Found the link I was looking for -
3 Likes
Direct comparison with the HDD version showed that the SSDâs subtle âhaloâ effect was indeed less natural. And the HDD version has a clear advantage on one aspect of sound quality: music flowed a little better and timing was superior too, with more natural dynamic expression.
And we worry about the cabling?
1 Like
Music flowance is always important.
I notice the site that was selling the magic wooden stick is either out of business or the seller has been run out of town. Hope the reviewer got tarred and feather also.â
Attaching a stick to very highly shielded cables like the coaxial Crystal Cable with its Kapton and Peek layers or the Nanotec interconnect with its robust copper foil should rationally allow for no such effect at least not of the sort we encountered now. Burkeâs voice is that of a man of grand stature albeit with a slightly nasal top. Or so it was before the universal sticks entered the scene.
Now it seemed heâd blown his nose or inhaled some nose drops. His voice opened up from top to bottom and back up. The same happened to the band. Clarity mopped up the sound without introducing sharp âsâ sounds and what emanated from the speakers had an extra inner coherence. Where prior the music had been great replayâi.e. reproduced stuffâwith the AC and universal sticks in place the sense of being part of it all grew gloriously.
â
â The Akiko Audio E-Tuning Gold mkII. $269 for a stick you tape to your power cord.
Hi Jamie,
I believe that most supplied cables in our system along with the power supply including component power supplies are often the weakest links in most systems. If you havenât spent more than a few thousands dollars on your system there is probably little to gain.
After spending a considerable amount of money like numerous others I want to optimise what I have bought. When spending around $50k US on a system I believe if you want to get it operating at close to its best you need to eliminate any weak link within reason and always budget for this in the total cost of the system. A well set up system will normally outperform a poorly set up system that costs somewhat more.
I have sourced what I see as fairly high quality components, spent some effort optimising its set-up, treating the room acoustics, buying cables that wont limit but enhance its performance and have treated that horrible power that comes off the mains.
One of my components is a AC-DC-AC power conditioner with a high quality battery in it. I hear no difference in my system whether its plugged into the wall outlet or not. My stereo is always running direct off the battery which gives a rock solid voltage & frequency output with adequate reserves of current and lasts for 3-5 hours. Its generally charged by solar panels during the day as I make excess power and draw from the power network at night. My system always sounds the same, again eliminating any identifiable weak link which gives me a consistent high quality sound and should increase the longevity and reliability of my components. There is no change at all to sound quality if I turn off the power point and pull the power cable out of the socket when my stereo is running. I have also installed a higher quality shielded cable run from my fuse box to a reasonable grade hospital wall outlet which is on its own circuit. The cable,breaker & outlet cost $250 dollars all up and if it doesnât improve the sound it helps to ensure the integrity of everything including my power conditioner.
There are still numerous things most of us can do to enhance our systems in a cost affective manner and to some people they are obvious, to others they are worth looking into and others will think most are all a waste of money.
Hi Anthro,
Do you have a link to this, why would Roon not recommend their own product. I though they had developed it specifically for this quality music playback and to connect to the network and a DAC.
Here scroll down to âOur recommendationsâ
A Nucleus is a NUC and a NUC is still a noisy computer. Best to remove them from your audio chain. Roon obviously recommends the Nucleus as a core, they simply wonât recommend connecting it directly to your DAC.
You talk in absolutes Anthro. Roon donât. It is best practice to use a remote device if you can or simply wish to but it is also just fine to use USB or HDMI. A good DAC wonât have a problem.
No I donât! I was asked to provide a link to support my claim. Which I did. The Roon team is crystal clear in their advice for BEST possible audio reproduction. Obviously the Nucleus works fine when connected straight to a DAC, but this was never the subject of discussion.
I hope that is the case.
So far on different forums I have read that every different type of set up mentioned is worse than everything else and it all adds noise? Are there any positives other than convenience.
I was intending to control the Roon Nucleus by a tablet, power the Roon by a quality LPS and use a galvanically isolated USB regenerator between the Roon and a quality DAC and now probably skip on the so-called upmarket cable!
I believe that streaming music quality will not quite match the sound quality of stored music.
Let your ears decide, donât bother with what other people hear and post. Itâs a small fee to trial either Tidal or Qobuz and give it a listen. But, donât forget to enjoy the music primarily! 
Your plans were fine. The LPSU and USB treatment more than mitigate any additional noise.
Thanks for the reassurance.
I like to research before I buy which lead to the baptism of fire over the original thread topic but have no previous streaming/Roon experienceâŠ
1 Like
Which is based on what exactly?
Experience and a willingness to compromise where practical. Based on my experience, I found that even when using an endpoint rather than direct connection to the DAC via USB, you still needed to use a decent LPSU and in the case of my DAC at the time USB treatment to get the best out of a USB connected setup. You arenât really changing anything because while you can argue that an SBC is smaller, less powerful and therefore less electrically noisy you arenât really doing much different because we now know that the most popular SBC was compromised by the practice of sharing busâs to save space and simplify design. Go to a purpose built device with lower noise characteristics such as the micro and ultra Rendu products and you still need expensive super capacitor based PSUâs to get the best out of USB. So, based on my experience if you are going USB, do it direct with the above mentioned mitigations or go to a networked DAC. The rest are expensive diversions and you end up with option two in the end anyway if you want the absolute best performance and are lucky enough to have deep pockets. Ultimately my advice is designed to put the mind of a potential Nucleus user and Roon subscriber to rest. Dean can work his way through other permutations once he has a working system up and running. But to be clear there are plenty of people on here running a Nucleus USB direct and are perfectly happy with what they have.
Apologies to Dean and the mods for straying off topic but I think Anthroâs question deserved a comprehensive answer. And they are entirely my opinion based on a couple of years with Roon going through lots of permutations.
The reason I asked was not because I didnât understand your statement. The reason I asked is because you, just like me, gave the OP advise to what you believe would be the better sounding solution to a computer based streaming setup. Thus rendering your reaction to my post obsolete.
Anyway the OP seems to be interested in upgrading his SQ and therefore posted a thread on this board. I simply gave my 2 cents about useful upgrades chasing the aforementioned goal.
I find it kind of amusing that in the professional world, a multichannel recording interface is plugged in to a powerful mac or PC based workstation via USB or some other higher bandwidth interface and job done. I donât think I have ever seen additional isolators etc being used nor even noticed people talking about them.
Increasingly these are starting to become standalone ethernet connected interfaces, but that has more to do with the evolving standards and bandwidth needs of high channel counts at high sample rates and as a better means of getting that data over the distance between point of capture to a DAW.
3 Likes
I am giggling yes. With audio cables yes, I think some think snake oil others like me definetly see a difference in a u d i o cables. SATA cable is a computer cable to make a drive or device work. Never heard of anything so silly. Iâm giggling.
2 Likes
Hi OP
Please donât fall for this snake oil bullshit.
Please learn how these technologies work and how data packets work in computing.
Itâs literally impossible for a Sata cable to change the quality of your audio
The only thing that matters is that the file correctly arrives to your dac which standard pc parts can do and there are standards
A u d i o cables are often worse and make things not work properly as they are not compatible
Absolute rubbish I donât know how they can legally sell this stuff itâs so easy to disprove
Anyone that says they can tell the difference is flat out lying and just placebo influenced
6 Likes
My reasoning behind my choices is I want a simple but quality set up. I have a DAC that does MQA, 768kHz, 512DSD and will upsample 44.1 and everything in between up to these limits but its not Room ready. using the Nucleus would allow me to put a SSD with all my music on it inside and stream music when I want as a backup. Reduce most of the electrical noise using a quality LPSU, JCat USB Regen and an Uptone USB adapter joining the JCat and DAC.
Anyone have a better idea or suggestion without end up with numerous more boxes or changing the DAC.
Iâm one of those people. There is nothing at all wrong with running a Nucleus direct via USB to a DAC.
Iâve also used Roon-Ready, Ethernet endpoints in my system, and the Nucleus-USB-DAC alternative has no functional or SQ drawbacks whatsoever.