it was a good time to provide an update on what’s been going on behind the scenes.
The Roon team has been working on improving the search engine throughout 2022, and last week, we rolled out a new architecture for search. If you are running Roon 2.0, you have been using the new stuff for several days.
Previously, the cloud performed a search of TIDAL/Qobuz libraries and the Core performed a search of your personal library, then merged the results.
Now, the Core gathers potential matches for the search query and submits them to a cloud service. The cloud service then searches the TIDAL/Qobuz libraries if needed, ranks and merges the results, and returns the final list to the app.
This change will allow us to deliver better results and improve the search engine more quickly. For more information, keep on reading.
Automated Testing Tools
One of the challenges of improving a search engine is understanding the effects of each change that we make. A change that improves one search might accidentally make other searches worse. In order to make progress, we need to be able to test our search system and understand the intended and unintended consequences of each change.
We introduced an automated testing system in 2022 to help us with that. This system allows us to test thousands of searches in the cloud without using the Roon Core. Our test infrastructure will help us make sure we’re not making things worse as we continue to improve the search engine.
Shorter Cycle Time for Improvements
By moving the search engine to the cloud, we can release improvements without shipping new versions of the Roon Core and apps. This reduces the time it takes to deliver improvements to our users, and allows us to iterate quickly on specific issues when they are reported.
Metrics
While our primary goal is to make our users happy, it’s also helpful to have objective signals that show we are making things better. The new search system includes an array of metrics that allow us to monitor search results quality on an ongoing basis. This helps us see if our changes are helping, and also helps us catch any accidental issues that might degrade the quality of search results for our users.
As an example, the “Average Click Position” metric measures the average position where a user clicks when they select an instant search result. For example, a result of ‘1’ means that the user selected the first item in the list.
These are the results from last week’s rollout. You can see that the number dropped quickly around the time of our rollout, which shows that our changes were an improvement.
Smarter Ranking
One of the challenges with the old search system was merging lists that had been ranked separately in the Core and in the cloud. It was difficult to compare scores from different ranking systems, so we relied on heuristics that tried to balance the ranks, popularity information, and text match accuracy.
This often led to less-than-ideal results, and troubleshooting issues was time-consuming because we had to replicate each user’s library in-house in order to see the issues. Since search ranking is now performed in the cloud in a unified way, this class of tricky issues has disappeared.
More Powerful Algorithms
Today, state-of-the-art search systems use Machine Learning to deliver results. It was difficult to use these techniques in the old Roon Core, so one of the main goals of the re-architecture was to enable this.
In the future, we will be able to tailor results to individual users. For example, a Beatles fan typing “John” into the search box probably expects “John Lennon” to be the top result, while a Jazz listener might expect “John Coltrane”.
This will also enable the implementation of modern search techniques like spelling corrections, search suggestions, semantic search, and gradient boosting, none of which are practical within the Roon Core.
Instant Search Improvements
After deploying the new architecture internally in September, we started the process of tuning it to perform better than the old system. We focused on improving the instant search dropdown, making sure that fewer characters are required to reach the desired result, and that the results continue to feel sensible as more characters are entered.
In addition to automated testing, we have a weekly review process where the product and search teams come together to examine a set of 50 representative searches and discuss how the results changed because of the previous week’s work. This helps us understand the tradeoffs and make decisions that prioritize the user experience.
Dozens of Smaller Improvements
As part of this work, we made many of smaller improvements to the search system. Shorter queries like “john” or “pink” should now return more coherent results. The system is not directly auto-correcting misspellings, but it is more tolerant of misspelled terms in multi-word searches. It is also better at prioritizing exact matches, deduplicating similar results, and choosing the best version of an album or track when there are multiple versions available.
While things have definitely gotten better in the past year, 2022 was mostly about laying the groundwork. We plan to make faster and more visible progress in 2023 and beyond.
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I want to thank everyone for their patience as we work on improving the search engine, and for all the feedback in last year’s thread. It has been very helpful in understanding our users’ perspectives, and we hope you will continue to use our product and provide feedback in the future.
