Growing up beyond Sonos - streaming Hifi considerations?

keylion said:
I'd not heard of either of those speakers so I've just looked them up. Very interesting designs. I was going to suggest looking at some active speakers but they are generally functional design wise.
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I like the idea of the Larsen speakers as I can shove them up against the wall in the lounge and be done with it.

The Duevels are cheaper but look like they need 50cm ish space from the wall. The moni directional speakers sound like a great idea over a traditional box to me, but I haven't heard any speakers in years so I cannot comment further!
 
Yeah I’m months if not a year away from a purchase of amp dac and speakers

I’m going to stick to the Sonos and my headphones and build up my cd collection
 
I’ve took a punt as a trial, ordered two albums used from music magpie. 2 for £3. I’m expecting severely scratched disks or broken cases!
 
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Maybe check out the bluesound node2i.

It's a great streamer and can hook in to Amazon, Spotify, tidal, qobuz and more. It can also play and auto manage a library of flacs over a network of via direct usb. It's got a decent DAC built in but you can also bypass it if you want to use something else.

They also make their own Sonos like speakers that you can add for a multi room setup if you wanted. I've been very pleased with mine so far
 
sHo0sH said:
Maybe check out the bluesound node2i.

It's a great streamer and can hook in to Amazon, Spotify, tidal, qobuz and more. It can also play and auto manage a library of flacs over a network of via direct usb. It's got a decent DAC built in but you can also bypass it if you want to use something else.

They also make their own Sonos like speakers that you can add for a multi room setup if you wanted. I've been very pleased with mine so far
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Yeah I heard about that device looks good. I would run it as Roon endpoint and use the dac until I could afford a super one
 
craptakular said:
Yeah I heard about that device looks good. I would run it as Roon endpoint and use the dac until I could afford a super one
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The DAC in it is very good IMO. I previously had a cambridge audio dac magic and it's far superior to that. I would imagine the diminishing returns beyond it would be very expensive! I have it feeding an Arcam FMJ A39 and some B&W CM9's and have pretty much decided to stop there.
 
As a Roon user with a fairly reasonable system, some thoughts:
- Roon is the best streaming package that I've seen, having additional layers of depth in it's ability to wander your way through your music collection. However, it is just that, i.e. a VERY nice way to manipulate your music collection. As far as I know, it has no sonic benefits over other similar applications that can't be achieved with other free apps. e.g. it DOES include a free digital room correction capability, but that needs to be tuned manually (not that hard).
So whilst I love it, for a person new to it, my suggestion is that you use say the Squeezebox route on a Pi3/4 to see if you like it. The SB app does all of the basics that Roon does, just not the additional fripperies
- EAC or DBPowerAmp are both supposedly bit perfect. I use DBPowerAmp. As long as you've ensured that you genuinely understand how to use them (watch a few vids), you'll be fine
- I use a Pi3 as a secondary streaming point, for the dosh, it's a definite. My assumption is that you can use an App installed onto your phone/tablet to control it

Hope that helps.
 
Mr_Sukebe said:
As a Roon user with a fairly reasonable system, some thoughts:
- Roon is the best streaming package that I've seen, having additional layers of depth in it's ability to wander your way through your music collection. However, it is just that, i.e. a VERY nice way to manipulate your music collection. As far as I know, it has no sonic benefits over other similar applications that can't be achieved with other free apps. e.g. it DOES include a free digital room correction capability, but that needs to be tuned manually (not that hard).
So whilst I love it, for a person new to it, my suggestion is that you use say the Squeezebox route on a Pi3/4 to see if you like it. The SB app does all of the basics that Roon does, just not the additional fripperies
- EAC or DBPowerAmp are both supposedly bit perfect. I use DBPowerAmp. As long as you've ensured that you genuinely understand how to use them (watch a few vids), you'll be fine
- I use a Pi3 as a secondary streaming point, for the dosh, it's a definite. My assumption is that you can use an App installed onto your phone/tablet to control it

Hope that helps.
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Thanks, I do have a Pi 3 lying around somewhere and a Hifi Berry Digi + pro that’s in my shopping coming back from Australia or in my parents loft.


I’ll try to find it at some point and play with moose, voluminous and lms.

I think it’s best for me to build up my collection a bit more and stick to my headphone setup.


Not ideal at the moment either as transitioning back to UK so stuff is everywhere!
 
Pi3 is not exactly some device to use with lms, use the Synology Nas like I do and it's fast and easy to use.

Pi3 is too dorky a system. I have pi3 which I used for a bit, I'd just use it for a silent internet browser.

Happy with my two squeezebox classics and touch
 
I’ll have to look into all options.

the blue node looks like a good plug and play solution abs works with all closed streaming services like amazon.

I’d have to look at a headless Mac mini or intel nuc as well
 
Give it a try. Lms in use doesn't need massive amounts of power dual core might be ok.

Ran it on my qnap ts-209 ii that is 300mhz single core and scanning was slow, navigation a little bit painful but once it was playing it was ok about 20% CPU use on flax playing.
 
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