Mac AIR v MiND 180 v Auralic ARIES v totaldac d1 server

[PhilP]

New and interesting information just arrived on the French forum regarding how Air works. I am not sure I understood everything but apparently, the computer would only decompress the files (into wave format) but all the decoding to the audio flux and transfer of the audio flux is managed by the Devialet and its clock. This information is said to be coming directly from Devialet support.
It is getting more and more interesting and confusing at the same time to really understand what is going on but if this is true, any external server like Totaldac would have in theory not a lot of interest on top of the Devialet. But so many people find the solution Totaldac server better than Air...
I guess the discussion is not over on this subject but let's hope we can learn more about it.
That is a good question for the Guilford Audio Workshop on October 11th & 12th 2014...
regards
philoouu

That is very interesting information - thanks for posting it.

I think the Totaldac server is still very interesting when you want to use a streamer rather than a PC/Mac as the source and you want to link from that streamer to the Devialet via AES/EBU or USB.

If you want to stream from a PC/Mac via ethernet or wifi then AIR is the best (only?) choice currently. The interesting question then is which software player sounds best or because of the way AIR works do they all sound the same?

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...the computer would only decompress the files (into wave format) but all the decoding to the audio flux and transfer of the audio flux is managed by the Devialet and its clock.

That's what I was trying (failing?) to express in my posts 57 and 64 earlier in this thread. Good to have it confirmed, though.

Thumb,

I understood what you meant and agreed with you. I think the thread got a little confusing as posts alternated between comments on the totaldac and comments on AIR (and it was getting late...).

Regards,

Philip