Clock vs Streamer advice


Hi,

My current system is/was

Aurender N100H>Bricasti MC1>ARC Ref6 Pre>PS BHK 300 monos>B&W 803 D3

I sold the Aurender to try a different streamer and am temporarily using a MacBook to run Roon straight the the DAC through USB. I currently don’t have a huge budget. I emailed a local shop that has a used Melco N1Z to demo at home. I am going to try it out. I also want to try the Bricasti M5 streamer to see if there is synergy with my DAC.

I also came across the Mutec MC3+USB and Mutec Ref10 Nano combination in a similar price point, but I won’t be able to demo this.

If I have to pick between using a mac>Multec MC3+USB and Ref10 Nano>dac and the Melco>DAC option, which do you think will improve sound more. I’m still pretty new to this hobby and can’t currently afford the Melco and Multec combo.

zpatenaude37

Showing 2 responses by mazian

@lalitk

I tried apps associated with streamers from Elac, Cambridge Audio, Auralic, iFi Zen and Aurender but none of them was as good as the native Qobuz app. I was unable to find any way of using the Qobuz app with any of those streamers except via Airplay but when doing that I could not stream in Hi Res. I resisted subscribing to Roon for years but eventually succumbed and Roon is easily the best way of managing streamed albums, not perfect but the best. To achieve that I ended up buying an Antipodes CX streamer which was both Roon Ready and Roon Core in the same unit. The sound quality is excellent, on par with an Aurender N200, but not cheap and there is also the ongoing payment for Roon. Is it worth it? This you have to judge for yourself.

Aurenders sound great but the app is not good if you want to stream classical music. Also you can't at present use Roon with an Aurender if you think you might want to go the Roon way.