I have a Yamaha Amp with B & W 800’s powered with Macintosh MC462. The Yamaha claims to have built in DAC but always runs through airplay,
Should I buy a streamer endpoint that will play through Yamaha or will I end up needing a DAC too? I would buy a Necleus if it ended there but if I need a DAC too I might buy a combo DAC streamer. Is there a cheap option?
If goes with airplay than it has a dac. Airplay over wifi or ethernet? A streamer would be nice but how are you going to connect? (coax, toslink, HDMI…) Anyway you should find the specs of the Dac inside of Yamaha and match the connections between streamer and Yamaha.
(MP3 / WMA / MPEG-4 AAC, ALAC: up to 96 kHz / 24-bit, FLAC: up to 384 kHz / 24-bit, WAV / AIFF: up to 384 kHz / 32-bit, DSD: up to 11.2 MHz).
I have an Yamaha with network connection, all I can do from roon is airplay. I can use tidal from musicast app on a phone. I did research and I did not find any way other than airplay or streamer. Maybe a google chromecast with HDMI it will work and it is the cheapest option.
Hope to get better answers 
Airplay only plays 16/44 and I have most of my music in 24 bit. Airplay does sound good but I want my 24 bit lol. I hardwired my network and have a switch at the stereo end (now tv, blu ray, amp and apple tv all has hard connection).
Airplay for me works as the amp is used as background music for the living room. If I want better I have to go to musiccast app.
I do not know if it is stupid but: Apple TV has HDMI out? you plug that in to your tv? or in the Yamaha. Never used Apple TV but maybe you can use it for roon? but not same airplay. Maybe you have an old laptop to hard wire to the switch and use HDMI out if it has.
I do not know why on Yamaha site says that RX a8a has usb, maybe in the front panel? the usb is for media only?
You could get a pi with HDMI
Yamaha and roon I learnt the hard way do not go hand in hand
Apple TV is 16/44 as well. Down samples everything. It sound good but I want better.
I thought so 
I do not know about google chromecast but maybe same downsampling. Then an old laptop, a pi (maybe a used one), or a ifi zen stream or so and so on…
Let’s hope that someone else has a better idea
A DAC (digital-to-analog converter) doesn’t mean it’s Roon Ready. I think you’ll have a hard time finding any AV receiver by any brand that is Roon Ready (maybe NAD?). You’ll probably want/need a streamer with HDMI and/or SPDIF (coaxial/optical) output that is Roon Ready.
I think a Chromecast is the cheapest option, but it has limitations (less so than Apple TV). ROCK is a DIY solution. A Raspberry Pi is another DIY solution. My DIY solution is a mini pc with HDMI output (connected to my Yamaha AV preamplifier processor). Argon Audio SOLO and Bluesound Node 2i are the cheapest turnkey solutions I could find. I suggest you search for “Cheap Roon Endpoint” or “Roon Endpoint” on this forum.
If you want something budget, Raspberry Pi with an Allo Digione running Ropieeee and connecting to the Yamaha with Coax if you want to use Yamaha’s internal DAC. I have been using that with my Yamaha AV for a couple of years, and it works perfectly.
Yamaha has a few amps with a built in DAC all of which is not Roon Ready.
The A-S801 has a DAC which if you hook it up via USB from a PC, you can use it with Roon.
Yamaha has several amps with this abilty but the AVRs do not have this ability except for Airplay to use with Roon. None of the Yamaha amps can be used as stand alone endpoint (except for Airplay) and also are not Roon Ready or Certified.
–MD
Update - I remember that I once used a now discontinued Google Chromecast Audio as a Roon end point through my Yamaha AVR. Never was a fan of stereo thru a AVR receiver though and the surround was really not that great.
