Clearing the fog about streamers?

[shyamv]

Whether USB or non-USB (SPDIF/AES/Toslink), your DAC is always slave(in terms of clock and clock is the key) to the source.

Nope. As per my understanding, in asynchronous USB mode, which is used by most modern DACs, DAC is the clock master.

Very Cheap DACs might use synchronous USB mode where source is the clock master, which is less difficult to implement apparently.

 

[bornfi]

Nope. As per my understanding, in asynchronous USB mode, which is used by most modern DACs, DAC is the clock master.

Right, that is what I too read somewhere but I suspect that the board inside the DAC that converts USB stream to DAC consumable format too has a clock so again, DAC's clock and performance is at the mercy of USB's implementation and so, the DAC sounds as good as USB implementation is. My understanding is based on what I see/read on internet and I do not have any engineering background so, thanks for correcting.

 

[Analogous]

Dante

Hello @bornfi, glad you could join the discussion. Could you clarify Dante? Is this a DAC or a song/album?

 

[Analogous]

As per my understanding, the difference in price is due to the following.
1) Yes, the DAC section contributes more to the overall cost than a streamer section. Costlier D-S DAC chips or resistor ladder circuits etc plus a few more things below.
2) Cheaper DACs or DAC+Streamer use a noisy wall-wart adapter and not a toroidal transformer or forms of power supply that can provide a linear voltage.
3) EMI filtering or isolation mechanisms are missing.
4) Better USB, Clock implementation
5) Analog output stage - Low-pass filters, amplification of the low-bandwidth DAC output, remove residual DC current, single-ended or balanced output etc. Some of these elements might be missing or scaled down in terms of capability.
6) Finally, a $100 product would have much lower manufacturer's margin in comparison to a $4000 product.

Note that items 2 and 3 are shared between the streamer and DAC sections. So if these are present, both streamer and DAC sections shall benefit.

So it’s kind of like comparing a Bentley to a autorikshaw? Both are transportation devices, but each offers unique user experiences due to differences in design, quality of components, detailed implementation and manufacturer margins.

 

[Pancho]

there are hundreds of standalone streamers (ie, without builtin DAC) out there - and the one of the best example at "entry level audiophile" grade unit is the Auralic Aries Mini. This unit is priced approx US$ 500/- which I beleive is approx Rs 37K. I am not sure whether this unit is available in our market - but this unit doesnt disappoint. Several people use it with an LPS to make it even better.

The Rasperry Pi with Allo Digtal Board or the Humming Bird unit (couple of pictures attached) are the very basic of units that helps one to play either spotify / tidal or qobuz. The popular software being Volumio - and the app m-connect. In selecting the basic units - select or if you can "disable" the wifi / wireless facilities - the units attached was made - programmed and supplied to me by an Sound Engineer based in UK - originally Polish - his units sell worldwide at premium prices that can go upto $ 12 or 14K .....and then you could be looking at units like Taiko extream at $25K . The aurender A30 I believe is another unit which is around similar price range.

So clearly its not just all zeros and ones that determines the quality of a streamer - every component that goes in - especially the power supply / the precision clock / the chip / processing speed / jitter reduction / shielding / the vibration control / the chasis / the connectivity - the prices are mind boggling. Auralics Aries G2.1 has an external solid aluminium body with yet another full copper internal chasis - and they say it privides 100% shielding from all kind of external interferences.

For every day music listening - an average user - he / she should only be considering spending based on the value of their main gear.....

Is Auralic availble in India ? and if not maybe one of the Audio delaer ought to consider this brand - especially their Aries Mini.

 

[bornfi]

Hello @bornfi, glad you could join the discussion. Could you clarify Dante? Is this a DAC or a song/album?

It is a format for transmission of audio data over Ethernet. More details are available at audinate.com.

In my case, I use USB to Dante converter at PC side and then on DAC side, I use Dante to AES converter. The only limitation it has from users like us' perspective that there is no auto-sample rate switch. Not a problem for me as I always run with 44.1 k.

Interested users might want to do a search; I have some detailed threads on this site on Dante.

 

[Amitdubey]

The job of a streamer is to pass bit-perfect, low-jitter, noise-free audio signal at all times in a reliable manner to the upstream DAC. It should, and can, have ZERO impact on audio quality. In that sense, audio quality of a streamer does not matter. It is only when the streamer introduces noise or jitter then the audio signal takes on certain characteristics.

 

[Amitdubey]

All these are theories. Just listen to various bridges like Lindemann and U1 mini and you will hear the difference the streamer section alone makes to the sound. For one the background is pitch black which makes music from the same dac POP. The imaging, resolution, gain, staging, timbre change. The tonality due to the same dac would be the same. I have a Lumin T2 and continuously switch between using cca to cxa81 dac, lumin t2 (streamer + dac), lumin(streamer only). The differences are very audible when T2 is used as a streamer only compared to streamer of cca connected to the same external da. And the difference is audible and the only reason you can't hear the difference is if you have a very low resolution system

We might not understand what the company is doing with their product and it's topology.. But rest assured, streamer only/bridge products are not here to scam people. They aren't that stupid, neither are folks buying.

This is similar to people who can't hear differences cables make. Either you hear it is your don't. But just coz you haven't heard the difference, it doesn't mean it doesn't make a difference.

 

[Analogous]

I thought it would be helpful to some if we compiled a list of streamers (stand alone and with DACs) currently available in India and their prices? Please copy and paste the list to add items you know are available in India. Please feel free to correct the prices noted if you know this to be a fact. Not sure if it would help to include streamers built into amplifiers like NAD M10 or Naim Atom etc. I suggest anyone wanting to list out standalone Bluetooth streamers start a separate list or thread to avoid (further) confusion.

1. Bluesound node 2i - 60k
2. Allo Digione Signature - 28k (with Allo Shanti LPS @8K)
3. DNM AS2 - 8200
4. Yamaha WXC50 - @30k
5. NAD C338 - 73k
6. Audiolab 6000N
7. Cambridge Audio CXN v2 - 1.2 L
8. Pioneer N30 AE - 60K
9. SMSL Su-9 - 43K
10. Cocktail Audio N15D - 63K
11. Matrix Audio Element 1 - 95K
12. Bluesound power node 2i - 1.4 L
13. Sonos port - 50k
14. ELAC discovery music server - 1.4 L
15. Lindeman Limetree network DAC - 1.3 L
16. SOtM sMS200 Ultra Neo - 1.16 L
17.

 

[rajeshv]

Lindemann limetree bridge-89K
NAD C658- 184k
Lumin D2- 198 K ( 2300 USD in some co websites abroad)
Lumin U1 mini- 198 K ( 2100 USD in some co websites abroad)
Mcintosh MB50- 268 K
Lumin T2-355K
CA Azur 851N- 171K

Price Information in Rupees as mentioned in The Audio Co Website.
There may be some discount also .

 

[fLUX]

@Analogous I think SMSL SU-9 is a pure DAC with BT capabilities. I would like to add below to the list

Paradigm PW Link - 38k ( Streamer with Anthem Room Correction)
IFI Zen Stream - 39k ( Newly released , no reviews yet)
SOTM SMS 200 Neo - 47k
Amazon Echo Link - 19k ( a new one, but dont see Tidal mentioned)
-

 

[shyamv]

All these are theories. Just listen to various bridges like Lindemann and U1 mini and you will hear the difference the streamer section alone makes to the sound. For one the background is pitch black which makes music from the same dac POP. The imaging, resolution, gain, staging, timbre change. The tonality due to the same dac would be the same. I have a Lumin T2 and continuously switch between using cca to cxa81 dac, lumin t2 (streamer + dac), lumin(streamer only). The differences are very audible when T2 is used as a streamer only compared to streamer of cca connected to the same external da. And the difference is audible and the only reason you can't hear the difference is if you have a very low resolution system

We might not understand what the company is doing with their product and it's topology.. But rest assured, streamer only/bridge products are not here to scam people. They aren't that stupid, neither are folks buying.

This is similar to people who can't hear differences cables make. Either you hear it is your don't. But just coz you haven't heard the difference, it doesn't mean it doesn't make a difference.

Firstly, you have misunderstood what I said. I said a price-comparable standalone streamer SHOULD NOT sound different but DOES sound different for reasons I have already explained in my earlier post.

Coming to your comparison of CCA vs Lumin T2. If I understand you correctly, you are comparing A) CCA connected via Optical Out to CXA81 DAC B) Lumin T2 connected via BNC SPDIF to CXA81 DAC and your assertion is B is better than A. My thoughts on how this comparison can be more objective and scientific as follows:

- Firstly, Lumin T2, given that is 40-50X more expensive than CCA, SHOULD sound significantly better.. otherwise there is something seriously wrong here.

- You are comparing output via optical toslink SPDIF vs BNC SPDIF. It is well understood that BNC SPDIF as an interface is significantly superior regardless of the equipment in which it is used. Please refer my earlier post of how asynchronous USB is better than SPDIF. On the same lines, Optical SPDIF, while it is immune to electrical noise, has jitter of the order of nanoseconds while jitter in BNC/Coax SPDIF can be minimised to pico/femto second levels.

- CCA maxes out at 24/48 quality. Lumin T2 BNC goes up to 24/192 quality. So a higher resolution file would have been down-sampled by CCA and definitely it won't sound good.

I can explain this further six ways to Sunday but I rest my case here before the OP asks the mods to banish me from the forum .

 

[Amitdubey]

Firstly, you have misunderstood what I said. I said a price-comparable standalone streamer SHOULD NOT sound different but DOES sound different for reasons I have already explained in my earlier post.

Coming to your comparison of CCA vs Lumin T2. If I understand you correctly, you are comparing A) CCA connected via Optical Out to CXA81 DAC B) Lumin T2 connected via BNC SPDIF to CXA81 DAC and your assertion is B is better than A. My thoughts on how this comparison can be more objective and scientific as follows:

- Firstly, Lumin T2, given that is 40-50X more expensive than CCA, SHOULD sound significantly better.. otherwise there is something seriously wrong here.

- You are comparing output via optical toslink SPDIF vs BNC SPDIF. It is well understood that BNC SPDIF as an interface is significantly superior regardless of the equipment in which it is used. Please refer my earlier post of how asynchronous USB is better than SPDIF. On the same lines, Optical SPDIF, while it is immune to electrical noise, has jitter of the order of nanoseconds while jitter in BNC/Coax SPDIF can be minimised to pico/femto second levels.

- CCA maxes out at 24/48 quality. Lumin T2 BNC goes up to 24/192 quality. So a higher resolution file would have been down-sampled by CCA and definitely it won't sound good.

I can explain this further six ways to Sunday but I rest my case here before the OP asks the mods to banish me from the forum .

Lol. No worries man. We are sharing this here. No one is getting banished.

I did comparison with non mqa and with flac 16 bit steely Dan - 'everything must go' album streamed from Plex media server with gain carefully matched from both the sources. A friend of mine got bluenode 2i, same result to a/b with.

I was responding to a point that streamers are low jitter, bit perfect systems and should not add or take away from the sound. But theories aside, I hear clear audible differences. But the differences are not what people would think (save that for another topic)I bet on my system even Lindemann bridge would have a noticeable difference when compared to the rest below within its value chain.

The whole conversation started with streamers being rated on attributes besides sound with the reasoning that streamers don't/shouldn't necessarily add/take away. I am disputing that. Differences might not be as significant as dac, but are present.

By the way, I am using a shitty old belkin coaxial cable with a bnc adapter which is inferior to my toslink cable connected to CCA. No cable advantage for Lumin on this front

 

[Yogesh]

I thought it would be helpful to some if we compiled a list of streamers (stand alone and with DACs) currently available in India and their prices? Please copy and paste the list to add items you know are available in India. Please feel free to correct the prices noted if you know this to be a fact. Not sure if it would help to include streamers built into amplifiers like NAD M10 or Naim Atom etc. I suggest anyone wanting to list out standalone Bluetooth streamers start a separate list or thread to avoid (further) confusion.

1. Bluesound node 2i - 60k
2. Allo Digione Signature - 28k (with Allo Shanti LPS @8K)
3. DNM AS2 - 8200
4. Yamaha WXC50 - @30k
5. NAD C338 - 73k
6. Audiolab 6000N
7. Cambridge Audio CXN v2 - 1.2 L
8. Pioneer N30 AE - 60K
9. SMSL Su-9 - 43K
10. Cocktail Audio N15D - 63K
11. Matrix Audio Element 1 - 95K
12. Bluesound power node 2i - 1.4 L
13. Sonos port - 50k
14. ELAC discovery music server - 1.4 L
15. Lindeman Limetree network DAC - 1.3 L
16. SOtM sMS200 Ultra Neo - 1.16 L
17.

Allo Boss 2, 9500 excluding PS.

 

[rsjaurr]

dCS Network Bridge - 4.40k
dCS Bartok - 9.50K

 

[Analogous]

Thanks to everyone who suggested additions/ edits to the list. So here is the updated list (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

Bluesound node 2i - 60k
2. Allo Digione Signature - 28k (with Allo Shanti LPS @8K)
3. DNM AS2 - 8200
4. Yamaha WXC50 - @30k
5. NAD C338 - 73k
6. Audiolab 6000N
7. Cambridge Audio CXN v2 - 1.2 L
8. Pioneer N30 AE - 60K
9. Allo Boss 2, 9500 excluding PS.
10. Cocktail Audio N15D - 63K
11. Matrix Audio Element 1 - 95K
12. Bluesound power node 2i - 1.4 L
13. Sonos port - 50k
14. ELAC discovery music server - 1.4 L
15. Lindeman Limetree network DAC - 1.3 L
16. SOtM sMS200 Ultra Neo - 1.16 L
17. dCS Network Bridge - 4.40k
18. dCS Bartok - 9.50K
19. Paradigm PW Link - 38k ( Streamer with Anthem Room Correction)
20. IFI Zen Stream - 39k ( Newly released , no reviews yet)
21. SOTM SMS 200 Neo - 47k
22. Amazon Echo Link - 19k ( a new one, but dont see Tidal mentioned)
23. Lindemann limetree bridge-89K
24. NAD C658- 184k
25. Lumin D2- 198 K ( 2300 USD in some co websites abroad)
26. Lumin U1 mini- 198 K ( 2100 USD in some co websites abroad)
27. Mcintosh MB50- 268 K
28. Lumin T2-355K
29. Cambridge Audio Azur 851N- 171K

 

[sydney]

Are the DCS prices in USD

 

[Pancho]

Lumin U1 and U1 Mini are different models and I think U1 is missing from the list above... U1 MSRP on website is approx $5.9k

 

[Analogous]

Updated list of streamers (stand alone and with DACs) currently available in India and their prices? Please copy and paste the list to add items you know are available in India. Please feel free to correct the prices noted if you know this to be a fact.

1. Bluesound node 2i - 60k
2. Allo Digione Signature - 28k (with Allo Shanti LPS @8K)
3. DNM AS2 - 8200
4. Yamaha WXC50 - @30k
5. NAD C338 - 73k
6. Audiolab 6000N
7. Cambridge Audio CXN v2 - 1.2 L
8. Pioneer N30 AE - 60K
9. SMSL Su-9 - 43K
10. Cocktail Audio N15D - 63K
11. Matrix Audio Element 1 - 95K
12. Bluesound power node 2i - 1.4 L
13. Sonos port - 50k
14. ELAC discovery music server - 1.4 L
15. Lindeman Limetree network DAC - 1.3 L
16. SOtM sMS200 Ultra Neo - 1.16 L
17. Lumin U1 - $5.9k (available in India?)

 

[ajaipuriyar]

Updated list of streamers (stand alone and with DACs) currently available in India and their prices? Please copy and paste the list to add items you know are available in India. Please feel free to correct the prices noted if you know this to be a fact.

1. Bluesound node 2i - 60k
2. Allo Digione Signature - 28k (with Allo Shanti LPS @8K)
3. DNM AS2 - 8200
4. Yamaha WXC50 - @30k
5. NAD C338 - 73k
6. Audiolab 6000N
7. Cambridge Audio CXN v2 - 1.2 L
8. Pioneer N30 AE - 60K
9. SMSL Su-9 - 43K
10. Cocktail Audio N15D - 63K
11. Matrix Audio Element 1 - 95K
12. Bluesound power node 2i - 1.4 L
13. Sonos port - 50k
14. ELAC discovery music server - 1.4 L
15. Lindeman Limetree network DAC - 1.3 L
16. SOtM sMS200 Ultra Neo - 1.16 L
17. Lumin U1 - $5.9k (available in India?)

Lumin is now officially available in india through Cinema Focus, Chennai. Price is approx 4.9L for the U1.

I got it way cheaper from HongKong where it’s manufactured and it’s a stunning price of equipment. Even though I have upgraded from it, I still wish I hadn’t sold it.

And dCS prices should be 4.4L and 9.5L respectively. + taxes.
And you can also add dCS Vivaldi Upsampler @ 15L + taxes to the list.