Solo streamer

My experience and mine alone - I use a Lumin, U1 Mini (has no DAC) fed into a Line Magnetic, LM502ca Tube/SS DAC with extaordinary exotic NOS tubes. I also have a Canor, DAC 2.10 that I’m rolling better tubes into soon but right now, I prefer the LM502ca as I’m super used to its presentation. The LM was $1800-ish 8yrs ago but go for about $8-900 preowned today, also, (new tubes $500). The Canor was $4K and the Lumin was about $2K & the S Boster (a must) was, I think, $350. Money invested seems to be in step with the equal dollares spent on each, prob by coincidence, however it’s an amazing streaming set up. I use an Audience, AU24e Digital BNC cable as well and AU24e RCAs to my Calypso Signature prefering those connections to balanced. My feeling is that the Aurender may be overkill in your system unless you plan to up your DAC game at some point. Albiet a wonderful piece, you wont know just how great that Aurender can be unless you, and deoesn’t have to be right away, upgrade your DAC. Oh, and yes, would be helpful to know the rest of your gear. $6K+ is a "real number" and I don’t think you need to spend that to realize great streaming. It’s more about choosing the right pieces. Just my opinion & I wish you luck!

Respectfully, I do not understand the posts that suggest the OP won’t know what the Aurender is capable of with his current DAC.  The one thing most agree on with respect to the Benchmark DAC is that it is highly resolving, very transparent.  The most common criticism of it is that it is too analytical.  But regardless of where you stand on that, how can it be that an uber-resolving DAC won’t reveal exactly what a streamer is, or is not, doing?  

@mdalton I defended the Benchmark in an earlier post against those who had belittled it, but got no response.  I agree with what you are saying.

@abnerjack

Yeah, I saw your post and basically agreed.  As you’ve no doubt noticed, I’m a streamer skeptic, but you can’t have it both ways.  You can’t claim that streamers sound different, different tonality even, and then argue that you can’t hear the difference with a revealing DAC.  These two ideas are in violent conflict.  What’s not inconsistent is if somebody thinks a $10k DAC is more “full-bodied”, “refined”, blah, blah blah, but that has nothing to do with the streamer.  DACs sound different. Duh.

@mdalton  You absolutely can't have any audiophile street cred if you don't buy in to the "everything new and more expensive is better"  shtick.  Luckily not all of us accept this spew.  Of course there has to be a base line, entry level.  How far above that one must go is an individual decision.  I think the Bluesound node is an excellent streamer.  I don't feel the need to wear a price tag as a badge of honor.

For the record, my digital setup is :  Bluestream node n130 into Benchmark dac3 hgc, directly into Bryston 4bsst2, and then Magnepan 1.7.  Sometimes I alternate the Herron preamp and the Kef meta ls50 into the mix.  The sound with these variations is outstanding to my ear, but what do I know?  I have recently found a nice pair of used Sennheiser 800, and with the Benchmark dac the sound is remarkable.  I do think the headphone amp in the Benchmark is somewhat lacking and am looking for an upgrade to the Quicksilver tube amp.  I don't feel the need for any further upgrades.  But again what do I know?  

Reminds me of my favorite all time bumper sticker. "You just think you're happy" ( Bloomington, In. 1970).  In this case I just think I'm happy with my sound.