Saturday, 2 March 2019

Roon + Kii 3s! Who knew...

When the Kiis arrived they came with a free 6 month subscription to Roon, the premium priced (like - seriously!! $500 lifetime subscription!!!) media management and player software system. I was disappointed to discover that Roon Server only runs on Intel really, and then Windows, OS X or Linux. I really wanted it to run on my RPi 3 server, because that means I don't have to spend any more money.

I did sign up for the free sub though, why not?? The Server and Client is installed on my MacBook Pro, and I really like the interface, the Tidal link, and the great support for browsing and info. It was Roon that the dealer used when I first met the Kiis, ran great on his Mac Mini and iPad. Since that initial install, I've done nothing with it, largely because there didn't seem one any way way to get it to play on my RPi and thus Kiis, other than Airplay from the MacBook (gag!).

And then... (duh!) it turns out that RoonLabs have created the Roon Bridge, which is a bit of software that supports the Roon RAAT protocol, runs on various platforms, and feeds the bits to whatever audio interface is connected. Including ARM7... like an RPi 3!

It took me a few minutes to download the self-installing shell script onto my RPi 3 in the front room, running Rune, run it, and there you are! Roon Server recognises the RPi outputs in total, so there are four:

  • The standard audio output
  • HDMI (interesting!!)
  • IQAudio PiDAC+ (connected via the GPIO pins)
  • Kii Control via the USB!!
And now I'm playing with Roon, Kiis and the LXMinis (connected via IQAudio DAC). Excellent!

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