I think the main point I was making was in relation to @jan_van_der_Stegen comments about what Roon is ‘doing’ to his sound. I still say that Roon cannot be doing anything at all to his sound. As far as I can understand it, the difference between the sound of Roon and his preferred sound is because something else is changing the pure sound, either in a way that he dislikes when the Roon signal is decoded and/or in a way that he likes in the case of JRiver etc. Roon is not responsible for sound quality.
It is plausible that when using a PC feeding USB to a DAC located nearby (assume 1m USB cable) the software selected could result in a different SQ.
Nothing to do with bit perfect etc.
Foobar is a very lightweight app with next to no graphics. I would expect the minimal draw on processor cycles on the CPU and GPU.
Roon will be using much more CPU and GPU and I could imagine a greater level of RFI being transmitted through the air and via the USB cable.
If the DAC used was not robust enough to shield and decouple internally then I think there could be a difference in SQ.
That doesn’t mean that Roon itself sounds different but the system and environment could and should be improved.
Using a network streamer and keeping the PC well away would be a good start.
Sorry, but RFI is an analog problem and can’t affect digital data.
Otherwise you won’t be able to enjoy music from Tidal, where your stream has to pass thousands of kilometers of cables and over air transmissions with hundreds of routers and switches inbetween. Even in this worst of all cases, there you have no control on the passage your stream passes, you have a perfect result at the end, without RFI disturbance. Think about it.
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I did think about it. I know that. Which is why I said it wasn’t about the bits. I am not talking about whether 1’s and 0’s get from one unit to another,
If RFI gets into the DAC where analogue circuits DO operate then the SQ could be affected. That is why I also speculated that a USB tethered device is maybe just 1m from the noisy PC.
I am also just speculating that maybe the OP’s DAC maybe suseptible to such noise.
Thousands of miles of internet cable etc is a bit irrelevant to my point.
Not really, I don’t think so 
There was a 25d gap, I responded to the more recent post, and the conversation flowed from there.
As far as I can tell you’re still saying the same thing - high end digital bit perfect streamers/software can’t make any difference to the sound in a competently made DAC (and let’s assume for arguments sake that everything currently on the market at the high-end is such a device). This would still imply that manufacturers making these products - including many RoonReady devices - are either sold under false pretences or if we’re being generous I suppose, by people so wildly enthusiastic and optimistic (but perhaps maybe a bit delusional?) that they employ top engineers and coders in the audio streaming field but ignore all their scientific research and R&D findings in the hope that if they just build it a miracle will come?
I guess the point I’m making (and I’m trying to be humerous believe it or not) is if you strongly believe your stance to be correct, why hold back from saying what it is? It seems odd to feel strongly that it’s impossible these products do what they claim, yet worry about voicing it here.
It seems like if it’s scientifically proven that there’s nothing better than bit perfect, and no tiers of bit perfect quality, then all manufacturers of these products should be shut down or at the bare minimum be made to remove any notion of sound quality from their marketing material. Reviewers should be prohibited from discussing sound quality abilities of a digital streamer or software, as should resellers. There should be a warning on all devices stating that it’s impossible for the device to have any effect on the final sound output and that you’re buying it purely for its functionality and looks.
If I’ve been hoodwinked, I’d be grateful if people stepped in to protect me from evil snake oil merchants. And I’m being completely genuine there.
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In my ststem roon is better than puremusic, audirvana and jriver. The four players are similar. Only amarra has a different performance.
I canceled my Roon subsribsion and stopped testing it, I removed it.
Golden ears, but no hard evidence.
a good system is not about money😉 what makes you think ‘momey can buy real hifi’?
I’ve just made my way through this interesting thread. I have to agree with Andy’s comment above as that has been my experience. I have Roon running on my computer (connected by ethernet to my router) and my music files are on a Drobo 5N (which is connected by ethernet to my router). My roon endpoint is an Auralic Aries, which connects wirelessly to my router. The Aries is connected to my dac (PS Audio Directstream) via usb. I’ve used JRiver, Lightning DS and Roon as controllers to stream music and I’ve never noticed any difference in the sound quality, which has been uniformly great. Perhaps there is a difference, but if there is, it is so insignificant to be meaningless, at least to me.
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That’s what I was also trying to express in #65 above.
If you are tethered to a PC/Mac that gets RF noisier with greater CPU/HDD workloads that could explain differences in perceived SQ if a DAC is located quite close and is sensitive to such things,
Using a decoupled architecture with a LAN/wifi end-point is a good way forward.
I believe this would be measurable in either the noise floor or frequency response at the analog output. I’ve read dozens of DAC reviews with measurements and have never seen such a claim substantiated. As a community representative you should be sticking to facts and not vague and unsubstantiated things that “could be”, IMO.
Some food for thought (trolls needn’t bother).
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Wow. That ought to get things rolling on various audio forums. I’ll start the popcorn… 
Seriously, though, I would have liked to see the same comparison that included a “high-end” streamer that he is showing doesn’t live up to expectations. He’s comparing an ODROID and two PCs. I think his conclusions are interesting, but to prove that high-end streamers are snake-oil, it would help to measure one, don’t you think?
Archimago has blogged about this topic several times and also on audiophile Ethernet and USB cables, all with measurements to back up his statements. He is basically ignored on voodoo sites like Computer Audiophile and Audiostream. They don’t like to have their beliefs challenged with facts.
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[quote=“Krutsch, post:80, topic:5590”]
He’s comparing an ODROID and two PCs. I think his conclusions are interesting, but to prove that high-end streamers are snake-oil, it would help to measure one, don’t you think?
[/quote]agree it would help to end speculation, on the other hand the pedestrian stuff is already shown to perform at levels that are of no consequence to the receiving DAC’s output.
Yep… but why not just stuff the ball through the hoop and call it done. I would be curious to see the numbers - even if they match everything else tested.
Agreed, it’d close the loop nicely.