Best Server To Run Roon Core

More excellent Ideas. Thank you.

BACCH-SP appears to have preamp and dac capability as well. It is intriguing but I would be interested in how well it does all the things that it is designed to do.

Wolf Audio will definitely be a consideration.

Some of the recommendation above already have inbuilt server / rendered capability. For this, a Nucleolus was originally my frame of reference.

Consensus from above however, seems to be to keep the server and renderer separate, so thinking for server -to set up a NUC, powered by an external LPS (I might actually have a matching Paul Hynes for this) - total cost for the server with LPS is about $1500. - A separate NUC / PH LPS for rendering would run another $1500 -> for a total of $3500 with cables.

So assuming music storage cost aside, and this setup will be done correctly, thinking if there is a better way to go (SQ wise) for SAME Money with Roon? Or can one get the SAME SQ, but less expensively with Roon?

You don’t need 2 NUCs all you need is an endpoint which could be anything from a raspberry pi4 to any Roon ready streamer. The NUC runs the core and could be attached to a DAC if wanted but most use some sort of endpoint or roon bridge.

How much is the LPS? You can do a decent NUC for about $500-600.

I'm tempted to buy a NUC and set up Roon with my server. The subscription fee turns me off with all of the others I am currently paying for. Maybe it's time to save for the "Life" option if it is still available.

@jmarshak : what is your DAC? 

Consensus from above however, seems to be to keep the server and renderer separate, so thinking for server -to set up a NUC, powered by an external LPS (I might actually have a matching Paul Hynes for this) - total cost for the server with LPS is about $1500. - A separate NUC / PH LPS for rendering would run another $1500 -> for a total of $3500 with cables.

You don’t need 2 NUCs all you need is an endpoint which could be anything from a raspberry pi4 to any Roon ready streamer. The NUC runs the core and could be attached to a DAC if wanted but most use some sort of endpoint or roon bridge.

I agree with Dow Jones here. You don't need another computer to be used as a renderer (or endpoint, what Roon calls it). Depending on what your DAC is, you could use any Roon Ready endpoint. Good value for the money are the Sonore various endpoints (microRendu, ultraRendu, etc.)