Aurender X100 with Devialet

[amabrok]

does anybody use or have experience with the Aurender X100 as source for Devialet ? If you are an owner or user, I'd be grateful to hear what you think of your Aurender..... thanks

Hi Krass

I use Aurender X100L 8TB with D200 and it is just superb! Sound quality is top notch and you get to hear all the fine details to the very last bit. The Aurender shines even more when it plays high resolution files (24 bit / 44.1 KHz or more up to 192). This is best source I have heard /tried to date.

And mind you, not only does the Aurender replaces your computer it also replaces your NAS and all the associated potential issues of streaming.

But where the Aurender really outperforms all competition is its ease of use, flawless execution and brilliant app (currently for ipad and Android, iPhone version is still in the making) this is by far the best app I have used. It is smart, reliable and just works.

I am really glad I made this investment!

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does anybody use or have experience with the Aurender X100 as source for Devialet ? If you are an owner or user, I'd be grateful to hear what you think of your Aurender..... thanks

I'm also interested.. I'm thinking that I'd like a solution that doesn't involve having to use my computer (other side of the house) I'm pretty spoiled with Sonos, just plop down in front of the system hit the Sonos app and music plays... The Bryston piece is also interesting..

Krass and ErikM

Check this thread on the forum Auralic Aries vs Aurender X100

http://devialetchat.com/showthread.php?tid=454

It has good discussion and also my first impression on the Aurender X100L

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Do the Aurenders have integration of streaming services like Spotify and/or Qobuz?

Hi Rob35

I checked with Eric from TVLogic (the maker of Aurender) and they are working on Tidal integration towards the end of the year or early next year. No plans for qobuz as yet

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The Aurender is up and running but I have unfortunately had very little time to enjoy it. That said, I am posting some early observations -

1 - The app is top notch. Great UI, easy to use and well thought out. Nice search functionality. Better than any ipad remote/mac/jriver/etc for me.

2 - Library transition from USB drive was easy. Roughly 5 hours per TB.

3 - Build quality is great. Personally, I never really liked seeing a mac mini on my audio rack. You can select what you want to see on the display - song info/meters/ or nothing. The meters are a little cheesy imo.

4 - Reviews that refer to black background are accurate. To my ears, the Aurender does a better job than the Mac. It is more quiet

5 - Source matters - Isn't this always true? The Aurender comes with source material of varying quality for a reason. You can clearly hear the difference. I found it to be more critical of lesser source material than the mac. I need to spend more time here.

6 - The Berkeley and the Aurender did not get along. I have sent an email to Berkeley to understand why but think it may be the difference between a selectable computer interface and the Aurender. The dealer felt strongly about not using it but I am hoping to get it to work. I really liked the Audirvana/Berkeley Alpha combo and preferred it to air/ethernet.

I have not done any extensive AB listening so please excuse the lack of comparison. Based on what I have heard so far, the Aurender is here to stay.

@adstew

I agree with all your points apart from point 6 which does not apply to my case

However for point 2 ,I'd rather suggest transferring your library via ethernet connection as it is faster. The Aurender appears on your network as a NAS. So it is simply a matter of drag and drop or copy and paste

[amabrok]

Will Aurender iPad app allow user to rename folders (genre) or does user have to change their thousands of titles to those lame default folder choices built into Aurender app?

Does Aurender iPad app permit rotation, or is user locked into the horizontal view?

Thank you

Hi Geoff

Renaming folders is as easy as renaming them in Finder (Mac) or File Explorer (Windows). Your aurender appears as a NAS and regular folder management apply to it. So go to your file management application on your computer and rename or create as many as folders you want. All changes will be reflected in your iPad app.

For iPad yes you are stuck in the horizontal view. If you own an Android device, the app there is in portrait view


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[krass]

Will Aurender iPad app allow user to rename folders (genre) or does user have to change their thousands of titles to those lame default folder choices built into Aurender app?

neither... the iPad app is not used in anyway to @change@ the folder organisation on the Aurender. The App @uses@ the folder organisation as a 2nd row of presets within the App (first row is the traditional artist, album, genre etc). The 2nd row can be whatever you want; for example if you want it to say "Geoffs music" and "mikes music" then you can; it doesn't have to be genre, but it can, if you wish.

This 2nd row is created by the Aurender according to the sub-folders that you create on the Aurender hard drive. In the example above, just create a folder structure:

/music 1/Geoffs music
/music 1/mikes music

and you're done.
Of course you then should put Geoffs music files into one folder, and mikes music into the other.

Finding a way to do this automatically is probably the most complex part if you have thousands of tracks organized in a different way. I use a couple of cheap metadata apps on my main computer to do this for me, and I then synchronize to the Aurender hard drives automatically using Carbon Copy Cloner - an rsync derivative).

Does Aurender iPad app permit rotation, or is user locked into the horizontal view?

it's only horizontal from my experience.

[MusicLover]

Hi,

I recently received my X100 which substitutes a, now apparent, rather mediocre software optimised laptop. I'm posting my initial thoughts on the newcomer for those interested.

First impression is a sense of a more mature sound. It's fuller, more natural, real and engaging. No doubt, it draws you more into the music.

For Jeff Fritz the X100 only improved, albeit greatly, certain types of music; small ensembles mainly. My experience on the other hand differs, maybe because I come from a lesser source and hence I feel the improvement in all areas.
I listen to a great deal of classical, and complex passages have become an absolute pleasure to listen to (see Wagner or Bruckner). Likewise, piano works performed, for instance, by the great Brendel or Pollini, now convey much more faithfully the caracter of these performers and I would even venture to say, the caracter of the piano itself.
It's also the sense of space in the soundstage that now feels so real (depth in particular, as pointed out by fellow member Adam).

Moreover, it is now also easier to discern better recordings, and while it's true that the Aurender shines with high-res material such as Doug MacLeod or Xiomara Laugart recordings, which are absolutely jaw dropping, the unit improves noticeably also on regular redbook resolution.

As the niche of servers and streamers evolves so quickly and there is so limited info/home demo availability on certain models, I hope someone can benefit from my (limited) experience.

To sum up, I cannot stress enough the benefit of the Totaldac USB cable, or better to say, its filter. It is a definite must if you are planning your system around the USB input.

Happy listenings,


ML

[Confused]

An interesting post MusicLover. To be clear on the comparison above, were you running your laptop via USB or Ethernet. And if USB, was this with the same Totaldac USB cable?

I wonder what the Aurender W20 sounds like! Although to spend W20 money on a product in a category that is evolving so fast would be for the very brave or very wealthy.

[GuillaumeB]

Nice post MusicLover. Heartfelt and sincere. The Devialet really benefits from a decent transport.  No doubt about that.

Guillaume

[MusicLover]

An interesting post MusicLover.  To be clear on the comparison above, were you running your laptop via USB or Ethernet.  And if USB, was this with the same Totaldac USB cable?

I wonder what the Aurender W20 sounds like!  Although to spend W20 money on a product in a category that is evolving so fast would be for the very brave or very wealthy.

Hi Confused,

I was running my laptop with the Totaldac USB cable also. As I undersand, and given its popularity (also though AIR), the ethernet connection it's probably a much better option (from a regular computer at least).

For the sake of curiosity I'd also like to know how the W20 sounds, with its ocxo master clock and battery power..., although to be honest, if you can spend that amount on a digital server you can probably afford at least part of the dCS Vivaldi stack   And that is really THE real deal in digital audio. Soulution knows a thing or two too!

[MusicLover]

Nice post MusicLover. Heartfelt and sincere. The Devialet really benefits from a decent transport.  No doubt about that.

Guillaume

Thank you Guillaume!

Glad you guys find it nice reading. Definitely, I can now attest to the fact that the USB input in the Devialet is pretty decent! (having heard the Bricasti and several dCS dacs around). Next thing in my system is the power cabling and ground boxes, but as they say here in Italy, piano piano... now giving myself the time to rediscover my collection and enjoy this huge new improvement 


ML

[MusicLover]

"I recently received my X100 which substitutes a, now apparent, rather mediocre software optimised laptop. I'm posting my initial thoughts on the newcomer for those interested. First impression is a sense of a more mature sound. It's fuller, more natural, real and engaging. No doubt, it draws you more into the music.

For Jeff Fritz the X100 only improved, albeit greatly, certain types of music; small ensembles mainly. My experience on the other hand differs, maybe because I come from a lesser source and hence I feel the improvement in all areas.
I listen to a great deal of classical, and complex passages have become an absolute pleasure to listen to (see Wagner or Bruckner). Likewise, piano works performed, for instance, by the great Brendel or Pollini, now convey much more faithfully the caracter of these performers and I would even venture to say, the character of the piano itself. It's also the sense of space in the soundstage that now feels so real (depth in particular, as pointed out by fellow member Adam).

Moreover, it is now also easier to discern better recordings, and while it's true that the Aurender shines with high-res material such as Doug MacLeod or Xiomara Laugart recordings, which are absolutely jaw dropping, the unit improves noticeably also on regular redbook resolution.

As the niche of servers and streamers evolves so quickly and there is so limited info/home demo availability on certain models, I hope someone can benefit from my (limited) experience."

  I appreciate your post about X100. I sold my Lumin A1 Network Player last year and have been looking for another source. Health and financial issues forced a move to smaller living space and rather not have NAS in my small space. The DAR audio website will be reviewing X100 in April. I've read all previous reviews about the X100. The new N100 with linear power supply and adding largest SSD could be interesting, as if I'm not mistaken, could be used without a NAS if ones library does not exceed the on-board SSD storage space, and of course if one will use the N100 with a NAS, that's what its's designed for. Before I heard about N100, I thought how nice would it be to have twin SSD's in the X100 (besides the caching SSD)?

 What no one will answer for me is, can user hear any HDD noise emitting from the X100 when listening to music?  The Polish reviewer commented to effect that the X100 shared some sound quality similarities with the Lumin Network player. This is good and not so good speaking from experience with the Lumin (A1).

Hi Geoff,

Absolutely no noise from the HDDs as they don't operate when listening to the music, only the SSD does. And even when they cache the content or when you copy files into them they are super quiet. And I sit less than 2 mts from it (hopefully it's not my deficient hearing tricking me!   ).
The X100 feels and behaves as a high end piece. Only thing so far I have noticed that may be improved is the feeling of the front buttons on your finger when pressed (only to switch the unit ON/OFF really). Rather pedantic, isn't it? Different story if I was paying 20000 eur for it...

I also though about the new power supply on the N100 (linear, as they've got enough space now). But as long as the implementation is well judged and executed (see Devialet), a switching type can also sound properly, as the X100 shows.

Cheers,



ML

[kenreau]

Will Aurender iPad app allow user to rename folders (genre) or does user have to change their thousands of titles to those lame default folder choices built into Aurender app?

neither... the iPad app is not used in anyway to  @change@ the folder organisation on the Aurender. The App @uses@ the folder organisation as a 2nd row of presets within the App (first row is the traditional artist, album, genre etc). The 2nd row can be whatever you want; for example if you want it to say "Geoffs music" and "mikes music" then you can; it doesn't have to be genre, but it can, if you wish.

Finding a way to do this automatically is probably the most complex part if you have thousands of tracks organized in a different way. I use a couple of cheap metadata apps on my main computer to do this for me, and I then synchronize to the Aurender hard drives automatically using Carbon Copy Cloner - an rsync derivative).


Hi krass,

I recently picked up an Aurender S-10 and have discovered while importing my music library to it, I need to perform some music files metadata clean up.  I had the same general questions as above, around how to do these edits once the files are on the Aureneder HD.  Thanks for sharing that info. of thinking of it like a NAS drive.

Could you also share what metadata apps you use to scrub & edit your music files?  I can use either a Windows (by bootcamp) or mac OS.  I tried Bliss briefly until I learned it does not do AIF.  I had used TuneUp a few years ago until moving on to JRMC and Windows.  It doen't do WAV files.  I could try TuneUP again, but I would need to install iTunes again and I was resisting doing that as I suspect it caused the majority of metadata issues I've experienced.   I have approx 40K music files with a mix of 85% AIF, 10% FLAC, DSF and maybe 5% MP3, WAV. 

Thansk
Kenreau