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How to make a streamer (Pro-Ject Stream Box S2 Ultra) playing Qobuz & Tidal to sound better than CD

Timo_F said:
Thanks for your feedback @duckworp - I really struggle to understand that it is so difficult to code a decent sorting function, and more generally a good integration of Qobuz. Maybe I should bite the bullet and go Roon...
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I was thinking the same but I have no music on hard drive and so using Roon just to organise my streaming content seems like taking a sledgehammer to a nut. Though if the app does not improve its sort function that may be the only option.
 
Timo_F said:
Thanks for your feedback @duckworp - I really struggle to understand that it is so difficult to code a decent sorting function, and more generally a good integration of Qobuz. Maybe I should bite the bullet and go Roon...
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I’ve been using Roon and Qobuz for a while, it is a good bit better than Qobuz on its own (though still far from perfect). You can sort your album view by Artist, Date added, Most Played, Date and Album title, and use focus to narrow things down by Genre, Composer etc. And it’s great the way that Qobuz favourites are integrated more or less seamlessly into your own library.
 
Yeah, Roon is probably really the way to go. I did a Roon trial before Qobuz integration. Presumably Qobuz integration is no different from Tidal integration. When I tried Roon, I did like in particular that one could edit Tidal meta data, allowing for consistency with Album titles (e.g classical albums starting with the composer’s surname). Good for people like me with a bit of OCD... ;-)

But then it drove me nuts that the Roon Core on Linux platform didn’t like Android phones... I guess the next phone will be an iPhone — I have resisted this for a long time...
 
tomek said:
Hmm. £600 for Pi ? Most probably normal £35 Pi with piCorePlayer and settings from soundcheck will sound the same, or even better ...
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When someone on another forum said the same the designer came in and explained why it costs this much and why the investment creates a better sound quality:
https://www.avforums.com/threads/wh...ve-700euro-for-an-r-pi.2175090/#post-26431682

Also I guess that the Pro-Ject Stream Box is aimed at the market for a plug and play network bridge. With the competition in this field being bigbox Lumins, Auralics and their ilk at upto 6 timesthe price and 10x the box size, and little (if any?) gain in SQ, the Pro-Ject begins to look like a steal.
 
duckworp said:
With the competition in this field being bigbox Lumins, Auralics and their ilk at upto 6 timesthe price and 10x the box size, and little (if any?) gain in SQ, the Pro-Ject begins to look like a steal.
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Yes, it is true. It is "plug & pray" and compared to "real" high end gear very cheap and i am sure it is good for somebody without ANY computer diy skills. For people with some computer skills Pi with a digital interface like "Allo Digione" (IMHO the best spdif interface for Pi) or "Hifiberry Digi + Pro" is great, or just well adjusted Pi using usb dac.
 
I'm pretty competent around computers and could have bought a PI and faffed around a bit but i just wanted something straight out of the box to act as a Roon endpoint for my Sony 1Z Walkman used in USB mode. The Streambox just works and works very well too. I have a Roon Nucleus too, something i could have knocked up myself with a bit of time to get the bits etc...

Duckworp - interesting your comments on the Cisco switch and the Streambox. I use one in my setup and found the stream box pretty sensitive to the Network in front of it. It certainly liked a 2960 in front of it compared to a Netgear GS108 so i moved a few things around on my network to accommodate both the lounge and bedroom system.
 
I don't use either Tidal or Qobuz so I cannot speak from direct personal experience but I think I recall a number of people enthusing that either sounded as good as or better than CD. This is why they were so well received compared to that terrible Spotify. A lot of it might be the mix used I guess.

Certainly my rPi’s with Moode Player leaves me still finding new facets of music I thought I had known for years
 
whatsnext said:
I don't use either Tidal or Qobuz so I cannot speak from direct personal experience but I think I recall a number of people enthusing that either sounded as good as or better than CD.
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Everyone’s system and connections are different so it is difficult to generalise. But often people are comparing a CD player against streaming through a different DAC, and in that case the resulting SQ will be more to do with the DAC. Played through the same DAC most people I have discussed this with find that a really good CD transport is hard to beat other than by playing local FLAC files from a dedicated audio transport (eg Melco etc). Hence I was not surprised when the Pro-Ject Stream Box streaming Qobuz fresh out the box was not as good as the CD transport. The fact that through tweaking it moved it up the SQ path to get as good as/better than CD was not something I was expecting. Hence I chose to report how I did this in case it was helpful to others.
 
Re the Cisco switch, presumably this is a managed switch?

Do you have to faff around with settings or can you pretty much use it as plug and play, like the Netgear?

Thanks
 
Timo_F said:
I have to admit -- when I heard about the Stream Box S2 Ultra for the first time, I nearly choked like others. 600 quid for a Raspberry Pi and Volumio??!!
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Funny how in our computer-savvy age a £600 computer elicits a "HOW MUCH?" response but we have been living with a Naim Flatcap for decades (A metal box, transformer, rectifier, possibly a single voltage reg, and £900 in its latest incarnation) without comment.
 
rod ayling said:
Re the Cisco switch, presumably this is a managed switch?

Do you have to faff around with settings or can you pretty much use it as plug and play, like the Netgear?

Thanks
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I simply plugged and played the Cisco 2960. It was second hand. Not sure if it is managed or not.
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/switches/catalyst-2960-8tc-l-compact-switch/model.html

These switches seem to be being accepted as very good quality switches for audio use and given they are a few hundred new they are a steal on eBay at present at £50. I suspect as more people realise their quality the second hand prices will rise.
 
Apparently, a linear power supply on the switch wouldn't do any harm either.

Have you tried that out of interest or any of the below?

IFI do a SMPS power supply upgrade and so does Russ Andrews too. No surprise there.

Then of course MCRU/LDA lps at £235.
 
rod ayling said:
Apparently, a linear power supply on the switch wouldn't do any harm either.

Have you tried that out of interest or any of the below?

IFI do a SMPS power supply upgrade and so does Russ Andrews too. No surprise there.

Then of course MCRU/LDA lps at £235.
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The power supply in the Stream Box is clearly first class as my experiment with a battery power supply yielded no improvement. I am not sure about the power supply within the Cisco switch. It has a 240v mains lead - I don’t know what power supply I would need to test this out.
 
stevec67 said:
Funny how in our computer-savvy age a £600 computer elicits a "HOW MUCH?" response but we have been living with a Naim Flatcap for decades (A metal box, transformer, rectifier, possibly a single voltage reg, and £900 in its latest incarnation) without comment.
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Rather than Naim’s Flapcap, I compared the Streambox to its competition, such as Hifiberry, Allo and even SoTM.
 
Cisco switches are used in medical, financial, military, governmental and scientific networks all over the world and I can almost guarantee none of them have ever needed to consider its power supply (apart from resilience reasons) yet here we are......
 
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