Advice on best upgrade path for a Mac Mini setup

Dctom, this doesn't make sense. An ssd by itself will not improve the sound, all it will do is read the music faster. Most good software will read the music into ram and play the song from ram, not from a hdd/ssd.
If you went with Linux instead of using OS X, then you would also have to change the software you are using to read the music, now this could have a bearing on the quality of the sound, but just an OS change will not bring you a huge increase.

For anyone interested, I’ve been listening to ALAC files ripped to an external Seagate 2TB hard drive connected via USB cable to the Aries Mini.  USB out from the Aries is to a VLink 192 USB/SPDIF converter (it does NOT up sample signal from the Aries) and then via Stereovox coax to a Schiit Gungnir DAC. Still running the stock switch mode power supply supplied with the Aries.

VERY pleased with the sound and tickled I no longer have to use my MacBook air OR run a long USB cable from my MacBook Air to the V-Link OR plug in the hard drive every time I want to listen to ripped music files. The Aries Lightning app on my iPhone is FAST and the set up guide easy to follow. It read the 400 albums on my hard drive in maybe a minute. Can I say with 100% certainty the sound is better than it was from the MacBook Air running BitPerfect? My aural memory is not great and I haven’t gone back to do direct A/B listening comparisons since getting the Aries. Just been enjoying the music. The sound is certainly not worse and for convenience alone I ain’t likely to be going back BUT I will do a comparison soon now that the Aries has some hours on it and since I’m starting to get closer to the 30 day return deadline.

I’m able to use Airplay to stream Spotify wirelessly from my iPhone to the Aries. That’s pretty neat. Haven’t yet activated the 1 year Tidal subscription that is part of the Aries Mini purchase.

The only glitch compared to running BitPerfect/iTunes on the MacBook Air is that not ALL album art is represented. Some albums did populate. Others not. I contacted Aries tech support (they are very responsive via email) about this but am not sure I understand their explanation. It MIGHT be that where album art was downloaded off the web it must have the same name as the actual album for Aries to link the two. I did not always save album art images with the exact same title as the album, so might need to go back and see if editing those file names helps.

Am VERY curious about the benefit of a Linear Power Supply BUT since I’m not using the Aries internal DAC am uncertain whether it will make any difference. Anyone with experience on that, please advise.

Considering I was looking at a new MAC Mini + wireless keyboard and mouse for dedicated music playback use, the Aries Mini is, for me, a lower cost and more elegant solution with what might be better sound. I think Aries has done a really good job with their software and the features provided with the Aries Mini. Thanks for the suggestions here and especially to jond.

@ghosthouse Glad to hear it's working out for you and glad to help! Not sure about the album art I am a moron when it comes to metadata and all that stuff but I would say between 80-90% of  my albums have are on the DS app. On the subject of power supply upgrade, I run my Aries out to a Yamamoto YDA-1 DAC and I do feel the power supply upgrade on the Aries made a difference. I am using the Sbooster and not the official Aries Linear supply. Cheers!

Okay, jond.  So you too are running the Aries Mini into an external DAC and still hear a benefit with an LPS.  Good to know.  That Sbooster looks like it might be  better constructed than the Auralic LPS based on some photos I saw.  Thanks yet again.

@ghosthouse  Yes, you should still get a clearly audible improvement with a good LPS whether the booster, the Aurelic one that comes with the higher priced Aries or one of many others. The Aries threads on computer audiophile discuss LPS comparisons. 

iTunes doesn't imbed art into each song file. If you bought any music from iTunes store it will be missing art when you look in Lightning or any other software that isn't iTunes. Doug's Scripts has a cheap (~$5) download that will help imbed the art. I use the Mac software Yate which is flexible nice tag editing software. You should still be able to use your mac and find the Seagate drive on your network to edit metatags of music stored there. Cheers,
Spencer