Noob question about streaming . . .


Okay, I’m not exactly a Luddite, but my audio journey started in the 70’s with Marantz separates, JBL speakers and a Dual turntable. Thaw about thirty years ago I got into home theater, with Parasound separates and four Bose 901s (no haters please — they work well for watching movies). 

Anyway, my Parasound AV preamp died, and I replaced it with a Marantz AV7706 preamp. I’m starting to explore its capabilities, which are light years beyond the old Parasound unit. I’m also exploring using it for music listening in addition to home theater, but streaming is new to me.  (I’m also exploring new speakers, but that’s a discussion for another day). 
 

So, with that background, here are my questions. I’m using the HEOS in the Marantz to stream music through Spotify, which I’ve used in my car for several years. Would a separate streamer be a significant improvement over what I have now?  My understanding is the Marantz’ built in DAC is good enough that I don’t need a separate DAC, unless I’m going to spend big money on one, which I’m not inclined to do right now (speakers first). Second, would a streaming service like Roon or Qubuz or Tidal provide significantly better music quality?  Spotify provides access to all the music I want, but I do realize that it’s limited in terms of sound quality. Help educate this old dinosaur. Thanks!

mbarrett635

Showing 1 response by erik_squires

I don’t think you should pay for another DAC, but I do think it’s worth it to have direct streaming of Qobuz or Tidal that doesn’t involve a tablet or phone as an intermediary. I have Roon and while it’s OK, I find the overhead of keeping another server, and paying for it as yet another subscription kind of burdensome. If I didn’t have so much music on disk I’d probably give it up for something simpler.

IMHO, you want a little box with Ethernet on one side, and S/PDIF on the other.  You could get a combined streamer/DAC, which would improve the digital resolution you can download also.

Here is one example, so I’d say don’t spend more than the ifi Zen streamer.