Music Server Advice

You’re right about vinyl quality. For the brief time I toyed with vinyl again a few years ago I was appalled at the quality of some of the offerings. Surface noise in some cases was obvious, meaning they’re using low-grade regrind material, as well as just plain bad masterings. I won’t get into the pricing lol.

Not sure you’re aware, but there are a few websites for researching recordings and their quality. I often use Discogs, DR Database, and Hoffman Music Corner for this purpose. And AllMusic for music quality. Not for everything, but definitely worth checking out if you haven’t already.

How do you feed your Esoteric D-05x from your NUC?

By the way, the Innuos Pulse you mention is not a server. It is just a streamer. You would still be running Roon Core in your NUC with it, there is no other way to use Roon with Innuos Pulse. You would need a separate machine for server (Roon Core) duties.

You are correct about the Pulse. I fed it with the Nuc as Roon Core. I feed the D-05x directly from the NUC via USB. The D-05x is a Roon endpoint. 

The D-05x is a Roon endpoint.

If you fed your D-05x via USB from NUC, the D-05x in not an endpoint. Endpoint is the Roon lingo for "streamer". The NUC would be in your scenario both the Roon Core and the Roon Endpoint. Not optimal for sure, certainly not optimal to use the NUC as the streamer. 

I you really like to try Innuos, you can get a ZENith or a Statement, that can be both the Core and the Streamer, feeding your DAC (the D-05x) via USB.

I also assume you know Aurender does not do Roon? You should know since you have had Roon since inception. 

My nomenclature may be in error but functionally the Nuc feeds the D-05x via USB. I wanted to do away with using the NUC and thought that the Pulse would do that.  I quickly found out during setup that I still needed the NUC. (I know about Innuos other offerings, but I don't need or want a CD ripper.) I  knew the Aurender wasn't Roon so I tried the Aurender App and felt paralyzed by the learning curve. However, it sounded very good. So now after having both the Pusle (didn't like the sound) and the Aurender N10, I'm willing to part with using Roon as my primary interface and delve into Aurender's app. My strategy has evolved to using Roon just to discover new music and use Aurender, or other software related to another device for my primary digital listening. I also inquired about the N200 and other streamer suggestions.