Clock vs Streamer advice

@zpatenaude37 how are you getting on? 

Hey, sorry I haven’t responded in a bit.

I spent the weekend with the N200 and N1Z. Both were great. The N200 beat out the N1Z on certain albums, but I strangely found it more fatiguing for long sessions.

I did look into the network upgrade for my MC1, and they can do it. It sucks that I won’t be able to demo that before doing it, but I think I will go with that option. It is Roon ready, so I’ll be good to go. Looking through the forums, I haven’t seen anyone expressing disappointment with the network upgrade on their Bricasti.

That will save some money, and then I will demo the shunyata altaira. I live in an apartment currently, so I'm curious if a grounding hub will add a notable difference. 

“I strangely found it more fatiguing for long sessions.”

@zpatenaude37 

While I respect your decision to go with network card option w/Bricasti….the N200 is anything but fatigued sounding. My best guess, you are now used to N100 laid back and slightly recessed sound. Whereas N200 is more dynamic, detailed and has a better much frequency extension and slam. Just my .02 cents. 

@lalik +1

This is an unusual observation. This is just not a characteristic of the Aurender sound. I can only think the fatigue is coming from elsewhere in the system.

@lalitk haha, my brain may have fatigued because I’m not used to such attention to detail

I will admit that I was listening with some bias. The used N1Z is the cheaper option. I was really hoping that I would prefer the N1Z to save some money, so maybe I tried to create a preference for it.

There were several albums where the difference was not notable. But when I listened to Glenn Gould, the Goldberg Variations, the N200 shined above. Then Billie Holiday. Her vocals have always sounded a bit harsh in my system. On the N1Z, it was slightly harsh, but with the N200, it was not. And then Tool’s Chocolate Chip Trip had another dimension on the N200 compared to the N1Z.