WiFi streaming — streamer vs. through iPad

My streaming took a substantial jump in quality when I got a dedicated streamer/DAC combo and relegated my PC to simply being the streamer/DAC's controller. As expected, sound quality went back to not-terrible-but-nothing-special when, just for kicks, I once again used my PC as the streamer/DAC.

I stream through a MacBook Pro usb into holo spring dac. One of the biggest sound improvements I made was to hard wire with cate6 to gigabyte switch. I will say the sound stage and bass came to life. I was very happy with the bass improvement as it is now tight and defined, the muddy thud was gone and you can now distinguish between an upright and a guitar. Wifi does work but no matter what you do wifi can only carry so much of the 1’s and 0’s. I am still going back and forth on going streamer only but have not. Part of my thought is that a streamer is just a dedicated computer and not sure how much it will change from my MacBook. I will upgrade my signal first going with the Small Green Computer fiber optic package. I stream Qobuz and internet radio mostly Austin Blues Radio direct from their web page.

I use ethernet extenders(TP-link), Uptone Audio EtherREGEN with Cat 5 cables into Bluesound Node 2i , outboard Benchmark DAC with excellent results, though not SOTA, for sure. As with analog, find huge differences among source material(redbook v HR), and the recordings themselves. Admit to enjoying the convenience and ability to easily learn new music and musicians via QOBUZ.....LPs remain superior in my system, but my analog front end is also WAY more $$ and SOTA. One thing I learned a while ago..I must UNPLUG all my ethernet extenders in the house(3) before I play LPs, as they add significant noise to the analog system

A dedicated streamer is the way to go.  WIFI can work just fine as it does for all of my audio and video streaming. It is important to understand that it might take some trial and error and perhaps some expenditures to get WIFI working well. 

If you have strong WIFI in your listening room, you might not have to do anything but get your streamer connected to WIFI.  I get the best results using the 5 Ghz WIFI band.  If you have issues using your current WIFI network, then you can try  different types of extenders.  I tried all of that and I ended up installing an ORBI Mesh network that has been working very well for quite a while.

If you can use ethernet cable do so. I get about 30 Mbs with WiFi and 300Mbs with ethernet. 

Just less chance of losing signal.