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Pi - Dac - CCA

H

hilts10

Active Member
Newbie here straight in with questions for you experts on here.

Bit of background.
Dragged my old HIFI gear out of the loft that I bought in the mid 80's it consisted of NAD 3020, Ariston Q Deck, and a pair of Mordaunt Short MS25 speakers. It all still played but I soon got the bug again and upgraded my amp to a Marantz PM6006 and some Focal Aria 906 speakers. Still using my Arison Q Deck and streaming Spotify with a Chromecast Audio.

I fancy a little project and was thinking of building some sort of streamer/dac with a Raspberry Pi and one of the dac hats like:-

http://iqaudio.co.uk/hats/47-pi-dac-pro.html
https://www.hifiberry.com/shop/boards/hifiberry-dac-pro/
https://www.justboom.co/product/justboom-dac-hat/

Now playing the CCA does sound pretty good in fact it sounds better than my Turntable but that is probably in need of an upgrade.

I would be wanting to stream local audio files and play Spotify.

A few question.

Would I get a better sound with the Pi dac than the Marantz inbuilt dac ?
Could I stream Spotify through the Pi ?
Could I connect the Pi to my amp ?
Which is the best sounding dac ?

Sorry for so many questions and thanks in advance.
 
The problem with the HAT DACs is their very simplistic output stage.
I have tried the HiFiBerry DAC+ Pro and the Audiophonics i-Sabre v3 and kept the latter which sound much better.

I am using HQPlayer Desktop in a MacBook Pro as a file player/processor and HQPlayer NAA buffer in the R-Pi.
Files are upsampled to the maximum rate.
 
I have a PI3 with a IOAudio DAC, sounds fabulous. It streams Spotify from a PI2 LMS server using the Spotty plugin, managed from my phone/tablet.

Bi5TgPm.jpg


There is a long thread http://www.pinkfishmedia.net/forum/threads/raspberry-pi-as-headless-streamer.131922/ Best start on the last page an work backwards. :)
 
hilts10 said:
I would be wanting to stream local audio files and play Spotify.

A few question.

Would I get a better sound with the Pi dac than the Marantz inbuilt dac ?
Could I stream Spotify through the Pi ?
Could I connect the Pi to my amp ?
Which is the best sounding dac ?

Sorry for so many questions and thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

I'd suggest getting a pi3 to run LMS (via piCorePlayer, mine references my NAS as a FLAC source), and then one or more pi2s for playing duties (again picoreplayer)...

I have a mixture, an IQ, an Audiophonics V2 (probably my favourite HAT DAC), a hifiberry digi+ pro (the best sounding in conjunction with an external DAC eg your Marantz perhaps), and the option of USB from a basic pi

The spotify integration into LMS is excellent...via 'Spotty'
 
Would I get a better sound with the Pi dac than the Marantz inbuilt dac ?
Could I stream Spotify through the Pi ?
Could I connect the Pi to my amp ?
Which is the best sounding dac ?

Sorry for so many questions and thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
I’d suggest trying a pi with lms installed from either max2play or picoreplayer and then just have a play with a hat dac and compare with connection to your amp (you may need a board with a spdif out unless your amp takes usb in). The hardware costs are pretty low .

The sonic differences between dacs are either
a) slight to negligible; or
b) entirely dependent on your ears and system.
Probably best listen to make up your own mind
 
adamdea said:
I’d suggest trying a pi with lms installed from either max2play or picoreplayer and then just have a play with a hat dac and compare with connection to your amp (you may need a board with a spdif out unless your amp takes usb in). The hardware costs are pretty low .
Click to expand...

My amp doesn't have USB. I take it that I would be connecting the Pi/dac by phono.
Also what is LMS.
Sorry for the numb questions.
 
CCA linked to your Marantz DAC is likely to sound very good indeed. If you use an iPhone; apps like MusicStreamer offer a great UI for any music you have stored and Spotify plays direct from the App on your phone/tablet.

An Ethernet adaptor for your CCA will give you a rock solid connection.

MusicStreamer and an Ethernet adaptor will cost less than £20.

In contrast the PI route involves a lot of hit an miss configuration. It also offers you myriad options that you feel forced to try and, in my experience at least, gives you questionable gains in sound quality.

Having tried both routes I’d say that if you are happy with the CCA, stay happy.
 
raysablade said:
Having tried both routes I’d say that if you are happy with the CCA, stay happy.
Click to expand...

The OP wants to stream his local files too...so not so happy!

By the way my rpi running piCorePlayer is far more robust than a CCA...

I've advised 3 spotify premium users to get a CCA, I wish I hadn't, all of them have had issues of one form or another, the CCA needs a fixed IP address to be reliable, and a few factory resets along the way...
 
WAD62 said:
The OP wants to stream his local files too...so not so happy!

By the way my rpi running piCorePlayer is far more robust than a CCA...

I've advised 3 spotify premium users to get a CCA, I wish I hadn't, all of them have had issues of one form or another, the CCA needs a fixed IP address to be reliable, and a few factory resets along the way...
Click to expand...
MusicStreamer lets me point my CCA to local files and I’ve never had any performance issues on my network.

The op says he is enjoying his CCA, and isn’t reporting network issues.

Why not give the low cost, low stress approach a go?

I enjoyed hours of tinkering with my pi and a hifberry dac, but it’s not for everyone and the CCA is a good alternative.
 
Happy CCA user here with no problems experienced. Streams local files and Spotify perfectly!

I do notice though, that after trialling Tidal recently the CCA doesn't play at 'Hi Fi' quality.
 
Yes #raysablade pretty impressed with the CCA running through my Matantz dac and not had too many issues other than the odd wifi dropout and phone app not connecting. But also #WAD62 fancy giving the Pi/dac a go as a bit of a project and compare.

So is it a case of adding let's say a Iqaudio dac to the raspberry pi, loading an SD card with PiCorePlayer then configuring it all with a lot of head scratching and eye poking along the way. Then connecting to the network and connecting to my amp via phono and away I go ? Somehow I thing that may not be the case.

Cheers.
 
hilts10 said:
So is it a case of adding let's say a Iqaudio dac to the raspberry pi, loading an SD card with PiCorePlayer then configuring it all with a lot of head scratching and eye poking along the way. Then connecting to the network and connecting to my amp via phono and away I go ? Somehow I thing that may not be the case.

Cheers.
Click to expand...
The latest piCorePlayer version is pretty easy to install;

burn the piCorePlayer software to a microSD card (laptop)
pop it into the pi
connect the pi to the network (wired)
find the IP address of the pi, advanced IP scanner or somesuch (laptop)
Put the IP address into a browser, and you'll get the piCorePlayer main page, and configure away

https://sites.google.com/site/picoreplayer/home

With regard to the HAT DACs, they're easy to assemble, and can also be configured/selected via the piCorePlayer squeezelite page...it's obviously best to construct before installing the software etc.

P.S. I prefer my Audiophonics V2 HAT to my IQ one, but the case isn't as neat

Edit; LMS can be configured to reference a NAS, or a local USB, or both, for your music catalogue and index
 
I don't see the need for a pi. As mentioned you can stream from the internet and local files with the CCA into your dac of choice, or even use the dac in the CCA.
 
Dozey said:
I don't see the need for a pi. As mentioned you can stream from the internet and local files with the CCA into your dac of choice, or even use the dac in the CCA.
Click to expand...
I don't think a CCA can stream from a NAS, or not as yet anyway...however I don't know where the OPs files are, so could be irrelevant
 
WAD62 said:
I don't think a CCA can stream from a NAS, or not as yet anyway...however I don't know where the OPs files are, so could be irrelevant
Click to expand...
It can via MusicStreamer, once I had found this neat bit of software the pi route became an irrelevance. Spotify and the BBC radio app already have chromecast integration. MusicStreamer does the rest.
 
For me it's not so much a CCA v Pi contest, they're both fantastic VFM, it's more that I prefer using spotify from within LMS rather than the native application...it's much more album/artist centric, albums can be easily added to the end of a plylist

Using the LMS plugin I can mix spotify tracks with local flac files within the same playlist (current or saved) on any, or all of the four squeezebox players in my house, and it provides gapless spotify playback, something I couldn't get the CCA/Spotify app to do...
 
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