jayfix

Do you need to have a Nucleus if you already have a NAS with all of your content stored on it, which is directly hooked into the Control4 amp? If not, what is required. I am really only looking for an alternative interface for metadata purposes.

Thanks. Do you speak from experience or do you know people that addressed issue through Roon?

I am a new Control4 user and purchased the product mostly as what I viewed as a better alternative to Sonos or Bose. I have a huge library of my own music that is now on a NAS and hooked directly into the system. The plan was/is to be able to access my music from mobile devices and broadcast to the various rooms in my apartment (8 zones total), broadcasting different music in each room if I so chose. They system itself works but Control4's interface, My Music, is the absolute worst. There is no tool for compilations and, short of changing the metadata for every song to reflect a single Artist name, each artist is listed. For example, I could have 10 different artists on one 50 cent album since he has a featured artist on every song. Unless I want to delete all of that information, I am apparently stuck with this. For I-Tunes, I can use Album Artist and, for example, change Bruce Springsteen's entire catalogue to "Springsteen, Bruce" so that all of his music shows up under one artist category while the Artist name remains "Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band" (not all of his albums were released with the group). The issue with My Music also bleeds into any band with a "The" in the name so The Beatles are under T as opposed to B. Other than my cataloguing issue, the program is clunky and not user friendly at all. If I put a song on and then look to back out to find another song to put in the queue, instead of backing me back out to that artist's catalogue or even the letter in which that artist's name begins with, it takes me back to the beginning of my catalogue. And these are just two of my gripes. I am looking for a viable alternative that does not include airplay. I want to be able to control a program that directly interfaces with the NAS that I can use to navigate through my music with ease. I know that I can access my music by leaving my iTunes on that is also connected to the NAS and then home sharing to my iPad or iPhone but this makes no sense to me if I already have the music hardwired into the system. There has to be a workable alternative that my Control4 specialists are overlooking. Everyone seems to be so focused on streaming services these days that they are following that trend. My library, however, cannot be replaced by streaming services (a lot of live music, studio outtakes, etc.). Please help.