Streamer recommendation

If you're happy with your Aurender, which clearly you are - get another one.  If it ain't broke... :)

agree @hk_fan .  And with your systems OP why not the N20?  You don't need Conductor in one and Bluesound in another.

If you do not mind experimenting build a Linux based NUC (or have built) and install Euphony to run Qobuz. You’d be surprised at the results for a mere pittance of capital outlay. 
Invest in a decent power supply for the NUC. 

I’m not the most tech savvy from a build standpoint. And I do understand the not broke, don’t fix side of things. I don’t want to invest quite as much money for this system as it won’t be for as mush of the critical listening parts of my life. I’ll keep upgrading my primary system for that. Just looking for something good, I appreciate everyone’s opinions and learn from it, and looking for something with a smaller footprint if possible due to space constraints. 
 

I do thank you all for your input. 

I've been happy with my Lumin U1 Mini which is relatively small.  Worth your consideration.

Come on Casey. You know the answer to that question. The Aurrender. The rest of your equipment shows you are not into cutting corners. I am sure you have proven to your sell that the high quality stuff is worth it. If you get a BlueSound... you will be wondering and eventually brake down and get a Aurender. 

I have a W20SE for my main system, a N100 for my headphone system and a Bluesound Node for miscellaneous components... which I swap around and use for breakin. 

The Bluesound is a great sounding sub $1k streamer. But it is not in the same category as the lower tier Aurender. 

Aurender N200 is really nice. Use a high quality USB cable to feed the Gryphon DAC module and you’re set. 

Have a look at the Volumio Rivo +. Connected to your Gryphon DAC - awesome and not expensive.

Consider Innuos.  They make excellent streamers.  They just upgraded their line.  They have built in storage up to several TBs with a CD ripper so you can store any CDs you may have.  Their Sense app is easy to use with Qobuz.  Qobuz has now added Innuos so you can select the Innuos as the output from your Qobuz app too.  

For giggles why not get a Wiim?  It will be way out of line price wise with everything else but it probably won’t cost more than your cheapest interconnect.  The app is fun and you might be surprised at the results.  If not go back to Aurender

You will not be happy with the Node in that system. It is a fine piece of mid-fi gear, and while your guests won’t notice, you will and eventually buy another Aurender.  If you really want something smaller, Innuos is a good choice. All that said, used Node 2i’s are pretty cheap, buy one and plug a USB drive in the back for your music.

Grimm MU1?

I am extremely happy with the HiFi ROSE RS520. 

One of the best all-in-one solutions for a high resolution setup is the Esoteric N05-XD. It is DAC/Streamer/Preamp. If you don’t need the preamp (Gryphon Diablo) and your budget can stand it, the N01-XD is the next step up and is DAC/Steamer only. 

Consider the room; you know the acoustics. If they are great then any high end streamer is the ticket. You like and know the Arender gear. I’m also thinking the Grimm MU1 (roon core too) a great choice.  I have one with 4GB of storage. If the room isn’t great for sound, then something basic. Nuance will not matter. 

Another thing to consider is will you want both zones pkaying the sane thing?

If you want to save a bit of money the N150 is about half the cost of the N200.

I'm happy with the Hifi Rose 250a.  If I could , I would purchase the RS130 to get the larger form factor.  I use the bypass via usb to a Schiit Gungnir DAC.  Streaming has opened up new avenues to a variety of music I have come to enjoy.

Innuos Mk3. SS had drivevk Teac cd drive if you chose to rip CDs later and 3 dedicated isolated vibration controlled drives .

Antipodes have a range of compact streamers which rival the best for SQ and also have the best ever customer service.

I concur with Mazian.

Very happy with my Antipodes K21, which replaced a Project Stream Box S2 Ultra.

Melco Server and CD transport are awesome.  I have two of them, one being the solid state drive version.  The performance to price ratio is exceptional.

I have a similar situation. $8K PSAudio streamer/ DAC in

listening room. A Marantz cinema 40 in my family room with

a BlueSound Node X steamer DAC. It works perfect for the environment 

it is in. I would not consider lighting $8K on fire in  a room 

No one cares about the sound quality.

What's wrong with using the Marantz built in? I know it can do Tidal cast. My HT system is a Marantz, Tidal works well on it, sounds good, like seeing album art and info on the TV screen. It is nice to stream multi channel audio on it. It still doesn't sound as good as my 2ch.

The streamer/DAC in the Marantz is not very good. Even my audio challenged wife uses the Node X over the Heos system in the Marantz.

I just configured a refurbished M2 Mac Mini this week solely as a Roon Core (+ Qobuz Connect streamer). I have a solid USB cable (Ricable Dadelus) feeding a very affordable Topping E70 Velvet DAC. Mac & DAC are both plugged in to a good IsoTek power conditioner. The DAC can receive PCM files up to 32-bit 768khz and the Mac sends my one album at that spec over with aplomb. I know it's sacrilege to many, but I also upsample via Roon to that rate too, and it sounds awesome! FWIW, DAC feeds a NuPrime AMG STA-SE amp & a MartinLogan Abyss 8 (active) sub. The NuPrime AMG STA-SE feeds Sonus faber Sonetto II G2 speakers. I sit about 10 feet back from the Sonetto IIs and, on many recordings, they not only "disappear", I also can perceive a soundstage about 20 feet wide, plenty tall too. I get some okay depth... wish that were more prominent — I don't get a lot protruding into the room from the speakers (mainly lead vocals and occasionally percussion), but I get stuff receding back into the soundstage beyond the speakers and wall. 

Very happy and satisfied with my M2 Mac Mini as streamer/Roon Core!

I love my N200.    I never thought I’d buy a pricey streamer   I leveraged a preamp I wasn’t using and ended up getting a deal too good to pass up.   
 

If you have a W20 you probably won’t think it’s too shabby with a good DAC 

I have had a lot of streamers, the only one that stuck is the Mano ultra mkIII with separate farad power supply from Magna Hifi 

I have an Innous Mini Mk III. I like the sound. It has a built in streamer for Deezer, QObuz,Title. It can act as a Room core if need be. I find the built in library management from Innous to be good. 

It also has a CD ripper to an internal hard drive. I cannot tell any difference from CD audio. Also, the streamer is great sounding. It's hard to beat for the money.

Grimm MU1 or MU2 if you want the DAC built in. Streamed files from online service sound just as good as locally stored files on Hard drive.

Let me try this again. I typed out a nice reply, then when I submitted it I got a validation screen, then a 404 error, which doesn't make sense. I hate the CloudFlare software that Audiogon is using on the site. I understand the purpose, but the implementation and execution sucks. Sorry for the rant.

Back on subject...

@wjcasey3rd In my opinion you have kind of answered your own question. You said you love the Aurender Conductor app, so why change? Go with Aurender. However, I'm thrown off by your possible choices: the Aurender N200 or the Bluesound Vault. The suggestion of the Vault makes me think you want to save some money, but then you also threw in the idea of the N200. The idea of the N200 kind of nullifies the idea of trying to save money. I'm with fthompson251. Go with the N150. Is there something in the N200 that is of particular interest, and do you get that with the Vault? If so, what is it? I'm curious.

With the N150, or the N200 for that matter, you get the Conductor app and the local storage that you're looking for. Both are now Roon Read if you were to ever decide you wanted to go that route in the future. With the N150 you save a significant amount over the N200, though it cost a great deal more than the Vault, but again, I don't know the reasons for the suggestions that you presented, so maybe I'm missing something.

There are a lot of great streamers/servers out there and you can't go wrong for the most part no matter what you chose. If there is something you like about the Aurender that is always a safe bet, but on the other side if you don't try something new you don't know what you might be missing.

In the end you have to decide. Have fun with your selection. That's what this hobby is all about, fun. I'm sure you will pick a great streamer.

Innuos makes awesome sounding easy to use reliable servers. I am finally selling my SE since I am going to Bach as my player. If I weren’t making that change, there is no way I would sell it. It has worked well with my tube dad and 300b amp. 
 

Andy

@wjcasey3rd 

You dropped enough equipment makes and models to impress everyone  Why not make a big leap to a dCS Rossini APEX or better still a WADAX Studio Player to see what high end digital sounds like?

I haven't owned that many DAC's but my end game machine that I really like now is the Denefrips Pontus 15. It is built extremely well and you can tell that by it's weight with lots of filtering inside from the ladder type system that results in a wonderful sound that isn't shrilled or over the top. Quite natural in fact with many surprises of new passages that were never heard before. I feel it's the best bang for the buck.

Sure. Stay with Aurender n200 or n20. Otherwise consider the hifiRose RS130. It has amazing sound quality and more outputs like I2S which makes a big difference depending on your system.

Just purchased the Auralic Aries 1 for my Chord Qutest.  A Review will be upcoming soon.  🤑

Eversolo A8 

Yeah, I would suggest another Aurender, preferably the N200 to go with the Gryphon. Nothing comes close to the N200 in its price range, and this keeps you in the Conductor ecosystem for both systems. As a dealer for many high end streamer brands, I’ll tell you it gets tiring after a while to switch from one app to the other and remember the user flows between them!

^ good answer. 

But if you really wanted something smaller, maybe more WAF, with exceptional build quality as it is swiss made, and are okay abandoning the thought above in having to download and learn a new app, have a look at this: 

https://www.wattson.audio/madison-streamer

I agree with those saying stick with Aurender but I also like the comment to try the Wiim.  It's about $300 to see if it can save you a ton.  And the app rocks for sure.  I suggest buying a few streamers or borrowing some from a hifi shop and see which one you like the most!  You may be surprised at some of these mass market streamers like Wiim and Eversolo.  Love my Wiim Ultra personally

Agreed.  The Wiim with outboard ps is hard to beat and add in the regularly updating of SW amd the super easy app, it’s a no brainer for most people.  Pay up for a nice dac and listen to very well converted music. 

Sounds like the OP is just on here for bragging! Why such an expensive system in a kitchen/diner where no-one will care about sound quality? Or where SQ can be perceived.

He’s answered his own question re Aurender, so why here wasting everyone’s time!

Streamer - Eversolo A8 or A10 if space allows, and if you put the excellent Denafrips Pontus 15th on it, you’ll have a world beating combo. I have the A-10 with a Venus 15th, and it’s amazingly good.

Although, as he seems to have more money than sense, get the N200.

Was certainly not on here to brag. That’s not my style. I was looking for advice from people that know a lot more about this than me and the great thing is that I got some fantastic recommendations. 
 

To clarify, the room is a combined kitchen, living room, family room near the entry of the house. That is where this system is housed. And where most people congregate when they come over. So I did want something of high quality still. 
 

best news is I received some great advice. I genuinely appreciate everyone’s input. I learned a lot and found it very helpful. I ended up getting a great deal on an antipodes streamer. It is compact so it fits in the space well. It has a built in disc player to rip cd’s which is a bonus. And sounds really good so far. So thank you to all that took the time to respond to this thread. 

@wjcasey3rd - Thanks for the follow-up. It is always nice to hear how things shake out. I am glad you came to a good solution.

@mahler123 - WRT your Wiim comment, I wish this site had an upvote capability!