I have just finished building a Rock server on a Gen 10 NUC (was going to use a Gen 11 but they don’t appear on approved hardware yet) so I have ended up with a NUC10i7FNH4 with 16gb ram and a 250gb M2 Nvme WD black.
Went together like a dream and I must commend Roon on their excellent documentation which helped a Linux virgin like myself.
Whilst I wait for a final decision on my endpoint (and the money) most likely a Lumin T2 I am going to run a direct cable (HDMI) connection out of the NUC to my hifi system.
My options are HDMI out of the NUC into my Oppo 103BD feeding into my Anthem AVM 60 or possibly feed direct to the AVM 60.
My instinct is to go direct to the AVM as being newer will probably have better DAC’s (memory is they were 32 bit 768 khz) and bypass the Oppo was thinking initially to use the Oppo for control but this is superfluous given the Roon control on my tablet.
Any thoughts appreciated.
also
Can any of the other ports on the NUC be used for audio output such as the thunderbolt USB C
Cheers
AceRimmer
(Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!)
2
Welcome and I can wholeheartedly recommend the Lumin T2 as the consummate endpoint.
There are a lot of very satisfied T2 users on this forum.
I use mine to upsample everything to DSD512 and manage that easily on an old nuc 7i3 so you will have much cpu to spare in your setup.
Enjoy the Roon experience!
I think neither supports USB DAC input. You may need to test both to see which sounds better to you. For your case, I guess feeding direct to the AVM 60 may be the better option.
The 768kHz refers to the capability of AK4458 DAC chip, not the interfaces supported by the AVM. I believe the maximum sample rate you can send to it is probably 192kHz.
I’ve had HDMI from NUC to OPPO 205 and NUC to a Denon AVR. With HDMI to OPPO I had the option of using the OPPO DAC with the 7.1 analog outs to the receiver, or the receiver DAC with HDMI pass through from OPPO to receiver.
Gave up on having too many options for playback and decided to go HMDI from NUC to receiver, avoiding another processor in the loop and extra step of changing the OPPO input to HDMI IN.
Yes, I agree with the other posters.
It doesn’t make sense to use the oppo as bridge.
The Anthem also don’t have an USB-DAC-In (also no multichannel analogue in) and so only HDMI remains.
If you’re using DSPs from the Anthem, then also the Lumin T2 must not be better solution for you than using only the Rock connect through HDMI, because all analogue inputs where resampelt in the Anthem.
For me I’m using for the AVR (Emotiva XMC-2) a direct connection to a Rock (only used as endpoint) through HDMI (for multichannel) and a Lumin T2 connect through XLR to a Stereo Pre (Primare PRE35 Prisma) and through unbalanced cinch connection to the Emotiva ( straight forward without any DSPs).
Both systems are using the same speakers and I much preferr the T2 with the stereo pre.
On the other side between the two connections on the Emotiva, there isn’t so much difference…