Lumin X1 latest Review like we have been saying
We love the pairing of the Lumin T2 with the Innous Zen or Zenith feeding an ultra low noise repacketed data stream via its ethernet port to the Lumin T2. As the Lumin T2 works woderfully well with Roon as the device is a certified Roon endpoint. Take your Tidal or Obouz data stream to DSD 512 on the T2 and boy are you in for a treat, you have the option of running the uncoversion in the Lumin or at Roon’s DSP setting. We have yet to find a combination at the price that can beat these two which are great used separately but make real magic when used together. For 2020 we will be doing a shootout of the Lumin T2 vs the $2,000.00 more expensive Bricasti M3. The Bricasti M3 is reported to sound fantastic and does have digital inputs, and a pure balanced analog volume control, the M3 also has dual dacs technology meaning that PCM plays through a dedicated PCM dac stage as well as a true 1bit DSD dac stage for ultra pure DSD decoding For most people a pure streamer is ideal we are testing the Bricasti as a possible option for those people who want thouse features also the M3 has an optional $500.00 headphone stage that should also be smoking. We have many clients with the Lumin gear it is so nice to see that other people agree with our findings. Rosbit we agree with you and your choice for the X1, add a set of Isouacoustics footers and a good power cord for even better sound. We compared a DCS Pucchini CD player/Dac many years ago as we had a client who wanted to move up to streaming, and we orchestrated a trade for a Lumin A1, the Lumin was $7k vs the DCS which was a $18k product the A1 was signfigantly more musical and nearly matched the DCS’s resolution, both has a big soundstage, but the A1 was clearly more involving. The Lumin X1 and T2 are so much better than the original A1 but the demonstration was very informative. Dave and Troy Audio Docto NJ Luimin dealers Happy 2020 leveryone! |
Tomic our on the radar is just that these are products we are going to be getting in for evaluation. We do have to buy them however, in most cases we have a right of return so there is no risk. If you read most of our posts we explain the reasons why a product line or product is of interest. You are correct that the CJ gear is excellent, they have been almost non existant in terms of doing shows, advertising, and for years they did not update their products offerings. Zesto is a very interesting company because their prices are good their best amplifiers the Eros 300 monoblocks are $20 vs CJ are $40k, Zesto's best preamp is $10k vs $24 for CJ. They get fantastic reviews, they do shows, the people behind the company are really nice. Add to that the Zesto Leto Utlimate has an amazing feature set as well as balalnced ins and output which CJ's gear lacks, home theater bybass, adjustable gain for inputs, a unique tone eq, and their designs are all about creating a very musical product that is well designed for the price rather than just being overbuilt and jacking up the price for these reasons the line is worth testing out. As per the Naim 555 streamer, although we have heard this piece at shows we do have the NDX 2/XPS 2 combo which is nearly $14k on display and the combo is very good, in our opinion the Lumin X1 is far better. The Naim NDX 2 is a very good sounding piece but we tend to sell it with a Naim system. For the high price of the Naim 555 streamer the combo is close to $30k we just can't seem to wrap our minds and hearts around that piece for that price point when we allready have the $35k Light Harmonic Davinci as well as the T+A SDV 3100 dac/preamp which is also a $35k piece, we also have the Aqua Hifi Formula V2 which is a huge improvement over the last version at $16k, and now we are looking at Bricasti starting with the M3 as a possible dac/streamer with digital inputs if that piece is excellent than it is possible we would evaluate their $16k M21 dac/preamp as well. Saleh you Aurender N10 is still an excellent piece we recently did a shoot out of the N10 vs an Innous Statement and the Statement was better however the N10 still sounded very good. the N10 is showing its age and Aurender really needs to do a major overhaul in terms of technlogy the N10 probably is close to five or more years old at this time and clocking and anti jitter technlogy has been improved since then. As per an Aurender W20Se not sounding as good as any other server it is going to be about system matching as well. It would almost be impossible at this point if you are spending $20k or more on a server to get a bad one, the Taiko extreme is super expensive, and is it really that much superior some people in Europe have tested it vs the Innous Statement and found the Taiko to be a bit better but hardly worth the gigantic price difference, the Pink Faun does look to be a contender but the company has done a very poor job of getting the product in front of people so is it better just as good hard to say. For world's best servers we would in no particular order look at Innous Statement, Pink Faun, Aurender and Antipodes the Taiko is just crazy expensive. The Memory Player in our tests vs the Basetis and Statement was a good sounding and very analog piece but it is a bit clunky to use. Hope that helps you understand our postioning we are always lookng at the market for 2020 here is what we are testing: Hegel H390 just got that in Zesto Monoblocks on order, Vimberg Tonda and Amea on order Bricasti M3 on order. Unison Research hybrid tube solid state integrated amplifiers the Unico 150 and Due. Who knows what else we will test this year we are also looking at importing a fascinating set of speakers from Europe.as we are renaming our company to reflect our import company as well as our retail side. Tomic we do a lot of testing of products that interest us, we want to keep the lines fresh and always find products which represent our core values 1: Musicality, tonality, soundstaging, 2: Techologically advanced designs. 3: Fair pricing for what you are getting. 4: Feature set. 5: Hopefully visibility in terms of marketing and doing shows. 6: Plays well with our loudspeaker lines 7: Reliability 8: Ease of use, ease of servicing, resale. You are welcome to come in for a visit if you are ever in our neck of the woods, we have one pretty cool little shop with many of todays hottest products on display if you notice in our 15 year history we have added and subtracted many lines as we are not wed to the manufactuer we are wed to the concept of finding the best products for our client and these products need to reflect our core values as listed above. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
Good evening gents, hello Liamowen, and gohelz. It is funny that our little group of haters doesnt utter a peep when another dealer makes the same kind of post note this is on Dec 7 https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/magico-a5-official-announcement?highlight=Magico%2BA5%2Bofficial%2BAnnouncement Rhbesterno, you don't read so good, we have in previous posts recommend products we don't sell, we did point out that one of our favorite rooms at Axpona and CAP were using Wilson speakers, we have also recommend Rockport. We have also recommend Focals and have said that the Grande Utopia EVO at Axpona was one of the best sounding rooms, guess what we are not a Focal Utopia dealer either. In a preamp post https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/reference-full-function-tube-preamplifier we recommended CJ we are not currently CJ dealers but did previously sell the brand, we also said that the Vac preamps were excellent as well as Backert, We don't sell CJ, we don't sell Vac, we don't sell Backert. Here is the quote: You can look at a Conrad Johnson preamp or a Vac, or possibly a Zesto or dozens of other preamplifiers, we heard the Backert Labs preamps and they were also stunning. As per the review it does kind of look like an ad with the exception is that everyone who has head an X1 has been blown away by its performance it is quite close to the best digital front end for 1/2 to 1/3 thre price and hence the reviewer said the Lumin X1 was the best source he has ever heard. Hifi Plus: t puts it in direct competition with products that cost several times as much and take up a lot of shelf space in the process. Audiophile It is without doubt the streamer that in my system has developed the most structured sound stage. Computer Audiophile: It has air, detail, liquidity, slam, and the appropriate amount of analog vibe that makes the Lumin X1 something to behold. The X1 is a true accomplishment for the Lumin team and a must-hear for eager audiophiles worldwide. Major is you recently bought a DCS the Bartok is excellent the Lumin X1 is a warmer sonic signature but if we had a DCS Bartok it is very unlikely we would want to switch either. The DCS products are excellent the tonality is different, so are the MSB dacs. It really comes down to what creates synergy in your system. We do we post this is for the very reason that many people here discuss DCS or MSB or Esoteric without thinking that Lumin is in this level of sound quality with the X1 which is a huge step up from anything they have ever built before. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
Mayor we hardly derailed your thread we suggested based on critical analysis of the Nucleus plus vs the Innous product to try the Innous, we even offered to send you one to evaluate if your local dealer will not lend you one. We do a lot of testing so far we havent found a server line that we like better. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
Dtrandall, we have every right to post, if you don’t like our posts please don’t read them. As per pitching our products like most dealers we are all fighting for our survival. Too few people will openly reach out to a dealer first, even in the case of shopping here many times a dealer can come close with a demo or display product vs a used one, and you have the benefits of working with someone who knows the products. What working with a great dealer can do for you is to help you not make mistakes, we are advising a client now who was sold a $26k set of reference grade floor standers for a titanicly large room and he is blowing them up, we have that experience with those loudspeakers and would never have sold them to him. He is going to take quite a loss because he received poor advice. Too many people are here just to sell something, we are not. We are in the business of selling products, however we are also in the business of making our clients happy, and in most cases very happy. We do this by constantly evaluating and revaluating the market and moving into the best sounding products due to extensive testing of new products. If you compare our post vs this one it is fascinating that nobody here is making a rukus over this post https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/magico-a5-official-announcement?highlight=Magico%2BA5%2Bofficial%2BAnnouncement This post even mentions every line that this dealer sells, notice not one peep? Look at it another way, do people learn things from our posts? Do many people comment favorably? Yes we get emails all the time from people who have read our posts and received great advice. We have our enemies those people who don’t like our position or our outspoken demenor. The point is we have tons of experience with many of the products people here really want to purchase because we sell most of them, if we published out\r line listing most people would be shocked by the sheer varitety of what we carry. Do we have real experience by having the products on the shelf vs many "dealers" who have a gigantic line listing yet you ask for a demo of the product and they don’t floor it, how would you know really how good that product is? You can see photos of our shop and actually see the products that we carry and recomend. Have you ever read a similar post and wanted to check out a product that you were not aware of? In the case of Lumin their products are really excellent, as we stated before one reason for calling attention to the current X1 review was to hammer home the point that the Lumin products are in the same league as the big boys, DCS, MSB, Esoteric, and at usually less money for the fantastic sound quality they bring. Are Lumins products always the best or right product for everyone the answer is no, Lumin has a singular vision if you want digital inputs or headphone amp or an analog volume control, or analog inputs this will not be the product for you. We gave Tuberist advice on how to set his Lumin T2 which he didn’t get from us and now he is getting far better results. Did he help this person or not? Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
We will be writing an in depth follow up to this question later. Long story short dac 8 running dsd 512 sounds somewhat close X1 is still better. The Dac 8 if run on a stable servcr at dsd 512 dramatically improves the sound quality however the more expensive dacs also improve dramatically. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
The Lumin T2 to T+A DAC 8 comparison is both a more illuminating one as the Lumin T2 can be run by itself although will still sound better through a server, while the Dac 8 requires a server, than the Lumin T2 is acutally the better deal. We will have to re do a test between the Lumin T2 and the Dac 8. We run the outstanding Innous Zenith with our Dac 8 and unfortunately the DAC 8/Innous combo will not do DSD 512, we are getting in a Lumin U1 Mini and that will do DSD 512 so we will update you in the comming weeks to see how that combo will sound. Mew you hit the nail on the head both the Lumin line as well as the T+A Dac 8 hit well beyond their price point. We have compared the Lumin T2 to a few $7k dacs and most of the time the clients pick the Lumin as being superior sounding as well as costing considerably less money. The Lumin X1 challenges a lot of $25-50k digital front ends so it to offers a level of sound quality that is very high for its price point. With the addition of Bricasti we will have one terrific selection of dacs and streamers including: Mytek, Bricasti, Naim, Lumin, T+A, Aqua, IFi, Lumin, NAD. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
Kren we were Esoteric dealers for years, the NT 505 is considered a competitor to the Lumin D2 and some people may prefer one or the other but these two units are of a similar level of sound quality. As per the Lumin T2 it is dramatically better sounding then the D2 in every way, The T2 is closer to the X1's design than the older D2, the D2 by the way still sounds extremely good even compared to more expensive dacs. As per Esoteric having superior tech than Lumin the fact that Esoteric can't even engineer an app and went to Lumin for their app shows what exactly? The Lumin X1 is $6k less expensive than the Esoteric NS 01 and most people who have compared the two prefer the Lumin. We did a comparison of the Lumin A1 vs the KO3 and the Lumin A1 was nearly as good for 1/2 the price and in terms of musical engagement the Lumin was more engaging even setting both to DSD. Lumin is a company of broadcast engineers they use a totally different design standard in how they design their products, every aspect of the circuit, every part is evaluated to how and to best utilize that part. The Esoteric is in a huge case that is not necessary to make it look more impressive, that case is made out of plate metal, vs the Lumin X1 is machined out of billet aluminium the X1 uses an outboard power supply which is quiet and located outside of the case, Esoteric puts the power supply internal. The X1 use SFP to remove noise from transmission Esoteric didn't even think about this, the design of the X1 shows a remarkable attention to putting money into areas where you will get the best performance for the dollar, and in every test the X1 has been considered to match or exceed digital front ends that are $25-50k. In our shop you have to go up to an Aqua Formula/Statement package or a T+A SD 3100 or a Light Harmonic Davinci/Statement package at $30-50k to really move into something better. It is interesting to note that the Esoteric NS 01 has not been lauded as a giant slayer nor a product to compete with many more expensive digital front ends. If you look at the Lumin X1 it has been lauded around the world as being one of the best sounding products on the market and true reference digital for far less than the competition. Does that mean someone might find something else they may like more in their system? Anything is possible but the Lumin X1 has a totally engaging sound, throws a huge sound stage, has excellent resolution and hits the tonality side with a big warm musical presentation, a great feature set, OTA upgrades, MQA, Roon, Airplay, from a company with a track record of producing streaming/dacs which are what is held up as the gold standard to which everything is compared against. Kren go listen to an X1 and judge for yourself. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
The reality is that an X1 is an aspirational product, it is among the best pieces of digital in the world and actually compares with many much more expensive front ends. The price of gear is no different than any performance item is a $30k watch a good deal or a $24k Hermes coach bag? The reality is many expensive high end audio products are extremely expensive to make and are sold in limited quantities hence the high sticker. The higher end T+A dacs are even better, the Lumin X1 is still a very noticable step up as the X1 sounds more like a much more expensive digital front end then it does compared to other units at a similar price and feature set or straight dacs. Yes Ricridi you can use a Lumin X1 with an Antipodes the Lumin is a full Roon endpoint so it would appear as such being fed from your server. The Lumin X1 is a different sound than the Chord, the Lumin tends to be a bit warmer and more melodic the Chord sharper and a bit faster sounding. It will come down to taste someone here had both units, we are not a Chord dealer although that may change as they are warming up to us again. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
Kren we have never done a shootout between these two, however, all the reviews on the NT 505 find it a good sounding dac but none of the reviews on the piece we have ever seen, have said that the NT 505 is a giant killer, it is on the recommended list of John Darko we do believe. The NT 505 will be a good piece in the same way the Lumin D2 is also really good, which one you would prefer is up to your tastes and system preferences, these are two very different products with the Lumin being a dedicated streamer vs the Teac piece which is also a headphone amp. On paper the NT 505 offers more, how ever as noted by Nutella the D1 as noted by Nutella sounded extremely good in his setup: "The lumin D1 outperformed Benchmark and Chord dacs in my setup. Don’t discount having a one box solution. Dac tech has slowed down while streamer tech seems to be seeing the most room for improvement. That lumin humiliated the blue sound I was using as a streamer only. " Your preoccupation on the dac chip of the Lumin is rather silly, the chip is just one aspect of the sound of a dac, in the case of the Wolfson Dacs Lumin uses that chip with the D1/D2 platform because this chip in this hardware produce an exceedingly musical sound. This is no different than other dac designers using a 30+ years old Philips TDA 1541 double crown chip because they love the sound of this particular chip, there are other companies using Burr Brown 1792A chips even in 2020 there are designers using the ESS 9016k which is a far earlier version of the ESS Sabre chip series including the 9028 and the 9038pro. As per your feeling that the NT 505 with an outboard clock would sound better then the Lumin T2 is again just speculation, just because you use an external clock doesn’t mean the sound quality of one product will necessarily sound far better the sound will be different. The fact that the Lumin D2 and the T2 continue to be the Gold Standard to which all modern streamers are generally being compared to. In our shop we have tested the Lumin D2 vs the Nad Blue sound, as well as the Cambridge Streamers and the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge and the Ifi DSD pro, most people love the sound of the D2 even in comparison to all of these fantastic dacs and dac streamers. The Lumin T2 is receiving rave reviews from everyone who has heard it again in our shop we compare the Lumin T2 to other dac streamers which are $6.5-7k products which makes the T2 a bargain compared to these more expensive products. Lumin is a very sophisticated company and they have world class engineering, when you are talking about all of these products your personal preferences and system synergies all come into it. As per your comments about not wanting to spend more than $2k on a piece that is up to you, the reality is that the difference in digital front ends can make a gigantic difference in the overall sound quality and level of performance a system. Lets say you have a $20k pair of loudspeakers and a $10k set of electronics on a great $2k dac do you think the overall system’s sound quality will be fantastic and you will be able to derive every bit of performance from the rest of the components, or is it very likely that the system’s sound will not necessarily be outstanding until the level of quality in the source is brought up to a similar level of performance. This is the perfect example of the weakest link, if you have great components you need an equally good source component, and if you really think there are no differences between a $2k dac a $4k one and dacs that are $7k and above you need to visit a good store and really experience this for yourself. As mentioned we specialize in digital audio and have played with dacs from the $500 Node to the $35k Light Harmonic’s Davinci and the oustanding T+A SD 3100HV which Robert Harley just reviewed and said it is one of the best dacs on the planet, a better source can make the difference between an expensive bunch of components making sound vs the same components making real music. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
Lalik do your own research, Lumin was one of the first companies to launch a dedicated high end streamer in 2012 with the original A1. The A1 continued to garner international press with rave reviews from all who heard it. If you continue forward Lumin' products are almost universally on all magazines lists of recommended digital streamers. In terms of experience they have been producing world class top rated streamers longer than anyone else. From the Six Moons Review in 2013 this sums up the company's technical prowess and why they can do what they do. Lumin is a division of Pixel Magic. Lumin Music in fact is a subsidiary of Pixel Magic Systems Ltd. which was founded in May 2003 as a privately held video technology equipment manufacturer for home theater and professional A/V markets. With offices in Hong Kong and San Jose/California, Pixel Magic has dealer/distributor networks for its own brand of products in over 25 countries and ODM/OEM customers in Europe and USA. Pixel Magic was the world's first developer to produce a Linux-based video processor under the Crystalio brand. Their core business is being focused on the development of innovative technologies for home-theater video processing/scaling products and high-definition TV-related products with advanced software programming features and design. If you have the prowess to design and develop your own technolgies and chips that is above what most traditional audio companies can bring to the table. In the case of Lumins use of Wolfson or ESS Sabre chips the Lumin engineers know that the chip set is one part of the equation and they cleverly look at maximizing the devices sound quality by how the entire circuit is implemented. Kren we have compared the Lumin D2 to the extremely well reviewed IFI DSD pro which is chock full of some of the most advanced digital technology in the world, DSD 1024 up-sampling, four interleaved Burr Brown dac chips, a GE tube set, extensive re-clocking and anti jitter techniques The IFI DSD pro was compared by Herb Rechiert to outperform the Schitt Yaggy, and the Holo dac and a few of the highly rated killer $2-3k dacs and he even compared the IFI DSD pro to the $7k Mytek Manhattan. Some of our clients prefer the warmer sound of the Ifi while others prefer the slightly more immediate yet still warm and full bodied sound of the Lumin the point is you evaluate a dac based on its technology but more importantly you judge its sound quality. Are we saying that the Lumin products are better than anything else no we are not saying that, we are saying that in each price range the Lumin products are constantly compared to most of their competitors and in most cases sound as good or better for usually less money. If you don't believe us do your own research and listen to their products. Again if you think we are only Lumin fans we sell quite a lot of great digital which does include: Mytek, Ifi, Naim, NAD, Bricasti, T+A, Aqua Hifi as well as servers from Innous, Baetis, Nad and Naim. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
The Wolfson dac chips are not that old and can do DSD they just cant do the highest sampling rates hence the ESS chips in the T2 and X1. The fact that the D2 still sounds fantastic is proof positive that the Lumin engineers really do know their stuff. The problem we all have as audiophiles is that we all want to believe that the latest and greatest chip and or part set is the magic answer. We are testing out Bricasti's new M3 which dare uses OP amps and our first inclination after seeing that was uck, however, the dac sounds extremely good, We are going to be testing Zesto's products after talking to George Couneous the owner of Zesto and their lead engineer he is relating that a good potentiometer can sound just as good a switched resistor volume control, and that a good Polypropolene cap can sound as good as more expensive Teflon after both are broken in. Hey what does George know trained electrical engineer, worked with the British Military and British broad casting and then studio engineering. The point is that there are many outstanding audio products that are all designed differently parts and design do matter but a well voiced circuit using good parts will outperform a poor circuit implemented with the world's most expensive parts. What we do is to seek out products that interest us, we get them in and then do comparative testing to see if the new product offers things that our existing product offerings don't. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
Lalik you obviously don’t know what you are talking about in this discussion we are talking about the Lumin as a streaming dac and in that capacity they are among the best in the industry. Lumin’s pure streamers, the U1 and U1 mini, are considered excellent but many people feel that the more expensive Antipodes, Innous, or Aurender units are even better as pure streamers, and these units also represent either Roon Cores or independent music repositories so again a bit of a different product than what you are talking about. As per being a Lumin fan boy yes we are, because their products are excellent, as per serving ourselves we are just one company that works with Lumin they have dealers and distributors all over the country. You also miss the point that yes we do benefit from selling this brand as well as the any of the other 60 or so brands we display and support, we know of very few products that our clients are so happy to purchase put into their systems and enjoy. How many companies offer what Lumin does, a great range of products at 4 different price points, over the air upgrades, Airplay, Tidal, Obouz, Spotify, internet radio, Roon and MQA, yes we know you will say Aurender and their products are quite good, however, their all in one units with the built in dacs, don’t seem to be as well reviewed and received as the Lumin products, add to that than many people love Roon as well as Roon’s ability to offer whole house control of Sonos, Heos, NAD Blue Sound, Naim, Chromecast and Airplay devices and now you can get a system that will play with a Roon based server into the Lumin as an Roon endpoint for your music room, as well as throughtout the house via these other streaming devices. Having an entire house with rooms of music throughtout the home is really cool, we can do this with a Lumin and a Roon server. For this reason we end up selling a package of the Innous Zen or Zenith with the Lumin T2. Good luck Lalik Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
Lalik thank you for understanding our enthusisiam for Lumin they really do make some excellent gear. Perfect no, for everyone no but overall a great product line. We sell products that we endorse because we feel that these are very special products, that fit into our philosophy it is very unlikely you will find us talking about products that we would just sell because we can. You will also find in most of our discussions the reason why we recommend a particular product and why that product represents something which may be better or is unique in someway. We do a lot of market research and that includes getting in new products all the time. and doing comparisons with our current products. We are not the ones saying the X1 is one of the best in the industry, the industry is. we are agreeing with the rest of reviewers: Rave review Absolute Sound https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/lumin-x1-streamerdacpreamp/ Rave review Computer Audiophile https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/reviews/lumin-x1-review-r860/ Rave review on the Lumin T2 https://www.soundstagesimplifi.com/index.php/equipment-reviews/103-lumin-t2-network-music-player Just for your edification we are currently testing Bricasti’s new M3 which is excellent by the way, Zesto tube electronics are comming in, Hegel is back on our floor, Chord is on a possible evaluation vs our other dacs and streamers We are bringing in the Onkk turntable from the UK looking at a German Phono stage, a line of new phono cartridges and a set of really innovative loudspeakers from the Netherlands. Look for our new website and our new import entity in 2020 Audio Intellect |
Yysantabarbara, the inclusion of SFP is just one way that demonstrates the forward thinking and engineering base of Lumin. Any way that you will lower noise with a dac/streamer is going to yield some huge benefits. We are sure in the comming years SFP protocalls will be appearing on a lot more devices like this. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin dealers |
Twoch we didn't have your comment removed, Your "fact" was that everything "we sell is the best." is what you say we are promoting or claiming. Twoch you miss the point entirely we take our position much like John Darko's site, we test alot of popular digital products from the starter level to the reference level. On another post we advised someone on a direction for a dac with a volume control, we mentioned 3 popular product lines that we carry that we have had direct experience with. We would doubt that most dealers might have had one product in that catargory we have Lumin, Mytek, Ifi and slighly more expensive then the OP wanted to spend the Bricasti M3. As per "best" we have never said that any of our products are the "best." We sell many recognized brands that are all critically acclaimed and do make fantastic products. We sell T+A electronics and their reference dac, we have Naim, NAD, NAD Masters, Nuprime, Mytek, Lumin, Innous, Bricasti, Kef, Kef Blades, Kef Reference, Paradigm, Legacy, Quad, Rega, ATC,Aqua Hifi, Micromega, Anthem, Hegel, Coda, and many, many others. As per best again we have never said that any of our products are the best becaise we don't believe that there is a "best" in anything. In audio as in life there are tons of valid choices, is a Mercedes Benz better than a BWM? Is an Audii is a Tesla? If you are looking at an Electric vehicle most likely your best choice is a Tesla. However in the case of a high performance sedan there are tons of great choices which is why if we feel a product or product line is interesting and it offers something our existing product lines don't we try to audition it and then if it is good we try to add that product to our offerings. This is why we are constantly brining in new products recently we put out Hegel products, Bricasti products a new ref turtable, a new phono cart waiting for Zesto electronics,waitiing for two new speaker lines, Unison Research two intergrateds. In the case of Lumin their products are excellent are they the "best" no, are they generally a good choice if you like their sound, and feature set then they could be a great choice for someone. Is a DCS Bartok better or a Chord Dave that will depend on what sonic profile and feature set you prefer. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
jorgean, you may be confusing our enthusiasm for Lumin’s with our observations on the totality of the subject of streamers and dacs. Yes the Lumin products are universally praised and are indeed excellent, however we have never said that their products are unbeatable or that someone might prefer the sonic signature or feature set of another product. If you follow our posts even on this thread, we mentioned we brought in Bricasti’s new M3 dac because it has an analog volume control and digital inputs which are features that the Lumin T2 lacks, as well as an option for a headphone amp. So if in our tests the Bricasti is better it is also alot more money to gain its sound quality and feature set. In terms of pure streamers we sell alot of Innous severs for a couple of reasons: the first being many of our clients love the idea of Roon and being able to play with sample rate conversion and whole house audio which are things that Roon does very wel. The second point: considering the Innous servers are designed to run Roon very well they make an excellent choice to be a Roon Core. The third point: add to that the built in CD ripper to digitize a persons CD collection The fourth point, the sound quality of the Innous servers is excellent. So in the case of a streamer being added to a dac you have to see what each platform offers. Aurenders servers are excellent however, they do not allow for upsampling or whole house audio control or eq which are features in Roon. Naim and NAD makes decent servers but the Naim doesn’t allow for Tidal or any streaming it is just a CD library and the NAD Blue Sound Vault and 50.2 are good devices but not built to the ultimate audio quality design modality of the Aurener, Lumin and Innous products. Hope this helps. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ Lumin, Innous, NAD, Naim, dealers |
Jorgean, Apple Music through Airplay may be very convenient but you are not getting the sound quality out of your Benchmark dac. If you like Apple Music get a trial Roon subscription and see how the Roon interface with Tidal compares. Roon is very graphical and works wonders, than you can explore adding a real server and running your dac with a real signal. You will be shocked at how much better your system sounds. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
Jorgern, we have done tests of 16 bit 44khz digital and then the same piece of music up-sampled up to higher frequencies and also converted to DSD as well, if you can't hear the difference you really need to do a lot more testing or your gear doesn't have the resolution. Airplay is a good convenience but in terms of sound quality, Tidal sounds better running through Roon and being up-sampled to higher frequencies sounds way better, 24 bit 192k sounds good, on our test dacs the sound becomes airy more relaxed and the entire sound stage sounds bigger, at DSD sampling the midrange usually sounds more full and the top end all sounds a bit more rolled off in a good way. One of the keys to running Roon is to use the DSP functions and then run the up-sampler. As per features of Roon that people like: 1: Whole house audio you can control Sonos, Naim, Nad Blue sound, Chromecast, Apple Airplay, Heos, and many other devices all through one convenient interface with grouping and syncronization. 2: The ability to use DSD functionality to change low res digital into high res digital be it PCM or DSD. 3: Roon Radio which selects music based on what you are playing as well as selections from Tidal and Obouz. 4: Integration of stored music and streaming services 5: A superb user interface with album bio 6: Understanding the way that each artist has similar artists, artists which are impacted by the original artist, similar, following, influenced tabs which help you identify new artists. Roon has the best music interface, Blue Sound's interface pales in comparison. Dave and Troy Audio Doctor NJ |
