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Streamers with best apps?

I tried this question on an Australian forum with no luck, so I'm hoping a more audio savvy community might do better. I currently have a Cambridge Audio CXN which as I discovered has 2 hopeless apps when you want to find classical albums saved on Tidal My Collection. So thinking of ditching the CXN and getting another streamer/server , preferably without a DAC as I will be running it through a Pure Audio Lotus DAC 5. Most reviews of streamers seem to focus entirely on sound quality but as I have discovered the apps used are of almost equal importance. I have considered an Elac Discovery DS-S101-G which is controlled by a Roon Essentials app. So first question. Does anyone know how the Essentials app lists classical albums in Tidal My Collection and does it have a search function for the albums saved? Second question what streamers can you recommend that at least are equal and preferably better than the Tidal app which does have a search function but very little logic as to how it lists classical albums. I have thought about the Bryston BDP Pi, Innous Zen mini or an Auralic streamer but know nothing about the usability of their respective apps. So anyone out there who can help.
128x128mazian
spiritofradio's avatar
spiritofradio
3,449 posts
 
@usery you may know about this service already but for a classical listener this is the best:

https://app.idagio.com/discover

check it out. You may be surprised by the absence of confusion.
tbayles
4 posts
 
Roon really is the best, and it’s the best by leaps and bounds. I’m a LUMIN owner and my opinion is that it’s awful. It doesn’t offer the functionality native to Qobuz or Tidal. Bluos is waaaay better than LUMIN. But in the end, Roon truly is vastly superior, especially if you want any info on what you are playing and/or want to discover new music. The downside to roon is that it requires a server/core. The app debate comes down to: you get what you pay for and the free options are simply bad. Using Tidal and Qobuz are decent experiences for their own content... but if you want access and metadata to your own media Roon is the way to go.
mahughes
171 posts
 
End of May there will be a new app from Innuos. The blog on their site about it is mightily impressive. Likely to be the first of many putting pressure on Roon by doing what they do at jest as well if but better.
lalitk's avatar
lalitk
5,555 posts
 
“Streamers with best apps?”

For me, Aurender with their Conductor App. Been using it for 5 plus years. Nothing else out there I care or feel the need to explore :-)
mike_in_nc
1,154 posts
 
Most streamers will work well with generic UPnP/DLNA apps or apps that support OpenHome. The Cambridge is an unfortunate exception -- it seems to work only with its own app.

Two of the better control point apps I’ve found on Android (in 9 years of streaming) are BubbleUPnP and HiFiCast. I have licenses for both.

B. is more flexible and supports OpenHome and Tidal, Qobuz. H. is more streamlined but does not support those things. I would recommend either, depending on what you and your device need. For example, Lumin and Auralic use OpenHome, so BubbleUPnP would be the recommendation.

@mazian -- BubbleUPnP when used with MinimServer does a great job of serving and controlling classical music (assuming you have got the tags right) and is far less costly than Roon. But if you are using Tidal (and to a lesser degree, Qobuz), the tags often will NOT be right.

P.S. Does ANYONE understand how to get paragraph spacing working right on Audiogon?
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