Clock vs Streamer advice

@mazian

Thanks for sharing your feedback. I have the luxury of toggling between ROON and Conductor and didn’t find much difference as far as search results for classical albums or artists. Since most of the classical composition shared by various artists / composers, I pay close attention to key words while searching for classical albums. I still prefer Conductor app over ROON for optimal SQ and its ability to keep my rips/downloads separate from Qobuz stream. Conductor also allows me to create folders and neatly put them on menu bar for easy access. Whereas ROON merges everything in one library (not my personal preference). I do agree, Qobuz native app is pretty good and I use it frequently when I am away from my main system.

I don’t have any major grievances with the conductor app.
Roon is more advanced in few areas - it slices and dices, consolidates and filters better than the Conductor. It also provides an actual bitrate of the album in the search results as opposed to “HR” or “Max” label that you get with the Conductor. But none of these missing features are essential and they don’t impact the sound quality. They’re just there as part of an enchanted feature set. Nice to have  

@zpatenaude37 let us know how that comparison goes.

👍

I briefly checked out a Melco N1ZH/2 review, and the reviewer’s opinion was the ethernet out "player" was the best connector, and I believe with the N200 it is USB? I suppose for an apples to apples comparison those are what must be connected for each server to perform at its peak.

But then what does one do with apps- conductor for Aurender, and what for Melco? I am thinking it would be easy for a salesperson to steer the auditioner in a particular direction. It sure isn’t like a/b testing a pre-amp, is it?

edit: Qobuz for both perhaps? 

Looks like Melco has a USB DAC-dedicated output. So I would compare N200 and Melco using USB out. 
Make a note though….Qobuz sounds better than Tidal with the Aurender N200. Not sure about Melco. To @mclinnguy’s point…the key is to use what works best for each streamer. Could be Roon for Melco. I don’t know…

All PC’s but Mac lapotps in particular have a couple of issues related to power and grounding. Get a USB isolator and consider keeping your laptop charger off while listening to music OR move it outside your power conditioner clean area OR get a linear supply.

For the power supply issue, the good news is you can validate if this is an issue or not simply by playing music with/without the laptop charger plugged in. I’d wait until your laptop was down to about ~ 50% charged though. That way the charger is working at it’s hardest and therefore making the most possible noise.

Ironically, if you put your laptop on a different circuit the USB isolator becomes even more important.  Well, this depends on the DAC, but sad to say too many modern DACs still don't have galvanic isolation built in.

https://amzn.to/3UlFRqU