I have an ifi Zen Stream used as a Roon endpoint. It is hardwired (no wifi) to the network and then connected to a DAC via the Coax data out. All other services on the Zen are turned off. This has worked well for months, until this month (August, 2023). It appears that ifi has pushed out one or two firmware updates which have now caused music dropouts. I am running firmware 2.32.9 released on Monday, August 21, 2023.
The symptom is that every few minutes there is a dropout, lasting 2-3 seconds. This does not occur on any other of my Roon endpoints. If doesn’t matter if the source is a local file or Tidal. My system has had no other changes when the dropouts began – this did not used to occur. It’s really annoying. I’m thinking of replacing the Zen with a Bluesound as the streaming device.
You are correct, I have auto update on, though I am regretting it. I presumed they wouldn’t break their own product. As for tinkering with buffer size etc. I’ve played with these values, including maxing them out, with no positive impact on the problem.
Does anyone know if I can download an older version of the firmware and force a rollback?
HI, I’m also having dropout / stuttering issue started recently… The music will play and dropout for a second or so then continues. very frustrating! I’m running the latest Roon Core on Nucleus+
Was your issue resolved since August?
Thank you.
Tony
The issue was not resolved by iFi. You can work around this by rolling back to firmware from the Spring of 2022 - but this approach brings its own set of problems. My frustration with this issue and iFi’s poor support on the matter led me to sell the iFi and purchase a different brand of streamer - which has worked flawlessly (and as a byproduct also sounds MUCH better - a nice surprise I was not expecting).
I see from the above postings that there is some curiosity about the streamer I purchased to replace the iFi Zen. When I originally posted, I intentionally didn’t mention the brand/model of the replacement as I didn’t want to shift the focus away from the problems with the Zen towards a debate about the merits of one streamer vs another. My view and point was that the Zen should function properly, without dropouts or other problems – it does not.
As for the replacement, as there is curiosity, I purchased a Lumin U2 Mini. This is of course more expensive than the Zen and I am fortunate to have been able to make that choice. My learning and surprise here is that the streamer matters more than I thought it should regarding sound quality. I am glad to have made the purchase/upgrade. Had the Zen functioned properly, I would not have upgraded my streamer and been blissfully content streaming Roon. Now that I’ve done so, I would never go back as the sound upgrade was far too much to ignore.
I suppose I should thank iFi. However, I cannot as I believe a product, regardless of its price point, should function as advertised and be well supported by the company that makes it. This was not my experience with the iFi Zen.
The streamer is really important. The ifi ZEN is great for the price (when paired with an iPowerX or better iPower Elite) but the Lumin U2 Mini (with a Farad Super3) is another level.
My Zen Stream has always worked well, especially with Roon, and I’ve had it for almost two years. No issues at all and it sounds good. However, it is great to learn about your impressions on the Lumin.Cheers
I also have a Zen Stream since the week of release and I am on the 2.32.9 August release and I am using WiFi with Roon and HQPlayer and I have not had any stuttering even with DSD 256 upsampling on Roon and HQPlayer.
I am using USB output to an iFi DAC. But I previously had some stuttering issues with SPDIF output at 24/192 and that was only fixed with Roon Only mode at least in my set-up.
I have the same problem with short dropouts 3-4 per hour since firmware 2.32.9 (on Coax and USB)! The Zen Stream is connected to LAN (Wifi deactivated)!
Also modifying the buffers did not help!
I recently replaced the Zen Stream by a Raspi (Ropieee) connected over USB to my DAC preamp and don’t have any dropouts since then!
I also tried a full factory reset and reinstalled the firmware using iFi’s anti-bricking solution in order to install everything from scratch! Unfortunately the dropouts remained!
I’m still hoping for a new firmware release soon because I really liked the ZS in my system!
I had the same issue with my Zen Stream after the last FW update with USB out to amp and using the ethernet connection. I had drop outs or even worse music just stopped after a few seconds. I switched to a WiiM Pro+ and had not one issue so far. The ZS was nice as long as it worked but ifi is lousy with maintaining their products and support. Now it collects dust in a drawer and I am happy I have a replaced it with something equally good and a company that pushes frequent updates and seems to care.
The WiFi on the Stream has Never been the best and I always used mine on Ethernet until recently.
Having bought a WIIM Pro Plus and plugged that into a power amplifier through it’s RCA connections I was not at all happy with the sound. I put the Zen Stream, DAC Signature Edition V2 combination in there instead and it’s great.
As mentioned above I am upscaling to DSD256 and have no drop outs at this point, so I must be lucky with the strength of my WiFi and that I happen to have a Orbi Mesh AP about 8 foot away.
At the same time the WIIM PRO Plus is doing wonderful work into my FIIO K5 Pro headphone amp so it’s a win win at least for me.
It’s a pity that the Zen Stream WiFi is not better (and I have had plenty of issues with mine in other areas) but as a device it helps create wonderful sound , just too many issues with it for some user’s.
@Marco_Gymnopoulos Maybe you should sell your device while it maintains some decent value
