New (was back in 2021) iFi Zen Stream device

Nope, limitation is not coming from ASIO, as far as I understand. I have seen ASIO go up to 768 and DSD 512. If you read that somewhere, I’d be interested in what they had to say.

Unless the Zen is doing something different, wouldn’t it be using ALSA anyway since it is a Linux device?

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When I was using a USBridge Sig Roon detected 512/768 for my DAC. If the streamer is hooked up via USB or IIS I don’t see why it should be limited to something less than what the DAC can support.

Yea I guess it really is a moot point since 256/384 is more than good enough (unless you are upsampling) but I just find it weird that this streamer does this even with a DAC that can go much higher. Maybe their own DACs don’t fair well at the higher settings or don’t support them at all and that is why they do this?

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From the fine print from myriad DAC streamers that advertise 786/512, but the asterisk says streaming to external DACs supports maximum PCM 384/DSD 256 based on some “driver” protocol. But I wasn’t certain so I said “apparently”. Perhaps I should have said “allegedly” to underscore that I wasn’t sure. The point was that I’ve seen very few streamers that support the highest sample rates and I of course welcome your input.

Any word on the 935 iOS release please?

That’s really odd that it’s gone for you. I made a point to check after I updated and it was still there. I need to check mine again. Over at Head-Fi I and others have been going back and forth with iFi on the ZS thread about this this morning—I wonder if it was something they changed on the back end since?

I am not certain about this, but I think there may be some tweaks iFi can make through Roon, now that it’s Roon Ready, in lieu of necessitating a firmware upgrade. Perhaps others can comment or confirm this?

I just went in again on a different device and it’s not there either.
So yes it seems a bit strange indeed.

Still there for me. What the hell? You have yours set to native DSD or Auto?

Native DSD for me.

I’m considering the ZS to replace my Allo Digione (not Signature). Digione drives a Schiit Gungnir MB,
via SPDIF.

The Digione works fine. I’m looking for a SQ upgrade. Is the ZS likely to be a meaningful upgrade? What power supply is recommended to achieve a good bang for the buck?

Thanks!

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I can’t comment on the quality of your current device specifically, other than I’m aware that it runs on Volumio and has S/PDIF outputs (not sure about USB)?

But the ZS, at $399, offers basically the highest SQ you can expect from a streamer-only device, it’s got all the features you’ll need if you pair it with Roon (otherwise its native GUI is purely functional), and I’ve had the best luck with the 15v power supply (I upgraded the stock wall wart with an iPower X).

If you’re not currently using USB and would be upgrading to that format with the purchase, then by all means it would open up a substantial number of new capabilities, although all the outputs have ANC and jitter-reduction tech built in and S/PDIF works great with it as well,

Hope that helps.

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I noticed that you have max PCM at 192 up there. Is that an intentional choice or was it in S/PDIF mode? Still can’t figure out why your DSD 512 is gone and mine ain’t. Oh well, it’s an academic question anyway—just irks the OCD side of me (which is the large side)…

Thanks. The rig in question is a Roon endpoint.

The Digione is running Ropieee. It is SPDIF only.

The Gungnir MB DAC is early vintage, and has the original USB implementation, which was regarded by Schitt as inferior in SQ to the SPDIF input. That is why I went with the Digione and SPDIF from the outset.

Schitt has since offered at least 2 rounds of upgrades to the USB, and says SQ with the USB now is equal to or better than with the SPDIF input.

I haven’t done the USB upgrades thus far, but would consider it if it is likely to net SQ improvement.

It gives me 384 in USB and 192 in SPDIF mode.
It has been commented before that I am special :wink: (or words to that effect)

I would definitely do it! But that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me—unless the port had a lot of jitter for some reason. S/PDIF was historically viewed as superior to USB due to total galvanic isolation but that’s been disproved. But if they’re offering a free upgrade I would do it anyway.

Sorry for the delayed post, but I just caught this. Roon detected 768/512 for my DAC when it was in bridge mode too, but if I tried to upsample to DSD 512 in Roon the songs would just cycle through one after the other indicating incompatibility with the endpoint capabilities. It still does the same with the new firmware.

I’m pretty sure that with a bridge, Roon will always detect the capabilities of the attached DAC, but if there are other devices upstream that cannot handle that throughout Roon won’t play it. And although the device is now Roon Ready and is being detected by Roon as such, the bridge is still active in the audio settings—from what I understand from iFi the bridge is baked into the ZS hardware (either on a permanent BIOS, CMOS or the firmware architecture itself).

I think this bridge configuration is highly unique to how iFi navigated their Roon functionality with this prototype streamer, and may be without precedent. Typical Roon Ready devices don’t show a bridge in the signal path—they’re just endpoints unto themselves. Can’t say for sure, but given iFi’s history, something tells me that before they go any further trying to retrofit consumer demands into this iteration of the ZS they’ll just release a v2 or Signature version that is Roon Ready out of the gate, possibly with higher throughput, and jettison the bridge altogether.

What does it mean for this device to be Roon Ready? How does that make it different from a Pi running RoPieee? Is there additional functionality?

Bill there are a number of requirements around visibility of of Signal path and how it works that apparently caused Hegel a lot of issues and maybe Primare as well. I for one never expected iFi to complete this work, but I am glad they did as it will give a small number of people the confidence to try these, especially in Roon only mode.

In terms of how it works and function, there is not a lot of difference in functionality that I see between Roon Bridge and Roon Ready. You now only get one device to select as opposed to having separate entries for USB and SPDIF, so that might be considered a slight loss of functionality though there is a way to swap that.

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Thanks, Michael. I’m a little curious Roon went ahead with this, though it makes sense from iFi’s point of view. New marketing claim, and they can ship the device with Roon Bridge already loaded.

Yes and that’s exactly what they did for the last year.
iFI always said they were aiming for RR, but they said a lot of other stuff as well.
I think most of us user’s were shocked to see it finally released.

I can actually see the sense for Roon as it gives them a high quality low cost streamer that is available from the likes of Amazon that works really well and is not a DIY Pi based solution (I say this as someone with 5 Pi’s plugged in and running in the house)
IFI have made a lot of mis step’s with the marketing of this Stream, but it’s a great little device