@bikeboy52, All I can offer with regards to a recommendation is sharing my process. I did recently buy my PS Audio Perfect Wave with Bridge II network card and in doing so I spent a lot of time educating myself on the technology and feel I made a good choice where I arrived. I am biased toward PS Audio partly because they are local for me. I purchased it from The Music Room for under $2k. I also really like iFi Zen stream and V2 DAC which I use in my studio. The Zen Stream is also compatible with Tidal connect which I believe to be key. Tidal has a list of compatible devices if you check the tidal connect button. I believe the bridge II card could be rebranded and possibly tweaked Conversdigital because it uses mconnect, but not sure.
New streamer or dac?
So when I put my system together the idea was strictly vinyl,I eventually added a budget streamer thinking I’d use it for background music or puttering around the house when its not practical to listen to records. I became immediately consumed with it after subscribing to Tidal ,the idea of being able to listen to anything that pops into head is just fantastic,Im enjoying music like never before.Im ready to swap out the $600 unit for something a little more inline with the rest of the equipment in the system but am not sure if another option might be better. So my question is would it maybe be a better idea to buy a Dac and use the inexpensive steamer with it as a transport until I could afford to change it out also ? or would it make more sense to just buy a new streamer/ Dac unit ( I like the Aruender ) any thoughts on that would be appreciated,thanks in advance.
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@lordmelton , Yes you would be correct if I had a PSA DS with bridge II. I actually have the Perfect Wave MkII with bridge II, which does not process DSD, so my card is using the I2S communication protocol. For $3k, I can upgrade my PW with a kit including new boards to fully convert it to a DS. I would postulate that feeding DSD directly from the streamer card has got to be the best solution. It is interesting to hear your experience with AES/EBU. I have read I2S is not great over any length of cable, so that could explain. I my mind, the card is just a more eloquent solution but as you say, it all depends on your setup... |
Ok here my suggestion to you and someone mention already about Denafrips Dac. Here's my setup for streaming. Aurender N100h (Streamer) USB out to Denafrips Iris DDC get a better USB Denafrips Iris DDC to Pontus ii using i2s cable also get a better i2s don't be cheap in cable if you want hear good details, soundstage, good base etc. And I also I change all my Power cable. Good luck and I hope you can get a good advice or help here.
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Thanks again everyone ,really interesting thread lotta info for me to dig into.I would love to be able to go relax in a comfy chair and A/B compare the Schiit the Denifrips and maybe something thats double or even triple in price to those two units. There’s just no place to do that in my area especially with brands like those ,Im sure you all have the same problem. I do however feel that info given to me in this forum is extremely valuable ,nobody’s trying to sell anything right? Btw I was a little surprised that it took that long to see Denafrips come up ,anybody?? Just sayin, brand gets great reviews but i dont see many or any on Agon. Thx everyone again! |
@pwayland Regarding I2s I really believe it'll be the USB of the future but it hasn't received mainstream support yet. It's mainly PS Audio and the Chi-Fi companies that are in full support. AES/EBU, provided you have a quality setup it will USUALLY outperform USB. However it'll only support up to 24 bit 192 kHz PCM and single DSD. This covers 99% of what a regular user will encounter but higher sampling rates need to go through USB or I2s. I've seen many reviews that preferred USB over I2s but that's basically because USB is highly developed whereas I2s is just starting out and it's higher specced too, so I2s brings much promise. |
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