I spent a lot of time and money swapping out different speakers, amplifiers, cables and DACS all while using a Bluesound Node. In my experience the biggest noticeable change that allowed me to hear what my gear was actually doing was changing the streamer to a Lumin. All my gear came alive. Depth of sound stage, the whole holographic sound stage that everyone talks about. After that I changed DACs and lots of other gear but I felt every piece had a fighting chance once the Lumin was up front. I had a friend who thought his Mcintosh DAC wasn’t very good and wanted to sell it. We plugged in the Lumin and even I was shocked how good it sounded after we took out the Bluesound. My friend ended up buying a Lumin T2 a week later. I also had a Zen streamer and it was an improvement over the Bluesound but nowhere near the Lumin. While using the Zen and Bluesound I did notice and improvement with Ethernet connection over wifi, Ethernet being better. Cables in my opinion do make a difference but I’d go there last. I’ll add on one more thing not digital related but after swapping out gear (15 pairs of speakers, 6 amplifiers, 4 preamplifiers including Mcintosh tube amps ect.) if you don’t treat the room first you may think all this gear doesn’t sound good.Most of the time it’s not the gear. If I were to do it all again knowing what I know now, do room treatments first, blow your brains out on speakers then work backwards from there but almost no one, including myself ever does that.
Where to invest the most in the "digital chain"?
Dear All,
I'd love to get everyone's opinions on where best to invest/invest the most, in the "digital chain".
Using my current "basic" system as an example I have very good Internet service into a very good router with the stock PSU on a dedicated power conditioner strip with an ifi AC iPurifier. From there I have Audioquest Pearl Cat6 to a Cisco 2960G with an upgraded Russ Andrews Power Cable. There follows another AQ Pearl Cat6 to an English Electronics 8Switch with an ifi iPowerX. From there I have the Chord C-Stream Ethernet to my ifi Zen Stream with a 15V ifi iPowerX. Then a Wireworld Chroma 8 cable to an ifi iPurifier3 into a Zen DAC v2 also with ifi iPowerX. The EE8, Stream and DAC benefit from a power-conditioner/surge protector and a pair of AC iPurifiers.
I've got a SotM iSO-CAT7 on order which I am intending to put between the EE 8Switch and the network transport with a dCBL-CAT7u into the network transport.
Phew, that was a lot of words!
My question is, and this applies to all systems as a generic question, where is it best to invest the most? Should the best Ethernet cables and/or switches and/or isolators be first in the chain (i.e. from the Internet source) or at the end of the chain (into the DAC/Music Streamer/Network Transport)? Similarly, where should the best power supplies be placed? Or does it all matter equally?
This is purely about the digital chain, I'm well aware that great speakers and a great AMP with good power and speaker cables make all the difference too!
I'm interested in opinions and I will of course experiment for myself.