why expensive streamers


@soix and others

I am unclear about the effect on sound of streamers (prior to getting to the dac). Audio (even hi-res) has so little information content relative to the mega and giga bit communication and processing speeds (bandwidth, BW) and cheap buffering supported by modern electronics that it seems that any relatively cheap piece of electronics would never lose an audio bit. 

Here is why. Because of the huge amount of BW relative to the BW needs of audio, you can send the same audio chunk 100 times and use a bit checking algorithm (they call this "check sum") to make sure just one of these sets is correct. With this approach you would be assured that the correct bits would be transfered. This high accuracy rate would mean perfect audio bit transfer. 

What am I missing? Why are people spending 1000's on streamers?

thx

 

128x128Ag insider logo xs@2xdelmatae

+1 @soix +1 @ghdprentice Going from a node to an Esoteric NO5 was a huge upgrade in not only performance but sound. Upgrading my Ethernet to fiber optic another improvement, and finally cables, ie: usb, Ethernet to the fiber connection, and interconnects another. 

Ridiculous amounts of money being spent on this stuff, with marginal difference in sound. The dac is where it’s at. No freaking way am I spending 1k or more on a fancy streamer.

I went from a Node 2 to a used Aurender that cost $1,800 a few years ago and had no expectations.  I was blown away at the difference.  You can now buy the same streamer for around 1K.  The "streamers make no difference" people are typically those who have never listened to a nice one.

@mikhailark the term bit perfect is incorrect, when has man ever made anything perfect. When digital audio first came out there was no mention of jitter, it was perfect sound forever, we now know that wasn’t true and audiophiles knew something didn’t sound right.

I went from a Bluesound Vault 2i to an Aurender N200.  No regrets.   I traded a preamp towards it plus $800 out of pocket.  No brainer for me . 

It is much better than using a PC, better sounding than BluOs and sounds great with my DAC.