Bryston BDA 3.14 versus alternatives


I’m in the market for a music streamer, with or without a DAC, and with or without a CD ripper. The Bryston BDA 3.14 seems like a good choice; refined sound, low noise floor, lots of input options.  The main knock against it is the Manic Moose software. MM software notwithstanding, are there other downsides to the BDA 3.14?  Thanks, Robert
128x128robert_gass
I had the BDP 3 and sold it off recently.  Isn't the BDA 3.14 the combo of the DAC3 and the BDP3?  If  so and you already have a DAC that you like there is redundancy there, although the Bryston DAC is great.
  Manic Moose is horrible, as noted.  I never did find a third party app that worked well with the BDP3 and I tried a few.  I had ordered the WiFi version the BDP 3 even though I use ethernet, because I wanted to have flexibility in case I move to a non ethernet setting.  It turns out the two front usb inputs don't work if you get the WiFI version, which pissed me off from the get go.  It turned out not to be a big deal, however, because the back two worked fine and you can only listen to 1 input at a time, but they should tell you this when you are buying a $K component, imo.
   After software updates there were a couple of times the BDP 3 couldn't find my NAS>. I had to ditch the ethernet and go WiFI in order to have it work again.  Bryston said it was a glitch in their software both times.  There were several times I turned the unit on and it wouldn't work for anything except Internet Radio, then several hours later it worked on all inputs. Dropouts were frequent, and I have not had that issue with the NAS that I was using with other players. I started wondering if I had to sacrifice a goat or something to please the Bryston Digital Gods.
   The Bryston Digital guy is named Chris Rice, and he is very nice, but I think he is a one man show, and there is no way that I want to get into a relationship with a product support guy to the point where I am contemplating sending him a Christmas Card.
   On the positive side, the BDP 3 when it worked, did sound great.  I went the Melco route, as you can see from other threads here.  It also sounds great, works flawlessly, and I am much happier.
I have the Bryston BDP Pi.  MM is certainly flaky.  But the Pi makes a great Roon endpoint. One option could be to invest in a SGC ST to run a Roon Core then use a Bryston Product as an endpoint.  You could pick up a used Bryston BDP 2 as the endpoint.  you could get all that for around $3K.

Also Bryston is re writing the MM interface. 

For about $3K you could also do SGC Optical Rendo Setup if you have a USB DAC.