Do I Really Need a Dedicated Streamer?

Hi, 

If you go to amazon.com, you can buy your Wiim and have 30 days to return it no questions asked.

Once you do that, you need to get ride of Spotify and get Qobuz. They also have a 2 months free period. I guarantee you will hear the difference.

Once you hear it, you can unheard it. You will never go back. You will only go forward, as there is much much better sound as you are willing to invest more in your system/room acoustics.

If your ever get to vinyl, you will find that the same record, pressed in different years sound completely different. It happens with digital as well.

This hobby is for the long run, but my proposed two trials represent a great start, risk free.

Enjoy!!

Switched from streaming via a MacBook using USB to  my DAC to using an Aurender N20 Streamer. Significant improvement. Better imaging, Sounstage, Depth and overall sound quality. Laptops, and computers add noise and muddy the sound. You won’t notice until you replace with a dedicated streamer of decent quality. 

@dunkin in that system I would ditch iPad as a source and Spotify as a service and switch to Tidal or Qobuz. 
Qutest is a nice DAC. Feed it a good signal and you’ll be impressed. 
Figure out the budget for a streamer. I recommend shopping on a used market. 
You can also try WiiM Pro Plus with a good digital coax cable as a starting point. Risk free from Amazon. 

I think so.  My music listening is sometimes seated, something background.  Having a streamer lets me have music going without also having to have my phone/pad or whatever draining it's battery.

As @bbenzaquen6343 stated: 

"you need to get ride of Spotify and get Qobuz. They also have a 2 months free period. I guarantee you will hear the difference.

Once you hear it, you can unheard it."

Agreed wholeheartedly... and the costs are about the same. Just make sure to seek out and attentively listen to some of the hi res audio available. 

In the first trial month, I'd suggest doing some A/B testing against Spotify. Assuming you hear superior results via Qobuz, in the second month, I'd suggest getting a trial subscription to Roon, and (with their DSP set up best for your signal path & components), doing A/B testing between Qobuz hi res and Roon processing Qobuz hi res. 

Pardon the redundancy, but it's true, once you hear it, you can't unhear it.