Are There Roon Ready I2S Streamers?

Resale on Holo is a good point.  I noticed that even with the difference in price the Aeon was compared and favorably with the K50.

If you're over budget, I highly recommend the Allo USBridge Signature with Shanti power supply.  I would sell mine but I guess I'll move it to my second system.

I too used a Nuc for my core, I7 6 cores, maybe the same one you are using.  I installed the Roon core inside of the windows environment that came with it and set it to autoload on reboot.  Sometimes it doesn't reload and I have to take the nuc into my office and hook it up to a monitor to sort it out.  Pain in the rear.  So I'm going to install the ROCK this week and that should fix it.

I was using another nuc as an exdpoint before I bought the USBridge, and it had the same problem.  Dedicated components, not running windows, is the way to go.

Jerry

I believe the K50 list did increase to $17,500.  The Antipodes K22, however, also has I2S output and list price for it is $9,000.  If interested in Antipodes, you could also consider the S Series, which are separates as opposed to all in one box for server, player, and power supplies.

Key is matching streamer to dac, purchase as package. Lots of nice dac's with optimized usb boards, which means quality clock, dedicated power supply, galvanic isolation all within dac, in this case optimized usb rendering from streamer and you're covered.

The problem with I2S is twofold, one is no standardization of pin outs or connectors, two, no conclusive evidence I2S superior to optimized usb. It would be a rare case where one could directly connect a streamer to dac without need of some conversion of pin outs via dip switch or custom built I2S cable.

Thank you all for your help.  I didn't mention that the MA-12000's DAC died over the weekend and that started me down this path.  I also have called McIntosh.

I purchased a Holo Audio May KTE and Timbernation maple equipment stand.  When I'm close to delivery, will probably pickup 0.75M Audioquest Earth balanced interconnects and the Shunyata  Sigma v2 NR power cable.  Power conditioner and good power cables have been the biggest improvement to my system.