Experiences with SlimDevices Squeezebox.

Yes. The sound quality was so promising I have played around with a few different permutations. Cheap DACs do not improve it. But the cheapest fix that really improved the sound was to put a Jensen Transformer between the audio outputs and my amplifier. The improvement was pretty startling. I have now decided I will upgrade my PC, and put my old one in the basement. The basement PC will have large disk storage holding all my CDs at full resolution, running the Slimserver 24/7, so that I can use the Squeezebox anytime I want.

I rip the CDs at full resolution and then use FLAC to compress the files without any loss of resolution. I started out using wifi but have switched over to a wired lan for greater reliability and much reduced jitter.

The convenience of selecting any of my music with a remote from my seating position is amazing. A much bigger jump in convenience than moving from vinyl to CDs - it is totally compelling.

I am so impressed, my mission is to get the reliability and sound quality up to a level where I no longer need my CD player. What I find stunning is that a USD199 box sounds so good without tweaking. One of the reasons is probably the lower jitter of reading off a magnetic disk rather than an optical one, but it is still better than say a Rega Planet CD player (though that is not saying much). With the Jensen Transformer it is much better again. Ideally it would be paired with a good DAC, but have not had the chance to try any good DACs with it yet.

Redkiwi:

Great to hear of your positive experience. it fits with mine. I'm running my Squeezebox into a Genesis Digital Lens and then into an Apogee Big Ben. Then I'm using a TacT RCS 2.0s and dCS Purcell and Delius. The sound of the squeezebox in this manner is nearly as good as CD sound from a modified Wadia 270se.

There are still some minor bugs that the SlimDevices folks are trying to work out. For example, sometimes my channels reverse for no good reason.

Harry

I also use a Squeezebox driving an external DAC (conrad johnson DA2-B) and the sound I get is most certainly cleaner and more resolving than with any of the transports I've tried. The digital PCM output is excellent quality and drives the DAC beautifully. The analog output is reasonable, but isn't really up to par with the current offering of mid-priced CD players on the market. For $200 however, its quite a value as a CDP replacement in a low to midrange system, and an astonomical value when compared to the price of a quality transport.

For reference, all of my music was extracted from CD using Exact Audio Copy and then encoded into FLAC format for storage. The combination provides a perfect copy of the CD audio and uses about half the space of the raw WAV or AIFF files.

Finally put a decent DAC on the Squeezebox, a Northstar Model 192 DAC. I am thinking of perhaps putting a MSB Network card in the Squeezebox next. The MSB netwok card upsamples and reclocks inside the transport and then has an I2S output via RJ45 and ethernet cable. Similarly the Northstar Model 192 has an I2S input via RJ45 connector. I am selling my CD player and modifying a TEAC VRDS transport and then it will be 'game on' between the Squeezebox and the TEAC. It should be fun. The Northstar is sounding better and better every day as it runs in.

I haven't any idea what an AIFF file is Harry, so I will look it up. Any reason why you use it? Is it an equivalent to FLAC?

I am TOTALLY sold on the Squeezebox. The convenience makes a big difference to my music listening. Perhaps the biggest thing is that it results in me listening to a lot bigger range of music in my collection - simply because I do not have to go over to my CD rack and figure out what to play next. Staying in the listening seat, listening to the current track and wandering around 10,000 tracks to cue up what I will listen to next is just magic. Adding three of four albums into a playlist and then shuffling them up and hitting play is great too.