Preferred PicorePlayer Build List?

[TrivQuad]

On the theory that everything matters, I'm after your recommendation as to the best sounding components. I built a PicorePlayer using a Raspberry Pi 2 B, Hifiberry Digi+ SPDIF card, Verbatim 8G Class 10 micro SD card, EW-7811Un wifi adapter, and an Apple iPad charger. I used the Ralphy Basic Version 1.22 software thinking that the less complicated the program the better.

It sounds pretty close to my Squeezebox Touch and has the benefit of playing higher resolution files. What should I upgrade to improve the sound? Inexpensive linear power supply likely is first on the list.

Apologies to those who reason that all hamburgers that have the same ingredients taste the same. I'm more a poet than engineer and am looking for thoughts from those who have experimented with different size/make of flash card, audio card, software program, etc.

Thanks all and Happy Holidays.

[Man in a van]

Well, for a start, the SBTouch with the EDO plugin will play the same high res files as the Digi+.

 

So you will be able to compare outputs on the co-ax and optical.

 

What is best, is determined by yourself , not others.

 

As the Digi+ is outputting into a dac, any change you make to the "front end" is most likely going to be less than changing the "back end".

 

My suggestion is to stick with what you have now, get to know how it sounds, read around a bit, and in a couple of months ask yourself what you really need to change to improve the sound quality.

 

I have eaten a few hamburgers (not so many, as perhaps other people) and think the difference is mostly in the relish.

 

Edit:

Using piCorePlayer restricts you to LMS (of which I'm a big fan and use all the time really), perhaps you should try Moode audio to see if there is a different flavour.

[master]

I'm having some really surprising (and even astounding) results with the Raspberry Pi.

 

For now I have only tried Moode Audio Player and really loving it.

 

I will be trying others like Volumio, RuneAudio, OSMC, and OpenELEC, but I am extremely pleased with the results of Moode Audio Player.

 

My speakers have completely disappeared, there is a little bit more detail, and the sound has smoothed out completely.

 

For the record: Using Raspberry Pi 2, Kingston microSD card 8 GB class 10, Seagate NAS, Chromecast Audio, and Blue Jeans Cable (Toslink). I have also swapped with a budget BlueRigger cable and did not find any difference. Don't use the internal DAC of the Chromecast Audio.

 

Though I have a preference for Schiit DAC, I have ordered the HiFiBerry DAC+ just to test it out in my setup. I plan to add another Raspberry Pi with the HiFiBerry DAC+ and a USB Wi-Fi dongle for a barebones streamer in the bedroom.