Raspberry Pi 4 running RoPieee or RoPieeeXL.
https://ropieee.codexwilkes.com/downloads/ropieee-installation-guide.pdf
1 Like
NP5 Prisma MK1 user with a Chord Qutest for years.
Roon ready, flawless and reliable.
You can even get an NP5 MK2 directly from Roon.
You may also have a look at their website:
https://primare.net/category/news/
I received an E-mail today, after comments on another firmware update in January concerning Roon, Qobuz and Tidal, Primare announces:
Spotify HIFI
All Prisma products are Spotify HiFi ready and only need Spotify to launch that service. That said, Spotify has provided no information when they expect to do so, although there have been recent reports, or rumours, that it may be soon.
1 Like
Another RoPieee vote here. Shame there aren’t pretty cases but it 100% does the job.
The build is simple, the documentation feels complete and the support on the forums here is great.
Love the Flirc case for my Pi4… looks nice, is well-built and does a nice cooling job.
2 Likes
Or you could look for a pre-loved Chord Dave as it also has an excellent hp output. My understanding is that you don’t want to spend on an additional hp amp? Sometimes you can find one for around 6000€. As a streamer I use a second hand Auralic Aries which I bought for 500€.
Really? A Chord Dave or RPi4. Let me think a minute…
5 Likes
Get a RPi with a hat as a streamer with optical output and a second hand Dave as Dac and HP amp. Perfect system.
Another rPi vote here – I use it with a TT2 and it plays beautifully. I attach the DAC via USB though, since I like to upsample and optical is too limiting for that. Good thing about the rPi is that all these options are readily available and easy to test and compare.
1 Like
Silent Angel Munich M1T - with RPI inside
Yeah, the post was to try and identify an alternative to the Naim unit, most probably using a TT2 as the DAC / Amp section. I mentioned the Naim as I’m considering it as the simplest option!
However simple and ‘best sounding’ are not usually the same in my experience. If the Naim sounded as good as a TT2 with streamer then I’d get one tomorrow…
1 Like
How do you find the Zen Stream? Did you compare it to others when you got it?
It’s on my shortlist of possibles but I wouldn’t be able to hear it prior to purchase…
1 Like
I guess this is the nub of the question, do streamers sound different to each other or are they all the same? In which case it comes down to a cost / convenience situation and choosing a DAC / Headphone amp which I like the sound of.[quote=“Traian_Boldea, post:19, topic:227412, full:true”]
Good argument, I was thinking the same but from the DAC point of view. As I do understand with my little knowledge and logic the bridge does not have “a sound” but the dac might… so after trying 100 speakers I would like to try 20 Dacs 
[/quote]
1 Like
This is a very healthy argument for getting seperate items. I’d hope that a piece of equipment in these prices brackets would last for a good 10-15 years minimum, this technology would surely have moved on in that time period.
1 Like
Looks like a great piece of kit for a very reasonable price. No Roon though from what I see. I’m not sure that I’ll end up using Roon but I do want the option
Warning warning warning, can of worms, can of worms. 
Joke aside, I think we can agree that if has a decent design (starting with a pi and a nice hat) we can look at the specs in order to make a decision. And with the specs I guess it comes down to personal options taking in consideration dacs imputs, upsampling and other features (tidal, NAA, etc)
No, I did shop online and while there is a 20 days returning policy mandatory for all online shopping it is still not something popular
I can compare only to computer USBs. and it is better sounding. Why? Everybody says that computers are full of noise. How? I can be sure that the sounds did expand in space. Lets say you have a chess table in front of you and I can imagine a 3 (deep) by 5 (left right), when I did switch from comp usb to ZS the number the chess table expanded to 5 by 7. In the first hour the impression was that I lost some highs and gained some more definition for the base but I did A/B test that and I think it was just the first impression, maybe it was autosuggestion or just the particular track that I was listening.
I have to say that setting up was I mess (I run away from a pi and end up spending the same amount of time) and without the threads in this forum I would not have managed. If you do get one post here so we can point to the links (so you can do it in 15 min).
Yes that was the road. Price. The difference it is not so big when compared with a pi and you do not have to make all the reading and choosing hats.
For this moment ZS meet my bill. If I had more I would have gone with other choices. Moving up there is the Neo Stream were I do not need its dac but I care that can support higher DSD. Moving up again I would look for I2S, while I’m not 100% convinced that it is better than USB why not have one (link from stack audio). Moving up Holo, Watson, Lumin, Auralic.
2 Likes
It’s not rocket science. All a streamer does is take the bits off of one channel and send them out a different channel. They are not involved with the sound, at all. Unless they screw with the bits. Which means they’re broken.
2 Likes
Sounds very interesting and might well be what I go for (available locally, reasonable price etc), thanks for the heads up on setting the device up.
1 Like
To me, you’ve got it backwards! 
Having “a sound” would be: very little differences between bridges and larger differences between DACs. But I might be wrong or relay too much on logic.
Pls explain why backwards?
Thanks
Well if you will go or not for it maybe it is better to have the thread now, it is a 2500 post thread.
If you just want to jump to the settings:
step by step:
some screenshots to go with the step by step:
And if your setup allows and you want to try you can connect the ZS with ethernet directly to your Roon Core (not thru a switch or router)
2 Likes