The answer to your questions is it depends. I used to use a blue sound node 2i streamer that I thought sounded great. I made a significant upgrade and picked up an Aurender Streamer. At 8x the price the the node 2i the difference in SQ is dramatic. My Aurender is not even one of the higher end models as their flagship streamer is 22k so I can't imagine how that would sound. Generally speaking unless you get into a high end streamer a redbook cd on a transport going into your dac will sound better....provided that it is a good transport. For ultimate quality a SD card reader transport is the way to go and they are cheap compared to transports and streamers. Here a review of one which basically gives you rundown of its operation.
https://6moons.com/audioreviews2/soundaware2/1.html
Streamer vs. CD Transport
I have my Arcam R Play streamer and my Cyrus CD t transport both connected to a Schiit Gungnir Multibit DAC. The streamer only has an output for a coax connector whereas the transport has provision for both coax and optical cable. Therefore, I have the coax hooking up the streamer and the optical connected to the transport. I like the sound of both, but the SQ from the Arcam seems to be slightly superior to the SQ of the Cyrus.
My question is, is this due to the inherent superiority of coax technology over optical technology?
Or, is streaming better sounding than CDs?
My question is, is this due to the inherent superiority of coax technology over optical technology?
Or, is streaming better sounding than CDs?