I’m looking for a small digital out streamer under $1k.
The Holo Audio Red looks like a great option - I can pair it with a Topping D50 III DAC to add PEQ. Can anyone describe the Roon integration, especially drawbacks?
An Eversolo DMP-A6 is another great option. Although I’ve heard you can’t Roon stream @ 768khz. It also has a PEQ, but I don’t know which inputs and outputs the PEQ works with - can someone describe its limitations?
Any I’m missing?
Use case is a desktop solution to stream music to my headphones, as a sibling source for a CD transport. I want a PEQ and tube amp included in the setup, but for now I’m only asking about a streamer.
Any Roon streamer works, essentially, the same way and provides the same functionality. At least to Roon. So, you will want to look to match output interface and rates. The other stuff is kind of unrelated to Roon.
Of course, you’ll find endless discussion about how each streamer sounds but you didn’t ask that
I like DIY projects. But what parts to buy and what are the tradeoffs? Then fight through the noise of people telling me one thing is important and another thing doesn’t matter. And if I think something is important, how do I measure it? Etc.
I’ll consider it though. What are the pi options? ropiee and hifiberry?
I’ve been looking at the modules and I don’t see one that does audio over USB. Audio over SPDIF is common, but some of them are over i2s under the hood. That strikes me as odd. Is the Pi able to pipe sound over the onboard USB? What are the tradeoffs?
Pi usb audio is out of any of its usb ports to a DAC with USB input . No need for external board. Spdif requires an external board.
If you want to use an external CD player then you need a streamer that supports Roon Ready over the network and has an SPDif in for your CD player. If you want DSP for all sources then look at the MiniDSP range of streamers as they also have Dirac Live but they are limited to 96/24 to apply DSP.
The Eversolo DSP options are limited and it has to downsample to 48/24 to apply any DSP to an incoming source and it’s limited on inputs on the A6 not sure about the A8 which has hardware DSP but still has the 48/24 limited to apply DSP.
But if you want to have high res PCM upto 768 then you’re not going to get a device that would handle that and have DSP inbuilt.
You have to make a decision as to what’s more important to you.
The RoPieee web site has notes on pi model selection and memory requirements. If you use a DAC incorporated on a pi hat you probably want to choose the DAC hat first, then the pi model. Some DAC hats require more specific pi specs.
I have used DietPi and RoPieee as operating systems. Both work fine. I use RoPieee as first choice. I used DietPi when I had a Allo Piano2.1 DAC hat because RoPieee did not make changing the Piano 2.1 output config easy, but with other hats RoPieee was great and easy to set up. RoPiee has options for easily adding a display screen and a hand held remote. As far as DAC hats, I think Allo and HiFi Berry make some of the nicer products. I mounted a Ropieee with a display screen in my small kitchen with a sound bar and it looks and works great. I can do some control functions without touching my phone pr PC.
In your budget not much if you want the device capable of performing DSP. You have the Wiim range of devices but you only get spdif optical as an input and max 192/24. Eversolo A6 but as mentioned using its DSP it will downsample to 48/24 and not sure you can set it per input so it may be on/off for all inputs. Wiim you can select which inputs have DSP. If you want play music higher than 192/24 and have DSP you need to use Roons DSP and have server capable of processing at higher sample rates as well as a streamer that plays back higher but you can’t us this for the CD. At your price not much goes higher than 384/24. You would need to go with a separate dac and source. I use a pi and my RME ADi 2 dac to apply DSP to my CD and use Roon to apply DSP when streaming.
Other options are MiniDSP SHD but again max is 96/24 with DSP active. Also Blusound announced their new Node will have Dirac but this is also limited to 192/24 you cannot have your cake and eat it. DSP hardware is expensive and is always capped to make it easier to do and keep costs down. Software DSP is more flexible but means you can’t always use it for all sources easily. There is a way to get your CD player into Roon and use it’s DSP but it’s not simple or elegant and requires an external device to do so.
Thanks for explaining all that. I never took the time to truly understand before. 24/192 is more than enough. I took time to poke around my music catalogue and couldn’t find anything over 24/96 anyway. This is great. I feel like I’m exiting some temporary madness lol.
Then wait for the new Blusound nodes to come out the top two both have Dirac and inputs. Or look at the Wiim range as long as your CD player has optical these are a good choice for the budget conscious. The ultra even has a phono stage in it.
