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Music Streamer Quality

This may be a dumb question but does the quality of a music streamer ultimately affect the sound? So here's some detail. I currently have a Sonos music streamer fed into a Simaudio Moon 300D dac. In the interest of having higher quality sound I could upgrade the dac or I could buy a dac with streaming capability such as the Simaudio 280D. I'm looking at a R2R ladder dac but would have the same Sonos feeding it. Does that make more sense than something like the Moon device? I appreciate an comments.
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thyname's avatar
thyname
3,107 posts
 
@jmarshak 

You were streaming from Spotify on your tests? If so, I don’t think any of Spotify tiers does red book cd quality 16/44.1 you mentioned. Up to 320 kbps lossy.

Such a waste using such a good DAC with mp3

Try streaming from Tidal or Qobuz


jl35
4,116 posts
 
agree, if you're streaming Spotify then probably doesn't matter too much what streamer or DAC you use, as SQ is so poor...
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jmarshak
157 posts
 
Yes, Good point. So i should have mentiined that i also tested streaming FLAC 16/44.1 using Jriver MC (using Sonos vs The Esoteric CD players - using same dacs) and (Sonos vs Ps Audio Bridge 2 - same dac) and (Sonos vs Azur 851N -same dac) These tests sounded same as well. Used Coex connections to dac when streamer is not internal. Sonos and azur input is wifi. Ps audio bridge 2 input via Lan. Now i am testing streaming with the really transparent Simaudio 750D DAC, so i guess i am reaching out to understand flaws in my tests cause Sonos connect sound pretty comparable to suposedly better steamers.
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thyname's avatar
thyname
3,107 posts
 
If you cannot tell Spotify lossy MP3 vs lossless FLAC, I don’t know what to tell you. Stop right there and don’t waste your money any longer. Maybe blessings in disguise 😂😉

Highest Spotify Premium is 320 kbps. Still mp3. On the other hand, CD quality is 1,411 kbps (44.1 times 16 times 2), so over four times higher resolution than best mp3.

This does not mean you will hear the difference. Many people don’t. It’s OK. You are not alone. Stick to your Analog 
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