JohnW
pfm member
Rune,
Have I not sent you the updated chassis (with extra ventilation holes) + larger CM3 heatsink?
Sorry if not, I can ship them out to you the next time we visit the Post office.
MDAC First Listen (part 00111010)
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Rune,
Have I not sent you the updated chassis (with extra ventilation holes) + larger CM3 heatsink?
Sorry if not, I can ship them out to you the next time we visit the Post office.
JohnW
pfm member
Oh - sorry
just been very busy on the MDAC2 and adding extra fume extraction on the work benches...Was it the Detox your asking about?
I've set an internal target to completed the MDAC2 Clock section before spending time on Detox. That said, last week I spent time to reworking the calibration procedures for the decorrelation circuit on the Detox - this came about while implementing the decorrelation circuit section on the advanced MDAC2 Clock option.
I'm targeting the prototype MDAC2 for Christmas period, so its hard to juggle time.
JohnW
pfm member
There are no plans for later units, but I can add that the MiniStreamers have a slightly improved internal PSU then its ProJect sister design as the Ministreamer has a larger chassis allowing slightly increased PSU decoupling. Its not a big deal, but its not an inferior design by any means...
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bigbuckyball
New Member
Hi John, can you keep me updated via email, thanks
No you have not send them to me.
While you are at it please include the case cover for the S2 DAC as well
beammeup
pfm Member
Even the humble Chromecast Audio is Roon Ready nowadays.
Incidentally, is there a sound quality advantage when streaming from Roon? I haven't bought into Roon ecosystem yet because I mostly stream from either Spotify, Tidal or Qobuz. Or is Roon just a great seamless way of organising your music by integrating all subscribed cloud services and locally ripped files into one pretty intuitive GUI, if the latter, then Roon is probably not necessary for me (unless SQ is significantly boosted).
beammeup
pfm Member
And JohnW - as you eloquently put it - buying into your project was based on expert Beta testers giving your developing hardware a good workout. I just thought, for some ridiculous reason, that after helping you test for bugs when in Beta, which in turn helps your development progress, we would be rewarded with a newly marketed finished product - of course I see now that was a silly expectation and misunderstanding from my part.
Anyway - I was a pretty useless Beta tester as I never subscribed to your very early units, wanting instead to wait until things were more finalised before getting my Streambox. Hah - and I got my Streambox 'after' you had officially release the Project Streambox. Now here I am feverishly testing the Streambox after the horse has bolted.
Er I forgot my long Ethernet lead again... ah well.
Anyway - I was a pretty useless Beta tester as I never subscribed to your very early units, wanting instead to wait until things were more finalised before getting my Streambox. Hah - and I got my Streambox 'after' you had officially release the Project Streambox. Now here I am feverishly testing the Streambox after the horse has bolted.
Er I forgot my long Ethernet lead again... ah well.
Yes Roon is about having the absolute best UI and a new and better way of explore your music library. Especially if you have a big collection (can also be albums added from Tidal).
The server does all processing (MQA first unfold, upsampling, DSP) and sends the raw PCM or DSD stream to the streamer. So very little processing necessary on the streamer. If that sounds better is very system / DAC dependent.
The Chromecast audio can be used as a endpoint as well as Sonos, RPI with RoonBridge, Squeezebox etc.
But none of them are RoonReady.
RoonReady is for commercial partners and adds additional functionality such as play control, volume, cover art on the DACs screen.
The server does all processing (MQA first unfold, upsampling, DSP) and sends the raw PCM or DSD stream to the streamer. So very little processing necessary on the streamer. If that sounds better is very system / DAC dependent.
The Chromecast audio can be used as a endpoint as well as Sonos, RPI with RoonBridge, Squeezebox etc.
But none of them are RoonReady.
RoonReady is for commercial partners and adds additional functionality such as play control, volume, cover art on the DACs screen.
JohnW
pfm member
No you have not send them to me.
While you are at it please include the case cover for the S2 DAC as well
OK
noted
beammeup
pfm Member
Just out of interest - the Streambox is essentially a computer - computers with processors can be noisy beasts in the audio chain - what was the formula for this Streambox to allow the digital world to live in a noise free environment? And I also heard reported that very fast processors are better for sound quality (as long as the processors generate little noise) - did you employ a fast processor to decode the digits in the Streambox John? Buffers help too.
Incidentally - even though Volumino is installed on the Streambox - can I install other Linux music player operating systems too, such as Daphile for example? Or would this present problems? And I assume if I didn't like my alternative installation I could always revert back to Volumino again.
Incidentally - even though Volumino is installed on the Streambox - can I install other Linux music player operating systems too, such as Daphile for example? Or would this present problems? And I assume if I didn't like my alternative installation I could always revert back to Volumino again.
JohnW
pfm member
A lot of streamers support the same service, but they are not all the same - e.g. the Sonos system is ONLY capable of 44.1KHz, 16bits all other sampling rates / formats are downsampled. Finding a streaming solution that is Bit accurate at all sampling rates, supports DSD AND allows the DAC to be clock master is very hard - when we started investigating streaming solution's I could find non that met this requirement (certainly non that would be licensed to a smaller company). The streaming companys we met kept this information hidden as obviously they understood that there platforms where less then ideal for HiFi applications.
Our Volumio based solution is not perfect by any stretch - but (OEM Volumio) is the best I know of WRT HiFi applications - Its a shame that it does not support LMS.
The streamer hardware is open so almost any suitable software can be installed.
JohnW
pfm member
These Beta Ministreamers are our first step towards the MDAC2 streaming solution - the Ministreamers themselves while perfectly good standalone streamers
are not planned for mass production but rather as a design stepping stone to the MDAC2 solution - importantly testing the software.The ProJect streamer is essentially the Ministreamer hardware rehoused into an even smaller chassis but also has a slightly smaller internal PSU due to the size constraints- the ProJect streamer is sold at x2 the cost of these Beta test units... The MDAC2 with streamer option will be the "finished product" of sorts - but this does not take away from the Ministreamer being a perfectly good little streamer in its own right
I use our lab mule daily and it happily does whats expected of it without issue (good news for MDAC2)One of the beta testers has sold his much more expensive streamer as he's so pleased with the performance of the little Ministreamer... (used with Roon / Tidal), so while its not intended as a product in its own right under the Lakewest brand - it does seem to have positive virtues
jansen
pfm Member
One of the beta testers has sold his much more expensive streamer as he's so pleased with the performance of the little Ministreamer... (used with Roon / Tidal), so while its not intended as a product in its own right under the Lakewest brand - it does seem to have positive virtues
Most likely it‘s been me. I sold my Auralic Aries Femto. It made me able to fund roon lifetime plus intel nuc for roon core and a studer 900 linear psu (same as dtd) for the streamer, which was JohnWs recommendation. The stability of the little Lakewest is better than the Auralic‘s in my case. Soundwise at least not inferior, my biased self tells me something like a tiny little beefier sounding with slightly improved soundstage and colours and no loss of details. And Roon is as awesome as Rune says. I won‘t step back.
Just for the record: After some years of investing in developement funds to make Johns work happen, I am so very pleased with the first outcome. I don‘t have any doubts regarding the incarnation of the further products. Better sooner than later, yes. But hey, it‘s life, enjoy and make friends!
Captain_Underpants
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lordsummit
Moderator
You will see that this thread is heavily moderated. pfm is happy for John to post updates, and won’t tolerate rubberneckers. This has been made clear on many occasions. The only reason that we continue to run this thread is so that John can continue to communicate with the people who have committed money to the project. pfm’s only interest in this project is to see that those who offered money in good faith receive what they have paid for.
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Going from an Allo USB Bridge to the Mini-streamer with studer 900 PSU revealed more clarity, micro detail, wider soundstaging and possibly a slightly more refined bass response. And that's at DSD 512 rates all day long via HQPlayer.
beammeup
pfm Member
OK wow - that's a lot to give up in preference to the Streambox! The Auralic family is heaving with supported features such as Spotify Connect and of course the USB facility allowing DACs to become the master clock - so perhaps you just like less comprehensive facilities in favour of sticking to Tidal and Rune in conjunction with a touch better (just a touch) better sound quality. I do find Spotify convenient, and actually quite good sounding - so I will miss this feature on the Streambox (because Spotify is not fully compatible with Volumino as I have reported earlier) - yes I know Spotify isn't exactly audiophile but it aint too bad.
Interestingly Spotify does work properly on the SOtM sMS 200 which is a Linux based operating system, and does not stutter with Classic FM (the latter in my case is a problem only isolated to me, not anyone else it would seem - weirdly higher res Qobuz does not miss a wireless beat?)
Whereas the hi-end Auralic has been toppled by the humble looking Streambox - the outcome might not be the same against the SOtM. Luckily I am in a position to find out.
Also for those that might prefer it, the SOtM comes with LMS facilitated by Squeezelite I think.
beammeup
pfm Member
Looking at your recommendation to use a higher quality to PSU such as, in you case, the Studer 900 PSU - it would highly recommend doing this ASAP. I am blessed with the PSU from the SOtM pairing (the sPS-500) and it lifts the performance of the Streambox in a very noticable way! I thought Hans said it didn't make much difference in his YouTube review - I'm afraid it does in my setup. Conclusion - change the cheap PSU which comes with the Streambox -it deserves better!
Fortunately JohnW said I could use the 19V selection from the sPS-500 even though the Streambox is set to 18V - I did ask first! As long as the DAC is self powered that is.
JohnW
pfm member
Spotify Connect is in the works for Volumio - in fact its already been released in Beta form so I can see it being available for the Streamer soon:-
https://volumio.org/forum/volspotconnect2-spotifyconnect-for-volumio2-t11151.html
https://volumio.org/forum/volspotconnect2-spotifyconnect-for-volumio2-t11151.html
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