Great customer service from Auralic Ltd.

I just want to say that I’ve used almost every AURALiC product made to date, yes this includes the very underrated and little known GEMINI 2000, and I’ve used them in every way imaginable. This includes numerous different combinations of NAS, Roon, internal storage, etc... AURALiC’s platform and products are so flexible that the options are endless. Reviewing the ARIES G2.1 I decided to use only a USB connected hard drive to store my music. The option is there, and I’m sure it’s a great one for many people without gigantic music collections, so I thought I’d give it a try. I tried both a large USB flash drive and my recently discovered Yottamaster HC1-C3 SSD drive with built-in cloning for backup. I initially copied my music to the USB drive while it was connected to my computer, then connected it to the ARIES G2.1. When new releases arrived I attempted to copy them to the USB drive while it was connected to the ARIES G2.1. Doing this I discovered a bug in the platform. This was reproduced by the AURALiC team and fixed in an update to the Lightning platform. One beautiful thing about controlling everything from hardware to software, is that support is much simpler for the manufacturer and the customer benefits greatly. Since the fix was applied, I’ve been copying new Three Blind Mice albums to the ARIES G2.1 over the network without any issues. Rebaid

I've had no issues with my Aries Mini over almost 6 years of ownership that weren't network related. And @ghosthouse thanks for the vote of confidence on the Mini I certainly enjoy the sound I'm getting and proud of myself for taking you to the "dark side" 😎

I will echo the OPs experience. I have also had direct correspondence with the company president when posing questions about preferred settings in the streamer and my Sirius upsampling processor.  The company is very responsive to requests.

I will also note that my Auralic gear is stable.  Yes, the company does control software updates but it hasn’t caused instability.  I never had issues with my Aurender either - stable as a rock. I know others who post here where that was not their experience. So, my suspicion is that, for some, like many computer users, not all peripherals work as seamlessly as we’d like in all environments.

One final point - I upgraded from an Aurender N100H to the Aries G2 and it was a notable improvement in lowering the noise floor, in detail and spatial improvement. The Aurender sounded somewhat “flat” in comparison. I gather the new Aurender units are better.  In any case - user experiences differ so an audition is required and people should take recommendations in this forum (mine included) as just a data point. We all promote things we’ve purchased as validation.

Regardless, I’m a fan of their performance (particularly when you combine their gear via lightning link - massive improvement) and their customer service.

My $.03 (inflation)

Glad you got the support needed but none of this should have happened in the first place.
The Auralic OS should have handled something like this much more gracefully.

I had the ARIES G1 and the firmware bugs that caused issues every week, several times a week finally drove me to dump it. I replaced it with Lumin U1 Mini that sounded better, didn’t require login other than to Qobuz and Tidal, and had zero issues while in my system. Yes the Lightning DS is nicer than Lumin’s UI, but the LDS bugs render the unit useless way too frequently requiring the entire network infrastructure to be rebooted. No thanks…

Not gonna be the last time ComCrap goes south.

Great to hear you had a great experience with Aurlic (Aries G2). I sure didn’t.

First, running the player is contingent on them approving you using it through the internet. For whatever reason mine was locked and would not function. My dealer contacted them and after a couple of days “unlocked it”. I spent thousands to own a player… yet they still hold the keys to allow it’s use. That was completely unacceptable.

Then, while it did sound much better than my Mac as a streamer… I still felt there was noise level too high. I swapped to an Aurender and the sound improved significantly… first a N100 then a W20SE.

Great to hear you are having better luck with Aurlic.

Great hearing from you guys.  

Might be a normal expectation, @pokey77 but as you know expectations ain't always met.  There's something to be said for dealing with a company managed by a "sole-proprietor" and not a board of directors.  The former tend to have "skin in the game" and take things personally (in a good way).

@jond - I've said it before in these forums.  This whole Auralic thing is your fault! ;-)  I actually still have the Mini and it works just fine.  Used it when the G1 was down.  Firmware updates seem to keep it sounding fresher than you might expect for its age.  

The Mini has got to be one of the best values in audio.  My ears, my gear but it seems to do maybe 80 or even 90% of what the G1 does.  Don't get hung up on those %, just trying to make a point.  And that performance for what price?  As originally priced the Mini was maybe 1/5th the G1's cost.

I almost didn't keep the G1 (30 day return option on an open box unit from Audio Advisor) because the Mini sounded so close.  What took me a while to appreciate is that while the Mini covers much the same frequency range; i.e. the two "sound" very similar tonally, the G1 presentation is more transparent; more "air & space"/stage depth; a little sharper in sonic images; the music is more "3D".  So maybe more "refined" covers it.  But I won't lie, it's not something that hits you over the head from the get go.  It took me a while to appreciate what it was doing because initially I was so focused on comparing the tone which like I said seemed much like that from the Mini.  Anyway, missed it when it was gone and glad it is back.  

I'm not crying about the mechanical hard drive.  Switched to solid state: SanDisk - Extreme Portable 2TB External USB-C NVMe.  SSD Prices have come down a good bit.  This one was on sale at Best Buy for just a little north of 50% the regular price.  5 year warranty.  

Bottom line, don't be apologizing for your Mini!  but if opportunity presents itself you might enjoy a G1 (or now, G1.1).

Awesome resolution Ghosthouse but sorry about your hard drive dying! And you can also always post over on the Auralic forums https://community.auralic.com/

There’s a ton of knowledge there and Xuanqian frequently responds himself. And how are you liking the G1? Still running my aged but reliable Mini here!

Great to read about this positive experience for you. I think this is what most 'philes expect when they invest in a quality piece of gear. -Glad you are up and running again. Enjoy the music!