Any audiophile use computer (MacBook) as your audio streaming source?

Whaa? One could plug his hifi streamer into his big TV or projector, sit back with a wireless keyboard/mouse and watch Netflix too??? HBO Max too??? Watch music videos and concerts with hifi audio on a streamer??? Play games??? Send emails??? The streamer (pc) can do that??? Whaaa???

I’ve been doing just that for the better part of, oh, 20 years and I honestly cannot fathom why anyone would set up their home cinema otherwise. In the past I would fish CAT cables through the walls to my media room, but nowadays you can easily stream perfectly steady 4K video over a garden-variety wifi connection. I am not using this setup for 2-channel audio listening though. One small caveat is that HTPCs often don’t play well with ARC / eARC. Mine sure doesn’t. But that’s a minor nit.

@deep_333 One thing I would add to your PC list is cooling fans. You don’t want them, and that can be a little tricky. CPUs and GPUs run hot. Liquid cooling works but will rule out most ITX-class enclosures because it's bulky. The good news is that audio processing is not CPU-intensive so you can run any number of low-power chipsets yet have power to spare. Seems like manyaudiophile streamers run ARM processors.

You have to wonder why so many seemingly reliable and reasonable folks report that strictly digital components (streamers, DDCs, etc.) make a sonic difference when logically they should not. What if the differencse were built in by the designer?

@devinplombier  Well, if they reduce noise and jitter, both of which are the well-known and proven enemies of good digital sound, why wouldn’t they sound different/better?  What in the world is not logical about that???  IMO it’s completely illogical to think otherwise, so maybe — just maybe — there’s a good reason why so many “reasonable and reliable folks” find significant sonic differences.  Hmmm.  If you wanna call jitter/noise reduction “voicing” I guess that’s your prerogative, but I’d call that a misnomer.  

 there are plenty of references out there that will show DACs sound better when fed a higher quality signal with lower noise/jitter, which is largely what a DDC does.  Just because you (or I) don’t understand exactly why that is the case doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, and the fact that both you and I (and scores of others here) have experienced positive benefits from adding a DDC is pretty darn good evidence that feeding a DAC a better signal has material benefits.  If it’s not because the DAC works/sounds better with a lower noise/jitter signal from the DDC they why else would that possibly be?

I completely agree with the first part, I said several times that I agree a DAC can sound better fed from a DDC

What I said was .... your conclusion that it does so because it doesn't have to work as hard or has to do less processing has no factual basis so stating that these are the reasons has no basis in fact.

I never had any problem with the conclusion that it sounds better. My problem is your statement about WHY it sounds better.

As you alluded to, it really doesn't matter why as long as it does, so why do you keep defending the reasons you stated when they are indefensible especially when you agree you don't know why?

the end. 

DDC effectiveness generally with I2S, I2S input on many dacs allows local or host clocking, host or DDC clock may be superior to dac clock. I don't see the point of adding DDC for usb unless streamer usb really poor.

I agree with prior poster in regard to diy builds, many levels of performance depending on build.

How can you argue with people who claim to hear no difference with dedicated streamers vs multi purpose computers, they get to be happy without any extra expenditure.  For those who've not heard a dedicated streamer in their system speak from experience rather than rehashing other's experiences.

I primarily use Windows desktop as a source, but occasionally Macbook as well. Streamer is just a computer. And I am pretty sure Apple gear is much better designed than some ARM Linux box.