thanks for the responses.
my goal with the Ayon was to use the 'streaming' option over ethernet, but Ayon's implementation of this on the S3 was weak; using the search capabilities on the unit are slow and not user friendly with respect to searching for files. In all fairness, this unit is older and is an early generation of this technology. And i was never able to get Ayon's remote app to work. Therefore, I got the Bryston.
I'll keep poking around with it to see if i can actually hear any differences with the various options.