Do I Need a Dedicated Streamer?

I’m not aware of evidence that rules out difference in sound between streamer models, but counting on this piece of kit in a music playback chain to make a “next level” difference in sound is a pretty dubious gamble based on how streamers and human hearing work.

I’m also not aware of a streaming service that discloses source info for each track/album it provides; this is not an insignificant detail since a huge number of albums have been remastered. If you are being provided with recent remasters or files that are otherwise likely compressed in dynamic range by your streaming service, then your source files are where the most considerable improvement could be. Either that or equipment to properly process your digital signal specific to your room (DSP), but to get either of those as turnkey would be very expensive.

There are presently no published / accessible studies that demonstrate audible differences between streamer models (vs., e.g., speakers). In buying a streamer, the only surefire thing you pay for = software support and the pleasure of the user interface (touch screen and/or smartphone app), and you hope that the manufacturer keeps up with iOS / Android updates if using a phone app.

I’ve had that very investment (trusting a company to keep the user interface up to date) go bad on me, which is why I now stick with open source for a transport OS. I will not use a streaming service that doesn’t provide source/master metadata for its music catalogue. If you’re unwittingly feeding remastered files of compromised dynamic range into your system, it would a fool’s errand to try to improve things with a fancy streamer. 
A good question to ask before trying to take your system to the “next level” is “What do I perceive to still be missing?” based on noteworthy experience(s) from music in your life. Otherwise it can be putting money on the fork with which you stab into the dark ;)

toro3

268 posts

12-21-2023 at 07:41pm 

Interesting conversation. @benanders @yage what streamers have you owned/used? Yage it looks like you’re using a Raspberry Pi in your main system - I’m assuming this is still the case, yes? 
 

The last streamer I owned was the Oppo Sonica DAC with a company-approved power supply modification. It’s still a fine DAC, but once the parent company killed the disc player lab in CA, the Sonica app and streamer functions failure rate became increasingly problematic until I was spending far more time dealing with freezes than listening to music. The DAC works and tests well enough that a used one can still sell for what I paid for the “whole package,” if not more - how often does that happen for audio kit, eh!?

Anyway, the Sonica “streamer” was supported for less than a year post-release, then every buyer was largely SOL. Since then I’ve had a few “loaner” streamers visit my system (purely for the curiosity of others - not for feeling need myself), some of considerably more cost and sophistication than the Oppo Sonica all-in-one. Blind testing didn’t result in anything consistent for the device owners, so I consider that there wasn’t [noticeable] audible difference in what various streamers were doing in my system. I purposefully omit brand/model names to prevent anyone online feeling need to dogpile to the contrary. To each their own on that matter.

Presently, I use a RPi for streamer and USB-to-DAC (have used one of the coax / TOSLINK-out hats too, which also was fine). I have a couple of 4b’s lying around but haven’t taken the time to swap out the 3b+ I started on. The 3b+ by design does have (minimal) USB bus issues in my use case, but a few split-second glitches here and there between tracks apparently aren’t enough to trigger my “FIX IT!” response. Another project for a holiday someday!

I should have said “freeware” not “open source” for the streamer OS, since there are many of the former for the RPi platform. If whichever service I’m using is discontinued, all I have to do is reformat an SD card. There are some very impressive streamers / processors on the market that use the RPi as the device’s computer. There’s probably something to be said for that ;)

Let’s not forget the intention here is not to argue whether streamers’ quality scales with device price (zero evidence for) or if there is audible difference between streamers (zero evidence for; limited evidence against). My point was there are more demonstrably sensible ways for OP to get audio kit performing better… as long as OP knows what “better” would be in the particular setup.

I think music source files of known parameters and/or DSP would be the most logistically sound (pun!) options here.