I have no problem believing that a source can measurably and significantly affect a DAC. HI-FI News measurements evidence that. My response is to avoid those DACs rather than buy into the source.
Any Chord Dave/M Scaler users recommend a streamer?
- Thread starter Dodgydoc
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duckworp
pfm Member
is that fact that amazon do not intend to integrate with Roon or rumour? I fear Tidal and Qobuz will close which leaves lifetime Roon subscriptions pretty useless.
Tw99
source last
You can't say it will never happen, but so far there is no evidence of Amazon allowing integration of their service with any other hardware device. I think it is a definite concern if they and Google end up killing all the other streaming services, it could obsolete a lot of existing equipment.
Strictly Stereo
Trade: Strictly Stereo
It’s already on Bluesound products. Auralic is working on integrating it into its streamers. Amazon is making it more complex for third parties than some other services. It seems like one of the prerequisites is support for Alexa control.
Fourlegs
Trade: WAVE High Fidelity digital cables
But are there are any DACs that are not affected by the source? I have tried a wide variety from different manufacturers and all were affected as long as the other connected equipment was sufficiently transparent to reveal the difference.
John Phillips
pfm Member
When Innous appeals to "noise" as a problem they've solved a good first question to ask "what noise is that?". In this case the Innuos claim seems only to make sense if it's time-domain noise [1] while Rob Watts may be writing about amplitude-domain noise [2].
Limited bandwidth over an optical digital connection plus the poor resistance of the basic SPDIF/TOSLINK digital protocol to data-dependent jitter in that situation means an optical receiver has to work hard to reject jitter (but that's been perfectly do-able for a very long time), while an asynchronous USB interface can be as perfect as the receiver's local clock jitter.
As usual, technical marketing stories from either Innuos or Chord tend to tell a convenient part of the truth, not "the whole truth". They have to be interpreted with scepticism.
[1] Jitter, wow, flutter, scrape flutter (or perhaps other names I don't know about) depending on the source.
[2] Voltage or current noise usually.
One of the things about the high end streamers I can’t get my head around is that they claim to solve problems they needn’t have. For example, the claim is that an HDD is noisy, so use an SSD, but that’s still electrically noisy so use all sorts of power supply and circuit board engineering to suppress the noise, but add expense. If you believe that is true, just get a Squeezebox Touch, it hasn’t got any kind of disc drive so can’t have the noise issues associated with them. Same argument about noisy CPUs - if it is the case that noise from them working hard running Roon core degrades the output, why run Roon core on the thing that’s connected to your DAC? Again, a Squeezebox Touch just acting as a Roon endpoint and doing hardly anything will be quieter. If you want a fancy version of that you could go for the Project Stream Box S2 Ultra - a Roon or DLNA endpoint, no disc drives, breathed on by John Westlake with fancy USB reclocking so plenty audiophile street cred as well as a measurable effect on some DACs and at £600 way cheaper than boxes like the Innuos.
Tw99
source last
That's good to hear. I hope it's eventually available to the open source community as well, without needing a license.
Fourlegs
Trade: WAVE High Fidelity digital cables
The scourge of digital devices is often RF noise and it is that which it is desirable to reduce. The source of this can be power supplies (although better SMPS can be better in some circumstances than LPS) but there can be other sources within the audio gear and also environment RF noise. Changing DAC power supplies or taking them outside the DAC box can have a marked effect on sound quality. And because noise overlaid on the digital signal from a streamer can get into the DAC analogue stage the same applies to power supplies for streamers.
Allaboutmusic
pfm Member
I have to say I didn't think source would make much of a difference but I've since changed my mind. I use a rega dac-r and have always used the optical out from a chromecast audio, I recently moved house and didn't have the Internet for a couple of weeks so used my macbook air and a USB into the dac and now I have the Internet I haven't changed back as it sounds great. I was initially put off using the USB on the rega dac-r based on the what hifi review which was pretty negative on it but to me it sounds much better. I have since read the stereophile review of my dac and they measured the input via optical and USB both gave the same output so there must be something going on with the source. I should really do a A - B comparison to confirm. Anyway, I am enjoying my new setup and considering investing in Roon to control my macbook.
As much as it pains me to write this, the digital source does matter, along side vibration control (dramatic in my case).
Having said that there are certain off the shelf Intel NUCs when fed with good quality power supply that'll get you a long way towards happiness but it does require attention to detail that most rightly cant be bothered to do.
Having said that there are certain off the shelf Intel NUCs when fed with good quality power supply that'll get you a long way towards happiness but it does require attention to detail that most rightly cant be bothered to do.
Whatsisnaim
pfm Member
There are a couple of different ways in which Amazon Music could be integrated into a third party streamer. The ‘proper’ way to do it would result in something a bit like Spotify Connect, where you use Amazon’s control app. It’s early days yet, and implementing it would be complicated. I suspect there are more hoops to jump through than Roon would care for (like AirPlay 2) but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if some brands went for it.
Whatsisnaim
pfm Member
Tidal and Qobuz are businesses. If Roon support gives then a worthwhile increase in market share, they’re not going to shoot themselves in the foot by withdrawing support. If they can’t compete with Amazon on price, that remains the case regardless of whether or not people are using Roon.
If that is the case why would you ever choose a streamer like an Innuos which starts out really noisy because of it’s design? Noisy SSD, noisy processor running Roon. It’s like choosing a tractor to mow your lawn and then having to spend a fortune on tractor tires to fix the marks the big tractor tyres leave and sound insulation to stop the noise aggravating the neighbors. It’ll never be as good as a Flymo. So why not just start with a Flymo? Btw I reject your insinuation that my system might not be as transparent as yours. And you should point out that you have a vested commercial interest in propagating myths about RF none of which you seem to be able to substantiate with measurement.
My point is simply that right now and for the reasonably foreseeable future very few cheap or expensive streaming boxes support Amazon - a major high quality streaming supplier. Next week Netflix could jump into the game. Or google. Or Warner. Flexibility is good in these times.
Whatsisnaim
pfm Member
There are endless posts on this forum from people who maintain a black and white vision of devices that are 100% immune to all forms of electrical interference from upstream digital electronics, and devices that are not 100% immune to it, and are therefore defective. People often quote issues like galvanic isolation as if they are a simple cure-all solution.
The reality is that good design can mitigate the coupling of electrical interference into analogue electronics from the DAC output stage onwards, but it is unrealistic to suggest that it can be eliminated completely.
Whatsisnaim
pfm Member
It’s early days, and I would be surprised if we didn’t see it happen. It’s probably a more complex thing to implement than, say, Tidal, and any manufacturers who rush into it might easily mess it up. I find it’s always best to exercise a little patience when chasing the next must-have thing.
Fourlegs
Trade: WAVE High Fidelity digital cables
Moderately hilarious. If you send me your address I will post you a chisel to try to get the chip off your shoulder.
Put up your measurements and I will believe the claims you make.
Appear at any public hi-fi show and demonstrate your ability to hear the difference you claim your cables make unsighted and I’ll believe the claims you make.
Until then, I don’t believe you.
