Do I have to download to a computer?

Audio Gear Talk
21

The Aries isn’t necessary but it may be desirable. It separates the noisy NUC from your DAC. If you are using Wi-Fi to the Aries you can put the NUC next to your router, well away from your Hi-Fi. Try out each and see which you prefer.

22

Thanks Andrew. Agreed that there maybe some noise from the NUC but can you help me understand more the exact function of the Aries on my case? I believe Roon not just do indexing and controlling but it does also act as a streaming server, am I correct in that sense?

23

Yes, Roon is serving the music and connecting to the Aries using RAAT. All the Aries is doing is transporting the audio stream from Wi-Fi to USB. It is quite good at doing that and has a nice low noise linear power supply. It’s not so much what it does, as what it doesn’t do. It is a galvanically isolated low noise network bridge.

24

Thanks Andrew for the quick reply. As mentioned, I am actually connecting everything thru LAN cables, I am wondering if it is worthy to get better isolation/ filtering for the USB side rather than keeping the Aries there which may eventually introduce more unwanted uncertainty though.

25

There’s really no substitute for trying the different configurations and listening to see which one sounds better for you.

26

[quote=“William_Ip, post:24, topic:8537”]
I am wondering if it is worthy to get better isolation/ filtering for the USB side rather than keeping the Aries there which may eventually introduce more unwanted uncertainty though.
[/quote]Try a cheap experiment - buy an ODROID C1 ($30), install Linux and Roon Bridge on it and connect it to your DAC via USB.

27

Thanks, may I ask what is Roon Bridge? I try to search the official site and seems not have anything too much details about it.

28

See here in the Knowledge Base for the Roon Bridge page.

29

William, Your Aries has an Ethernet wired input and USB out and it supports Roon’s RAAT protocol. You do not need a Roon Bridge. I would recommend connecting your Roon core computer by Ethernet cable to the Aries and locate the core computer out of your listing room. Wifi is for convenience for people without a wired network.
Jeff