Streamers, servers, players - woefully overpriced??


Look at the insides of these devices. They have very standard parts, power supply may be abit refined but still basic stuff.  All this for questionable SQ benefits.  We are still in the digital domain.  
Dacs and amps are considerably more complex and may justify some higher pricing.

why is streamer area so hyped and overpriced?  All to buy a pretty box?  And I do want improved SQ but it is tough to see it.
emergingsoul
They are like any other product on the market. If you have any DIY ability, you can get pretty dang good results. For example, you can get a Raspberry Pi streamer going for under $100. Fancy up the power supply for a bit more. Then add your preferred DAC and choose one of the many available operating system/player software programs (many free), add the DAC of your choice and you're off to the races. Bryston even thinks enough of the RPi to use it as the basis for their $1,500 streamer.

If you like pretty boxes, and high-end names on your gear, then you are going to pay a lot more. But that is also true of most of the non-audio products in the world. You can usually find a pretty good item that does a good job at a reasonable price, or you can go high-end for a lot more money.
Keep thinking Raspberry Pi is nirvana... it isn’t.  You get what you pay for with the Pi streamers.

I have a nice used once Allo Digione Signature you can buy if anyone insists on being a pi-phile.  
The soon to be released Sonore microRendu is $399 (sans power supply), but you already know this. Hardly overpriced. If the sound quality is even close (I expect it will be) to their previous generation it will be outstanding and not questionable at all. And it’s not exactly a pretty box!