Another post about a streamer upgrade

@mdalton yes nothing beats roon from the UI / UX and features standpoints.
However, one important note - with some streamers their proprietary UI/software forces the streamed files to take a certain path that involves extra processing such as caching (not buffering) and other tasks that might result in better sound compared to using the streamer as a Roon end point.
One example is Auralic Aries streamers. The Auralic Lightning DS sounded significantly better to me than Roon and I actually ended up pausing my Roon subscription. I had renewed it when I switched over to Lumin where I heard virtually no difference and the Lumin app was driving me crazy.

There are a lot of variables. The unfortunate truth in this hobby is that everything matters and as you go up the ladder it matters even more. Synergy is key though, so trying and listening for yourself to see what works in your system the best approach. 

@audphile1 

Hey, appreciate your perspective, but were you using a Mac Mini as your Roon Core?  Are you sure what you weren’t hearing wasn’t simply high jitter from your PC?  Check out the links I sent in earlier posts to see how high the levels of jitter are from a pc vs. a well-designed streamer.

“There are a lot of variables. The unfortunate truth in this hobby is that everything matters and as you go up the ladder it matters even more. Synergy is key though, so trying and listening for yourself to see what works in your system the best approach.”

@audphile1 Well said!

Assuming high quality analog components and DAC already in place and optimized, how digital bits delivered to your DAC plays a significant role. A well designed streamer elevates and recreates more intimacy with music.

Unless one had an opportunity to try a better streamer, you honestly don’t know what you’ve been missing all along!

@benanders

I’m glad you are curious. But we are not working on graduate degrees here (which btw I have). Those of us with lots of experience are trying to help those with less to effectively navigate this extremely complex landscape and avoid wasting enormous amount of time and money. 

@mdalton I was using mac mini as roon core only. Not a streamer. The comparison was done using auralic with lightning ds vs Auralic as roon end point.
There’s no jitter. Just different way of processing the stream by the Auralic.