Core Infinity board

[Hifi_swlon]

I have shamelessly stolen this recent quote from 'barrows' on Computer Audiophile from the 'Sonore Signature Rendu SE' thread.  For those that may not know, 'barrows' works for Sonore.

"There is nothing wrong with USB when does right, in both sender and receiver.
But, I do believe that the future will be direct ethernet input DACs.  Right now it appears that only Linn and Merging are doing that very well, other DACs with Ethernet inputs appear to be compromised on their Ethernet inputs (probably using poor Ethernet input boards from relatively affordable sources, 192 only, etc...)

What occurs to me is that the new Devialet OS Core Infinity Streamer board may well off just this, although the question remains if they will do it 'very well' or not.  Some reason for optimism I would say?

I guess it's obvious they have the technical ability to design and build complex electronics well, (I'm primarily basing this on the expert Pros and the technology they invented). They were well ahead of the pack in terms of Ethernet streaming - even the concept of AIR - but were hampered by AIRs implementation followed by what seems like a 'car crash' of QA, support, bug fixing and plan for resolution.

So I guess a lot of it depends on their commitment. If they see it as a window into Qobuz etc, rather than a state of the art, flagship, competition slaying interface, probably not. If the latter is their goal, and they've upped their software division in terms of skills and resources, and there's a full desire from senior management and investors to make it a 'best in class product', I'm sure it's possible.

Because other brands at least say something about what they're up to (the Merging QA on Computer Audiophile as an example) you get the sense that those brands are really on top of the technology. Since we dont hear anything but fluff about it from Devialet - with practically zero mention of technology - my hunch is it will be as good as the current solution, with much more useable/accessible features, but that perhaps Devialet aren't getting into all the nitty gritty of extracting 'the last 10%' from it.

I'd love it to be a class leader, and them reveal some staggering new tech that everyone raves about, but despite my enthusiasm I just don't think will happen. That said all I really cared about personally was RoonReady and since it seems like that's coming, I'm done. The differences between AIR, the microrendu, and the Allo digiOne are so small to be practically non existent in my setup so I'm not sure I'd really even detect much improvement. But if it had a good Room Correction setup for example, that would have way more obvious and audible benefit to me personally.

I guess whatever happens it will be clear where Devialet stand in terms of pushing boundaries with Expert, and whether the AIR fiasco was simply a one-off and caused by their time being diverted towards expansion/investment. If it's hailed as the best there is we can all relax and know they've taken the problems of the past on board, addressed them, and come out fighting. If it's a bit half-arsed, or even just unimproved by the standards of those here who extract the extra from Mutecs etc, then we'll know what that means too...

I'll actually just be happy if it launches on time, they have slots to fit it straight away, and the unit comes back sounding (and looking) as good or better than when it left. And that all the software related things are stable.

As a side note, I would have liked to see some sort of forum that was promised, because no matter their intentions there will be some bugs/issues, and right now they have no proper mechanism other than every individual contacting support and then sitting in silence wondering if things will get fixed (hence the 'dark' AIR years for me). For a more technically advanced product, the support/community backend has to match.

And yet jumping on the barrows quote, 'only' 192 is pretty much all us Devialet users can have anyway, so in that sense if this is seen as a meaningful obstacle to having a good implementation, were already doomed unless the 'tweaks' to the mainboard are actually them swapping the whole lot out for next gen DSDx10 technology.