DAC’s

That is a good price for a Meitner. If it were me, I would go for it.

You can easily sell it for that price, if you don't like it. Actually, you could sell it for more.

FWIW, I use Roon with a Brinkmann Nyquist. I don't need a Roon Core. Only a subscription to Roon and the Brinkmann does the rest.

Probably best to make sure with Meitner if that is so with their unit.

I can understand your trepidation. But, I had quite a learning curve when I moved to digital. I have owned many DAC's, from Schiit to Ayre. Moving to the Brinkmann pretty much ended my search. Though I haven't listened to the Meitner, I have heard good things about it, and I don't think you will be disappointed. Is there a possibility of you auditioning it against other brands at your dealer?

Bob

Okay, I am back.

But, it seems a lot has happened since I last chimed in.😮

So,

I wanted to have both my office and living room systems playing simultaneously the same music.

I thought Aurrender would be the cure, but, alas, no.

So, I got the Innuos Zen Mini for the office, and the Innuos Zenith for the living room (main system). Setting everything up, I had a choice to use Roon. Being a frugal (cheap) person I was hesitant, but, then thought, What the heck give it a try.

Mind you, I had Bluesound before.

It worked very nicely, and even though I had to work out some issues (which Bluesound helped to rectify), it was a very nice situation.

Moving to Roon was quite a pleasant change. A sleek piece of software that is very easy to work with and offers a lot of sound 'improvements' (DSP, for example).

So, to answer the question- Do I need a Roon Core?

From my experience, no.

You buy the Roon software licence and then set up your system.

Works like a charm for me.

(BTW- I was using an Ayre QB-9 Twenty with the Innuos Zenith before moving to the Brinkmann. I never had any issue with Roon during that change up).

Bob

Ahh, that was the mystery,

B