Best Server To Run Roon Core

I appreciate the thoughtful views here and the positive experiences most have had with the Nucleus Plus. I want to offer a Caveat Emptor. I have had my Nucleus Plus  for 3 months and it has never functioned appropriately. The last straw is that I cannot copy music files to its memory. It loops constantly and I have to force quit the program. I have a list of other failures. Needless to say it is virtually impossible to communicate with Roon, and going on a week, there has been no,response. Crickets. I am beyond angry to now pitch a $3k device into a landfill. My son said don’t buy a hardware product from a software company. I should have listened. 

@lafayette2010 Every company has products that fail. No one is perfect but Roon service is usually extremely good. Did you post on the forum? Who were you talking to in support? Your ticket may accidentally have been closed. It is very unlike Roon to not follow up. They are usually incredibly responsive.

@verdantaudio Thanks for the observation. I would have thought they would respond professionally. Maybe they are Covid short staffed. I have 2 acknowledged "tickets" but then crickets. It is very unlikely given my experience I will stick with the Nucleus. It's on;y a question how painful the transition will be.

@alephresearch

I just removed a MacMini M1 and replaced it with a Nucleus as a test to see if the hype is real. I am here to tell you, IT IS REAL. The nucleus was literally like I lifted a curtain..And I have a gigafoil working "isolate" the system from the Server. So there goes your theory. It's real, embrace it Servers are as important (maybe more) important than DACs. If you haven't listened to a dedicated Server it's nothing more than an opinion. If you're happy with the sound you have, great. But know for a fact a dedicated matters and will improve the sound. 

I returned the Nucleus and went straight for the top of the line Antipodes. 

When I was considering Roon, one of the important criteria was to choose a component that doesn’t rely on external server and associated LPS, cabling and isolation. 

One such component is Merging Technologies +player which sports an onboard CPU that allows running RoonCore on Linux RoonOS and implements a Roon Endpoint. It connects internally through Ravenna to the MERGING+NADAC (DAC) hardware and enjoys then the exact same characteristics and flexibility as an external computer running Roon. Pretty nifty, isn’t it :-) 

In addition to full blown Roon Server / DAC, it comes with a PRE and Headphone DAC.