Sound quality differences in streamers

mdalton,

Again, value is determined by every individual. If you don't think you need to spend  "x" amount for a streamer/server, it's pretty simple...don't. I never said, that you or anyone had to spend a certain amount of money to get to a certain level of performance, so I hope your not directing your comments to me. I simply don't believe in judging people for how they spend "their own money".

@ricred1 

Nope, not directing anything at you.  But it doesn’t seem like you’re getting my point.  So let me “flip the tree” as they say in statistics.  If I told people that my Koetsu is a better cartridge than their cheaper cartridge, and that any criticism of my Koetsu only reflected the critic’s failure to invest sufficiently in his or her cartridge, or that their system must be insufficiently resolving to appreciate the perfection that is Koetsu, I would be making a dumb argument.  It would be an even dumber argument if I said that my Koetsu sounded better and more accurate than their cartridge to my ears, even in the face of frequency response measurements showing the Koetsu to have a rolled off upper end.   Now I acknowledge, btw, that this is not a perfect analogy - indeed, the complexities associated with the analog realm do not lend themselves as easily to objective measurement as the digital realm.  (Keep in mind that DACs operate in the analog realm.)   But servers and streamers operate solely in the digital realm.  So in fact, the argument that Big$ server/streamer is better, especially when it flies in the face of easy-to-quantify measurements, is in fact even dumber than my Koetsu example.  

In summary, I really don’t care how much someone spends, but I do care if they argue that you have to spend extreme amounts on glorified file movers if you want to have a great sounding streaming system.  Unfortunately you see that argument made by many on this site.  

As one Absolute Sound reviewer put it:   “A simple, well-designed, robust streaming-signal chain should not have an audible effect on the sound of a music file.” And in my view, this doesn’t need to cost much.  And that’s what the OP was asking, isn’t it?

You must be directing your comments to someone else. I’ve never said Antipodes was better than any other music server. I always use " preferred" when I compare components. I never used the words "more accurate" either. I’ve never sad anything that you have posted. 

I don’t follow reviewers. I determine how much I’m willing to spend for a component  and I get a home audition when possible. If my wife and I determine a component to be a good value, I purchase it.

Great responses still coming through, thanks. However, I should clarify my interweb signal which, due to my “remote” location and where my listening room is situated is via WiFi only, no hardwired connections. So cleaning the signal with line switches or Ethernet is not possible. I will be relying on the ability of the streamer to handle to WiFi signal and pass it along to a DAC. 

Might as well put in my two cents. As far as streamers, the way I see it is deciding which application to use to send an email. Regardless which one you choose, the message should arrive 🤔.