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Where are the cheap home streamers?

When CD players were first introduced, they were $1000 and more new.  And this was in early 80's dollars.  New ones would eventually drop to under $200, and new players that also play most all formats can still be had around at that price or less.  Sure, not the best quality, but they work well enough for most.  

The new frontier is of course, streaming.  Whether from a local host, online, and so on.  Many options in the high end, but what seems odd is the lack of budget options.  Probably the least expensive that's of decent quality is the Sonos Connect.  Oh sure, you can pair a computer or tablet with a cheap DAC, and get by.  Or roll your own with a Raspberry Pi solution.  And yes, most disc players are "smart" and can stream audio and video just fine.  Among other issues, is that the budget options are defaulting to HDMI out, and omitting Optical, Digital, and Analog out.  

There were some early efforts by Sony and Dlink a few years ago.  Both not only required a display, but were pretty terrible implementations overall.  We recently tried one of the Dayton WBA 31s.  For a mere $50, expectations were of course also modest.  As you might imagine, analog audio out is not great.  Below that of many phones we'd say.  It does however had an optical output.  A dealbreaker for most of our clients in terms of added complexity.  If produced in sufficient number, there is no good reason such a unit with a decent DAC couldn't be built and sold for $200 or so.  Or maybe someone is doing this, and it's just not well distributed?  



128x128austinstereo
fuzztone's avatar
fuzztone
5,624 posts
 
I heard CCA don't do gapless. I'm out 
vinylshadow
497 posts
 
I’ve got a cheap solution which sounds great. On my system it does.

Android with UAPP(and Bit Perfect add-on for TIDAL MQA), OTG cable, Nobsound USB to SPDIF converter( USB To SPDIF Converter XMOS XU208 Coaxial Source Output, Digital 75 ohm Coax cable to my processor.
I don’t care about TIDAL MQA but my discovery tonight is selecting Mono on my processor. Everything sounds so much better...

Does a streamer with it’s FLAC ability sound better? Could be. But you asked for cheap and that’s my retort.
bosssound's avatar
bosssound
120 posts
 
Bluesound Node2i is a little north of $500. Not cheap. But not expensive.

Remarkable sound for price. It is source for my system, which terminates in Vandersteen Quatro Wood CTs. Happy with sound so far.

Have yet to hear it bettered in shootout at dealer against DACs costing 2-4K. Part of that may be that in configuration that I use it signal is handled by Parasound JC2 before being passed onto to amp.
I can hear effects of different power cords, Ethernet cables, and speaker cable elevators. So not deaf.

mwinkc
368 posts
 
I'm thinking that software development, API's, etc play into the price of streamers. 
Common phone apps, small and relatively simple, are downloaded to millions of phones and through advertising,  generate money to cover development costs.
When a company builds a streamer, hoping to sell 10,000 or 50,000 with no advertising income, the more complex development costs are spread over fewer devices. The streamer must be compatible with lots of providers and different protocols. Plus, they often have to create an iOS and Android app to accompany the streamer.
The node 2i can stream directly or in some cases, through the mobile app. It supports Spotify connect, roon, bluetooth, Google cast, etc. All that interoperability costs money to create and often involves paying a fee to those services or protocols.
The Node 2i does all that very well. When you pay less for a streamer, you may lose quality, interoperability, a user friendly  interface, or all of the above. When shopping for a lower price streamer, do a lot of research, read reviews, etc... make sure it does what you need it to do, and has a UI (user interface) that doesn't drive you crazy.
Yes, I have a Node 2i and like it a lot. I'm using it with an external DAC (not high end at all) and it sounds slightly better than it's internal DAC did. The internal DAC wasn't bad at all...but would be out of place on many of the higher end systems owned by subscribers to this forum.
The only thing missing, in my opinion is a BlueSound receiver that could be plugged into aux inputs on systems in other rooms for nice, whole house sound. The BlueSound Pulse speakers have streamers built in, can serve as endpoints for well synchronized sound originating from the Node 2i and they aren't bad as wireless, remote speakers go...but the don't come close to most, spare stereo systems most of us have. I bought one Pulse, the big one. Its wasn't cheap and the sound was a little disappointing...so it remains in the kitchen, where nothing resembling critical listening will occur. 
mike_in_nc
1,153 posts
 
@austinstereo--

As for the Allo, and the Pi, and any other DIY stuff, they are great options for hobbyists. And the results are beyond what you’d expect for the money. In this case, we’re looking for ready to run. Many of our customers just want a simple solution.
Oh, I missed that you are a dealer. The Allo can be bought pre-assembled and is pretty easy to set up and use, yet still, it doesn’t have the polish of more commercial products.
I’m going to look at the Songbird myself. People ask me for recommendations, and like you, I’d like to have something inexpensive, reasonable quality, and not tweaky.



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