2. digital
  3. 1285022471

Squeezebox Touch or Sonos ZonePlayer

I'm looking at streaming my digital music (FLAC audio files) from my HP EX490 server running Windows Home Server (WHS) to various sections of my home.

I was very close to getting the Sonos solution when I came across an article on the Squeezebox Touch in Stereophile magazine.

Unlike the Sonos ZonePlayers, the Squeezebox Touch also plays hi-rez FLAC downloads.

In terms of sound quality, would anyone know which of the two sounds better?

I'm looking at connecting the media player via digital coax to an external DAC in my living room to my dedicated stereo music system while for the other rooms the media player would connect to various "portable" boomboxes/radios via analog RCA cabling.
agiaccio
hamburg
69 posts
 
I had my sonos modified by Cullin Circuits to be clocked by my Apogee Big Ben clock. Big improvement but regular Sonos is pretty good. Also the high def files are downgraded by the squeezebox in order to play. Therefore no longer high def anyway.
soundgasm
152 posts
 
My experience completely echos Reg's - right down to the kinds of systems we're using. Concur with Ballan's opinion, too.
johsti's avatar
johsti
102 posts
 
The touch is reliable, sounds good without a dac, sounds better with a good dac, plays 24/96 files without downsampling and is quite a bit less expensive compared to Sonos. No brainer if you ask me.
djohnson54
396 posts
 
I have no experience with the Sonos but the Touch does NOT downsample anything 24/96 or lower. I would imagine that the use of an external DAC would pretty much negate MOST of the sound quality differences between the two.
kr4's avatar
kr4
3,693 posts
 
Johsti said: ....plays 24/96 files without downsampling.
Djohnson said: ...the Touch does NOT downsample anything 24/96 or lower."

I think they agree. Touch will play 24/96 or lower rates unchanged. It will downsample 24/176.4 and 24/192 to 24/96.

Kal
More to discover