My travels through into the streaming realm during this Covid stay at home period has been fun. I have a pretty nice ’old school’ hifi system -- Oracle Delphi TT, Ayre PX5E, Modwright tube output Marantz CDP, CJ Premier 16LS2, ARC VT100-2 amp, Quad ESL, Proac and Harbeth speakers w Rel subs. Took the time, with some help from the forums and a couple friends to get good streamed music working in it.
Transports/streamers tried - Sonos Connect (w and w/out Wyred4Sound clock mods), Volumio Primo, Project Streambox S2 Ultra, Node 2i
DACs - Chord 2Qute and Qutest, RME ADI2, Topping MQA D90, Hegel Rost internal DAC (Wolfson)
Music Services - Spotify, Tidal, Qobuz
Takeaways:
1. Moved quickly through highest Spotify to Tidal and Qobuz services, the SQ difference is not subtle. More subtle is SQ difference between Tidal MQA and Qobuz hi res. Have not tried Amazon HD. Suspect this whale will eat them all, esp. T and Q. Tidal is subscale on MQA and its benefits are unclear, Quboz has an incomplete library, poor customer service, sometimes suspect billing practices.
2. Volumio user interface and their Rasb Pi connection interface (I use wifi) just do not get along with me. I am not a super duper computer/network expert but I am not incompetent either. I hated how they interacted and connected - or should I say were difficult to connect. Tried both and returned for refund with frustration (Volumio Primo and Project Streambox). Sonos and BluOs much better imo. Simple and basic at some level, but how they connected and work on phone/tablet is solid. Roon is still out there, haven’t tried, dislike idea of paying $10 a month for Roon, then pay for music streaming too...
3. Blue Node 2i is an interesting piece. Definitely ideal for beginners... does it all with one box, very easy to hook up and use. But it is ironic it purports to provide full MQA sound, but through a rather poor onboard DAC. I was unimpressed with the sound -- SQ was clearly superior on redbook resolution stream through a better DAC like a Chord or RME. I am still trying to hear full MQA through a real and ’serious’ DAC, so bought the Topping MQA D90, but this thing only does full MQA through its USB input (not coax/bnc or optical)... are you kidding me??? So Topping going to be returned too (to be fair, it is a good sounding DAC without MQA, but not better than Chord or RME).
4. If you have a history with Sonos, I would say the modded Sonos units with cleaned up clock output is actually excellent for SQ as well as for interface/hookup. Very impressed with SQ of the Wyred 4 Sound reclocker modded Sonos units. I think it sounds even a touch better than the Node 2i digital stream out ... I think...
5. I agree with a poster above saying that streaming/sources are still evolving quite a bit... may be unwise to spend big $ on streaming front end/transport and have it obsoleted before long... but that DAC technology is stabilizing and maturing. I have been very very impressed with the Chord and RME DACs at the $1000-1500 level. Really great sound, tactile, great PRAT yet warm fullsome whole sounding. I suspect, thought I haven't had any of the big dollar DACs in my system, that $1000 or so may be the point of diminishing returns for DAC quality.
Hope my experience helps others starting out. It is fun and the idea of surfing through these almost infinite music libraries is wonderful. Overall SQ I am getting is very very close to CD/analog sources.
Transports/streamers tried - Sonos Connect (w and w/out Wyred4Sound clock mods), Volumio Primo, Project Streambox S2 Ultra, Node 2i
DACs - Chord 2Qute and Qutest, RME ADI2, Topping MQA D90, Hegel Rost internal DAC (Wolfson)
Music Services - Spotify, Tidal, Qobuz
Takeaways:
1. Moved quickly through highest Spotify to Tidal and Qobuz services, the SQ difference is not subtle. More subtle is SQ difference between Tidal MQA and Qobuz hi res. Have not tried Amazon HD. Suspect this whale will eat them all, esp. T and Q. Tidal is subscale on MQA and its benefits are unclear, Quboz has an incomplete library, poor customer service, sometimes suspect billing practices.
2. Volumio user interface and their Rasb Pi connection interface (I use wifi) just do not get along with me. I am not a super duper computer/network expert but I am not incompetent either. I hated how they interacted and connected - or should I say were difficult to connect. Tried both and returned for refund with frustration (Volumio Primo and Project Streambox). Sonos and BluOs much better imo. Simple and basic at some level, but how they connected and work on phone/tablet is solid. Roon is still out there, haven’t tried, dislike idea of paying $10 a month for Roon, then pay for music streaming too...
3. Blue Node 2i is an interesting piece. Definitely ideal for beginners... does it all with one box, very easy to hook up and use. But it is ironic it purports to provide full MQA sound, but through a rather poor onboard DAC. I was unimpressed with the sound -- SQ was clearly superior on redbook resolution stream through a better DAC like a Chord or RME. I am still trying to hear full MQA through a real and ’serious’ DAC, so bought the Topping MQA D90, but this thing only does full MQA through its USB input (not coax/bnc or optical)... are you kidding me??? So Topping going to be returned too (to be fair, it is a good sounding DAC without MQA, but not better than Chord or RME).
4. If you have a history with Sonos, I would say the modded Sonos units with cleaned up clock output is actually excellent for SQ as well as for interface/hookup. Very impressed with SQ of the Wyred 4 Sound reclocker modded Sonos units. I think it sounds even a touch better than the Node 2i digital stream out ... I think...
5. I agree with a poster above saying that streaming/sources are still evolving quite a bit... may be unwise to spend big $ on streaming front end/transport and have it obsoleted before long... but that DAC technology is stabilizing and maturing. I have been very very impressed with the Chord and RME DACs at the $1000-1500 level. Really great sound, tactile, great PRAT yet warm fullsome whole sounding. I suspect, thought I haven't had any of the big dollar DACs in my system, that $1000 or so may be the point of diminishing returns for DAC quality.
Hope my experience helps others starting out. It is fun and the idea of surfing through these almost infinite music libraries is wonderful. Overall SQ I am getting is very very close to CD/analog sources.