Does External Streamer Offer Sonic Improvements?

[David A]

…Does the streaming capabilities of the Expert Pro offer the audio performance of say, an Aurender or Innuous at the high end, or Blue Sound Node at the lower end? …

The Expert Pro will give you whatever audio performance the device you connect to it can provide but the "streaming capabilities" are different. If the Expert Pro's streaming capabilities were the same as those of the devices you mention, there would be no need to use one of those devices. You would be able to have a Devialet app on your computer or mobile device which would enable you to access a range of streaming services of music on your own hard drives and route that music to your Devialet, you would need nothing but your Devialet and a Devialet app plus your streaming service subscriptions. The Expert Pro range can't do that, You need to use other party software on your computer, mobile device, or on a device such as one of those you listed, to access streaming services and your own hard drives and to pass music from them to your Expert Pro.

So, what's the best way to get music from a streaming service or hard drive to your Expert Pro? There's lots of ways to do it but I'd start by thinking about 2 things, what input you wish to use on the Expert Pro and what kind of system you want in your listening room. You can go from a minimalist system in the room to a very complex one. At the minimal end you can have just the Expert Pro and speakers. You can use the Expert Pro's wifi input so there really is nothing but the amp and speakers for the system in your room or you could use a wired ethernet connection to the Expert Pro so you'd have an ethernet cable from the amp to a wall point and in wall cabling from that wall point back to your router location. With either of those options you've got the choice of having your computer, your mobile device, or one of those devices you listed connected to your router and located in the same location as your router. If you go the wifi or ethernet route you also have the option of having your computer or other streaming device in the same room as the Expert Pro and you would connect it to your router also using either wifi or by connecting both the Expert Pro and streaming device to an ethernet switch which you then connect to your router.

If you don't want to use wifi or ethernet to the Expert Pro you can use any of the Expert Pro's other inputs but you are going to have to have another device near the Expert Pro so you can connect them to your Expert Pro using your chosen connection method. Whatever device you connect to the Expert Pro is going to need a network connection to your router so that it can access your chosen streaming service and also so you can control it from a laptop or mobile device if it doesn't have a control interface built into the device.

So, the first things you need to decide are what connection you want to use to your Expert Pro and whether you want to have whatever device you're using to access the streaming service in the same room as the Expert Pro or whether you want to have it located somewhere else in the house, probably close to your router.

The sound quality your Expert Pro can deliver can be affected by your choice of input so you need to decide what input you want to use on the Expert Pro. Once you know that, then you can start looking at the different devices you can use to send the signal to the Expert Pro and eliminate those devices which don't offer an output that matches your chosen input on the Expert Pro.

The next thing to consider is whether you can access your chosen streaming service or services using the devices with suitable outputs that are left on your list. You can access whatever streaming services you like via your computer, and also via your mobile device using either an app provided by the streaming service or using your internet browser. If you use a device like the Aurender, an nnuous, or the Node then you're limited to whatever streaming services the control interface for y our chosen device supports. Not all such devices support all streaming services and not all support the same streaming services, Your choice of streaming services also affects the options you have available.

Once you've decided on what Expert Pro input you're going to use and you've narrowed your options for what device you're going to use to those which can access the streaming services you want to use and which offer an output that can connect to your chosen input on the Expert Pro you can then start considering things such as which device is going to give you the best sound quality, whether you like the control interface or not (choose a device with an interface you like, an interface you don't like will annoy the hell out of you over time and reduce your listening pleasure), and then you can start looking at things like the price and whether you think it's good value for money for not.

If you want recommendations then I think you need to tell us what input you want to use on your Expert Pro, whether you want everything in the same room with the Expert Pro and speakers or whether you want as little as possible in the room with the Expert Pro and speakers and the other devices or you want them out of sight in another room, and finally how you want to control everything, whether that's going to be from a laptop or mobile device or whether you want a streaming device with it's own control interface such as a touch screen. You can get equally good results via all of those approaches but you're likely to get a lot of recommendations which won't meet your personal needs if you don't provide that information because different people prefer very different approaches to the way they stream music to their Expert Pro.