Better music player alternative to Mac Air / laptop

Thanks, @ghdprentice. Thanks to this fellow’s review on Aurender N150 and the comparison with the Mac Air as the player, I was finally convinced thru my ears that noticeable part of spatial / SS information was indeed missing from using Mac Air as the music player. So, Aurender costs $3500 and can only be considered as a mid-tier performer, I am not sure if I have deep pockets for that kind of money to refine my system. My current system is worth only two-third of price for single component. I may choose to give up because I will end up with chasing my own tail with incremental upgrades.

So, are you saying that switching to streamer as the player won’t render better SQ based on your experience?

Correct. I’ve used a variety of PCs, Macs, Raspberry Pi’s over the years to play back audio and I’ve never noticed a difference. I’ve even compared a track ripped to FLAC and played back over a $39 Raspberry Pi to the same track played from the disc on my Oppo UDP-203 modded with a special board (Vanity203 HD) to reduce jitter on the SPDIF interface and it sounds exactly the same.

That’s the beauty of digital data.

Here are a few links if you want to learn more about digital audio and detecting real problems with digital playback.

Digital Show and Tell - Xiph.org

What does a bad USB (or other digital cable) sound like?

Let’s listen to some jitter effects

The 16 bit vs 8 bit blind listening test

I heard the Asio plug-in in foobar 2000 could get around the issue but I do not have luck to get it working yet.

You don’t need an ASIO device to get good sound. This particular output device is meant to reduce latency, important for mixing and mastering. These days, you can use WASAPI output for bit perfect playback. Just download the foobar component, install it, and select it in the Preferences menu.

Lots of options out there for less than $3500.00 Innuos Zen Mini, Simaudio Mind 2, Bel Canto Stream. …… all will sound better and laptop streaming and not cost a right lung. 

OP,

Thanks. That is why I asked about your equipment.

My general rule of thumb is that  each component should be carefully chosen and at roughly the same cost; streamer, DAC, preamp, amp, phono stage. While a single component can raise the performance of the whole system. Typically that only makes sense when going through an upgrade cycle and you will be upgrading all components to a new level. 
 

So, you may be fishing in the right pond. 

Finally, I tried out the iFi Zen Streamer when it is on sale for $299. I still has not streamed hi-res music from those music providers but simply played out the flac files from HDD. Wow, I wish I try earlier. The SQ is improved in every way as compared to playing from Mac or laptop. Music is more airy and open. SS is wider/deeper with darker background and better separation. Clarity is improved too, making low volume level music listening more enjoyable.  For example, cymbal sound more real with extended reverb. I was fully convinced.