£200 streaming option beats all comers upto £5K

[Hifi_swlon]

My personal beliefs have changed somewhat over the past year or so and mostly I wonder why anyone would listen to a load of ‘random nutters’ that post on CA, often with crazed findings purely based on listening (or could just be delusional or made up of course).

That said from what little I know of NUCs, it was also Roons platform of choice for the Nucleus because they apparently felt it measured well - - among other things, like NUC engineers availability for detailed optimisation advice. As such it seems likely it can be optimised guided by those that designed it. It (Nucleus) apparently measures well. That said Allo - a company I respect for many reasons but also their transparency in sharing measurements - have said despite trying they can’t detect a difference at a DACs analogue output between DigiOne standard and signature, despite knowing the latter measures better. Yet they’re still convinced it makes a differences and plenty of their customers seem to agree with them. I guess Roon wrote their own custom OS (or customised OS at least) for similar reasons to the Linux you refer. So I suppose you could pretty easily try Roon rock too.

In my setup I find the differences between say AIR and DigiOne inaudible, so have decided tha - for me in my situation - it’s a pointless thing to chase and no longer worry about it. But I’d definitely try the nuc if I was going to investigate.

Can’t wait to read about your findings confused. The question is, if it betters everything out there will it be enough that you never need to think about the source again!

My priorities and beliefs have changed so much I’ll be very surprised if I find myself with a passive system far into 2018.

[Gerronwithit]

“Can’t wait to read about your findings confused. The question is, if it betters everything out there will it be enough that you never need to think about the source again!”

I am afraid that the source is everything but not necessarily in hardware terms. I only use Roon with Tidal for my source. If you have a decent modern recording from, for example from Father John Misty, Passenger, the remastered White Album or Leonard Cohen’s last work, the level of detail is tremendous compared to many 60s recordings by Cream or The Stones. If I have My Favourites playlist on random the difference in quality between tracks can be quite shocking. Obviously recording techniques and equipment have increased immeasurably over the years and resulted in stunning productions that deserve the best output equipment eg a 250Pro. ?

[Antoine]

Those of you who read my last post in my systems topic know I’ve been away for a while from the audio ‘scene’ but recently started checking up on the latest developments again. I believe I had to catch up on 250+ pages of posts on CA in my favorite topic on CA (the one Confused linked to) but over this past week I did.

As I trust Romaz, Austinpop and several others posting in that topic (I’ve tried more of the stuff discussed in that topic last year) I’ve joined the latest NUC craze and today ordered:

Ballistix DDR4 SODIMM Sport LT 1x4GB 2400
Intel Mini-PC Barebone NUC7PJYH (this is the Pentium one which is supposedly even better than the Celeron one from a SQ perspective)
Akasa Newton JC fanless case

And a simple&cheap USB stick: Kingston DataTraveler 50 32GB to boot Audiolinux from.

These specific NUC’s and case are pretty much sold out everywhere. Perhaps Intel has cancelled the product, don’t know. I found the NUC in one shop in NL. The Akasa I found on Amazon UK. The Brits here could order both from scan.co.uk which I almost did as well. They even have the Celeron NUC in stock.

My D250 is still in France but I will build the system in the mean time while waiting for it to return. No hurries.

The NUC will replace my SoTM SMS-200 which I fortunately did not upgrade yet to Ultra (Neo) specs yet. I will keep my current DIY music server and try out AudioLinux on it as well. It’ll be the Roon Server and the NUC will become the Roon endpoint. Both will be powered by my Hynes SR7 PSU.

Will look into DC power cables next. Could order some from Ghentaudio but these’ll take weeks to arrive so I’ll probably cook something up in the mean time.

The upcoming Uptone ‘ethernet regen’ as an isolating ethernet switch in between those systems seems to be an ideal setup but unfortunately it won’t be available until 02-2019 (at earliest). Perhaps this switch will negate the need for an optimized server in a 2 PC setup.

To be continued.

[Confused]

First to say that I am pleased to read that both @Sailor4W and @Antoine have taken an interest in this thread and are prepared to try the NUC AL solution.

@Hifi_swlon has posted in his usual style, but I would point out that there have been some occasions where the crazed findings of the random nutters have been shown to provide benefits and some of the crazed findings have been adopted by manufacturers. Of course, we could debate this endlessly, scoring points, "of course the manufacturers will adopt this stuff, they just want to sell snake oil to delusional audiophiles". Frankly, I do not see the point debating this here, it has been debated to death on other forums, and never reaches a conclusion. In case it matters, my view is somewhere in the middle, the "experimenters" on CA do sometimes come out with some unlikely results and theories, but sometimes they do stumble on some interesting findings. Personally, I would like to see a scenario where people are free to experiment and report findings without being shut down by subjectivists and trolls, I see such experimentation as having at least the possibility of the occasional discovery. When a consensus builds, say on AL NUCs, upstream clocking, or whatever else, I would like to see some properly controlled blind test sessions. If these blind test sessions provided results consistent with the results of the "observationalists", then let's see if the hardcore subjectivists can measure this stuff. Indeed, it is the last bit that I see as a problem. The industry does not appear to measure everything to the level that it can subjectively be observed, but the level that can subjectively be heard is also at the margins within the threshold of confirmation bias, expectation bias, and all the rest of it. I look forward to the day when we have significantly better measurement techniques, then we might get somewhere without the debate. Anyway, I seem to be posting the opening salvo of a debate, which is not my intention in this thread, if anyone really wants to continue with this one I would suggest we open a new thread, feel free to cut and paste my words above as an opening paragraph.

I am also a little puzzled by some of the "one box solution" comments. If you want a one box solution, that is fine with me, I respect that totally. In which case you can ignore this thread as being of no interest to you. I have seen a few system threads where very nice "minimalist" systems have been showcased, it would be a bit dull if we all started posting "you need more boxes", both approaches are valid, and with a Devialet Expert, you can take whatever approach suits you best. I did have a chuckle at some of the posts though, why post your support of one box solution when you run an external streamer and two LPSU's?

That said, I pretty much agree with every word in @Gerronwithit 's post #12. Although here I need to make one point of clarification, I am not planning to try an AL NUC myself. I have very little free time at the moment and I have no Linux experience, so I am just an interested observer at the moment, I'd love to try it but it would be too time-consuming for me, and I have other things on my "to do" list, plus I do like to leave some time to actually relax and enjoy my system. For the record though, I suspect I will always be interested in any reports of a new and improved source, but I will also always live with the frustration that much of the music I love is not particularly well recorded, it is what it is. As for my short term plans, when I get time I will have quite a lot to post on my own streaming thread. I am working through some changes to my system that are not related to the source, I will post in detail with respect to this when concluded. Enough to say now that what I think I need to get my own system to be something I can sit an listen to and enjoy the music without worrying about the system itself, is not actually related to fine-tuning the source.

I have actually written far more than I planned here, but what I really want to say is that I find the concept of a cheap NUC running some relatively new software and getting (reportedly) great results as being rather compelling. If you happen to have a decent LPSU to hand, this is something with giant-killing prospects for maybe £200, this is less cash than many spend on USB cables. If you can't see why this is of interest, then this thread is not for you. Meanwhile, I shall be following developments with interest. If it is of no interest to you, that's fine with me, but if you are interested, or better still able to report after you have tried an AL NUC with a Devialet, I will be fascinated to hear your findings.

[Hifi_swlon]

Anyone that really wants to try a NUC could buy one and install Roon ROCK. Seems to have a following that think it’s good and I can’t imagine Roon guys writing a custom OS that wasn’t optimised for music. Simple setup, just add usb cable.

And usb regenerator
And galvanic isolator
And linear PSU
Or two

I’m actually pretty open-minded but with a healthy dose of scepriscm, especially where well understood and scientifically proven human traits are at stake. That and many of those CA pioneers just never seem satisfied - in a few months the NUC will be boring and dull and something else will sound ‘nearly real’. You have to wonder why things always end up sounding somewhat disappointing in the end, after a little time.

I think a genuine part of the issue is long-term satisfaction and happinesses, and that’s a tricky thing for many of us to pin down. This is also fairly well studied. I don’t think any of those CA guys will ever find it, they’ll always be trying to better what they have.

I’ll still read the experiments with interest.

[octaviars]

Anyone that really wants to try a NUC could buy one and install Roon ROCK. Seems to have a following that think it’s good and I can’t imagine Roon guys writing a custom OS that wasn’t optimised for music. Simple setup, just add usb cable. 

And usb regenerator
And galvanic isolator 
And linear PSU
Or two 

I run a NUC with Roon ROCK and have tried to run usb directly to my dac and to me it does not sound as good as my SOtM sMS-200ultra/tX-USBultra driven with two Paul Hynes PSU.

[Antoine]

The devil is in the details. I wouldn’t generalize. What they’ve tested with is the combination of certain 7th gen NUCs, diskless (when it’s used as an endpoint), Audiolinux fully loaded in RAM and the best possible LPSU preferably the SR7 DR. Though good, but lesser, results have been reported for the LPS1.2 and SR4. Thus far the NUC7CJYH/NUC7PJYH (low power) and NUC7i7DNHE as a higher powered option have been tested by those in the “inner circle”.

There’s more details but these can be read in that topic. Consensus is building, many are currently testing and experimenting and reporting back.

Intermediate update from my side; I picked up my NUC7PJYH NUC (and RAM, USB stick) on Sunday and bricked it several hours later. So currently waiting for a replacement unit. Details: https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forum...ent=901738

[Antoine]

See also: https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forum...ent=902212

[baconbrain]

I’m actually pretty open-minded but with a healthy dose of scepriscm, especially where well understood and scientifically proven human traits are at stake. That and many of those CA pioneers just never seem satisfied - in a few months the NUC will be boring and dull and something else will sound ‘nearly real’. You have to wonder why things always end up sounding somewhat disappointing in the end, after a little time.

I think a genuine part of the issue is long-term satisfaction and happinesses, and that’s a tricky thing for many of us to pin down. This is also fairly well studied. I don’t think any of those CA guys will ever find it, they’ll always be trying to better what they have.

I’ll still read the experiments with interest.

Well stated and something which I am also trying to become more self aware of. Not that I am being critical of experimenting, but getting a bit tired of chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Really wanting to focus more on the music and less on the technology. Let’s see how this experiment turns out ...

[TheFactsOfLife]

I put together an Intel Nuc with the lattest I7, top notch ram, set up poon and boy did it make a difference, next i brought the SBooster psu, brilliant.
This has been inconstant daily use since install, got better over time, the last edition to the pile was a PS Audio PP5 regenerator, fist running the front end then after a week or so evaluating plugged the 2 LE 200's in, i wasn't expexting much but i couldn't believe what i was hearing.
To put it to the test i invited fellow audio friends around on different times who all asked what was different, the hifi is in a small room nex to my listening room. They all agreed the differnce in sound for the better.
The most important thing is i can now listen to the Beonicks loud with no distrortion, bass bottoming, shrill top end, it's stoppedme looking for new speakers.