Best Roon endpoint

Good to hear. I think you’re all set. Enjoy the music!

First, what’s your signal path look like? Make sure you’re using exclusive mode and not the OS mixer.

Then, yes, a streamer can improve things. How much? Depends on the rest of your system. As others pointed out, and once you have a great dac, there are bigger gains to be had on the analog side than the digital side. But, there are some great streamers out there and they can be used to reveal just that little bit more into the music. But, this isn’t usually a budget game. I like the Allo stuff if you don’t want to use a PC. The Rendu is great too. Then you’re really expanding your budget as things get “exotic”.

Look at the Lumin streamers. In particular the U2 Mini or the U1. The U2 Mini looks very attractive to me right now and it works very well with Roon. I’d like to pair a black one with my Spring 3 L2 and I think the benefits will be as follows.
Lumin works very well with Roon
The Lumin products are pretty and very well made
The U1 Mini is a single box
The USB out is well engineered
Their software lead is a contributor here

I’ve been listening to my Spring 3 for a week now. I have a permanent smile on my face. A Holo May deserves to be treated to the best sources you can provide for it.

I was looking at U2 mini but again saw a video suggesting to change the internal switch mode power supply to linear power supply. Was bit surprised that for 2.4K$ they are giving switch mode power supply.
U1 seems to have an external lps.

Thanks, I will check if I am using exclusive mode or not and make changes as needed.
Thanks for the suggestions.

Plus the interviewee Mark Jenkins is from Antipodes who wants to sell you a $25,000 streamer.

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There’s nothing wrong with switching power supplies.

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And the engineers and designers at Lumin agree with you, as do I.

Would you recommend the DigiOne DAC over the HifiBerry DAC2? I ordered the HiFiBerry and am contemplating using it but I currently have my Raspberry Pi 3B+ with a Digi 2 Pro HAT feeding into a older Schiit Multibit Bifrost. I would think that a dedicated DAC would be the better option then using a HAT DAC. Now If I could just connect it wirelessly which you are all too familiar with.

Totally agreed. Was never satisfied untill I got my Magnepan LRS speakers. They opened up a whole new world and they are running on a cheap setup. A Emotiva BASX preamp and BASX Amp running 250W into 4ohms. Currently running an older Schiit Multibit Bifrost DAC. I tried a Geshelli Labs J2 DAC based on glowing reviews but really wasn’t much of a upgrade.

The May (I own a May KTE) has an excellent USB input that also gives it maximum flexibility in terms of sampling rates, PCM, or DSD. Since I use HQPlayer, I drive mine with an UP-Gateway mini-PC running HQPlayer’s NAA binary, with an Intona USB 3.0 isolator before the DAC. Before I got HQPlayer, I used I2S from Pi2AES, also a high quality source but limited to 192kHz PCM, which does not allow exploring what the DAC can do with higher sample rates and DSD.

I’d not bother with expensive DDCs or streamers.

The Allo DigiONE isn’t a DAC, it’s a transport with S/PDIF (75 Ω) BNC and RCA outputs for connecting compatible DACs.

For me a sonore ultrarendu into chord qutest, both with linear supplies is really really good

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Yeah, very true.
Long back once you get a good CD player and amp it was done. Now with streaming and local file playback things are becoming more and more complicated.
Now clocks, ethernet filters, usb reclocker and linear power supplies for all is the norm.

I am not sure how much each of them contribute. In my case I may go with a decent streamer and be done with that and will buy only once I am convinced with the performance of the streamer.

Thanks.

It really doesn’t need to be complicated. The CD player is replaced with DAC and/ or streamer and Roon.

Far from the norm. These are either integral to the components chosen or superfluous.

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I don’t have any of that stuff. It’s all integrated into a single streamer+DAC+preamp box, which sounds great and gets excellent reviews. However, I do agree that with streaming and local file playback, things can get complicated. This morning for example, we had a brief power outage. After power came back up, the HiFi system could not connect to Roon Core. Nobody else in my family would have a clue how to troubleshoot this.

Another issue is that much of the system is no longer controlled in an obvious way by a simple set of front-panel buttons, nor with a single IR remote control. Operations require a combination of software and hardware controls that aren’t necessarily designed to work together seamlessly and intuitively (unless maybe your whole hardware stack is from a single vendor). Again, nobody else in my family could pick up a single remote control, then quickly select and play an album, without thinking about it or consulting a cheat-sheet.

This is why I value one-box, integrated endpoints with trigger ports, HDMI ARC, and well-designed remote controls that are Roon-Ready down to the transport controls (including file play/pause and previous/next). Very few vendors offer all that (in addition to great SQ), and AFAIK none of them are made in the USA (except, possibly, for a new Mytek product at over $20K). A couple of Chinese companies do, but if I’ve spent $5K to $10K on an audio hub and something goes wrong, I want to be able to ship it to a service center here in the USA and get it back within 2 weeks or so. I’m not confident I could do that with any Chinese, Korean, or German company.

What more could one need than a raspberry pi 4 as roon endpoint?

Usb filters and reclockers and snake oil like etherregen are unnecessary :slight_smile:

Every proper designed DAC shouldn’t need any of this stuff.

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You are the one making it complicated by heeding claims that aren’t backed by science. All these companies preying on audiophile’s insecurities about an imagined inferior sound quality.

Just ignore all of this nonsense and enjoy the music!

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In the last few years, I’ve had A LOT of experience with various Roon endpoints. I’ve had Teac DAC’s, Chord DAC’s etc etc.

The OP posted a question about integrated streamers?

I just LOVE the flexibility of having a separate Roon streamer & DAC etc…

HOWEVER the best results IMO are with an integrated streamer (streamer, DAC etc). I can’t speak highly enough of the Lumin range of integrated streamers (A1, D2, T1 etc). They’re sublime. They ‘just work’ perfectly with Roon, and sound absolutely fantastic.

I’m currently using an Organik-upgraded Linn Klimax DS as my main digital source. And this source is, IMO absolutely peerless.

He asked about a stand alone streamer because he is happy with his May DAC.

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