What are you using as a streamer? Constructive feedback please.

In process of changing from SOTM sms200 neo to Sonore Opticalrendu. My next server will have optical out, goal is to have all optical post modem.

I am WIFI streaming Apple music HI RES from iPad USB to Marantz HD DAC1. Sounds fantastic to my ears. I have also thought of a separate streamer but nothing on the market currently can play Apple music. I've subscribed to Tidal and Qobuz in the past but prefer Apple music. Good luck in your journey!

3 picoreplayers using RPi4. 2 with USB amd one with Hifiberry hat outputting coax. Each has a Raspberry Pi 7" touchscreen. Ordered a pi2aes to get I2S. Everything works flawlessly except VU Meter problem I'm having with USB. It's 0s and 1s for streaming. After that it's about DACs and AMPS which make more of a difference. Using Gustard X26 Pro, Cambridge Audio 200m and Denon AVP as DACs.

I had AURALiC Aries G1 and switched to Lumin and to my ears it is more musical. Upgrading the streamer to something like Lumin U1 Mini should be a nice step up. It will give you the flexibility to try eith AESnor USB interface on your DAC. 
Since you’re using Roon you won’t have to deal with the horrendous Lumin app. 
Streamers do make a difference.
Don’t forget USB, Ethernet and digital will make a difference and improve the sound even further.  

I pulled the trigger and made the jump from a Bluesound Node to an Aurender N10.  I can validate the improvement was a game changer, as you would expect, given the considerable difference in price.   

For what it's worth, I have the ever popular Bluesound Node 2i and the integration with Tidal has been terrible. Accessing Tidal from within the Bluesound app takes forever and frequently doesn't work (I have to search multiple times before any songs come up). However, just found out that I can use the Tidal app and connect through that to the Bluesound which works much better. 

As for sound quality, I've heard that USB is the way to go (see: 

However, USB output is only available on the most recent Bluesound Node (2022 model). !

i went to roon at last year end

so i have an i7 roon core doing the processing (from @elberoth)

then three branches out

-- optical conversion at switch to optical rendu as roon endpoint driving usb out into dacs downstream

-- uptone etherregen clean (b) side to ifi zenstream as roon endpoint using its cleaned spdif rca out to dacs downstream

-- wifi to node 2i as endpoint, then rca spdif out to dac (as older, former setup as a reference)