Albrecht

(corrected Ruse)

Hiya, I am still running that beautiful APL Denon with a digital coax input & the wonderful H-Attenuator directly into my BC power amp and I've heard nothing that is clearly better. I agree with all that you've said and found that it bettered, or I preferred in my system it to all comers: even DACs that are much more expensive would make me say, - "really, - i don't think so!" Another great benefit that folks seem to rarely mention is the ability to compare directly and immediately digital file player audio via the digital input and CDs. Although I've been working on the digital file player side for years, - the APL helped me immensely to compare what I was doing on the digital file player side to help me improve it, and keep me on the right track in knowing what is "right" for me, - playing back digital files. I have also had the great pleasure of visiting Alex numerous times and hearing vs iterations of his speakers, amplifiers and of course, - Universal players. I really miss those great chats, and Alex as a friend & teacher, - explaining to me what he was doing, and why he was doing it! I so wish that I could move to the south of France and then zip over to Rune and get me one of these new DACs.

Hi Superdad. thanks for the correction..... EEeek. - the world has moved on since i last looked at the Aries (earlier version)? Which was essentially a typical Intel mainboard... The G2 is decidedly NOT an off the shelf PC mainboard. Thanks for the pic and correction... Cheers,

Hi, Congrats on your new DAC purchase. Depending on the rest of your system, - it sounds like you're going to get some really great sound going. From my knowledge/experience, - i think that one should do their best to get their streaming device commensurate with the rest of their analog system. This is still all about hardware, and Razberri Pi type devices don't have the capability of performing to nearly the same standard: as good as they are. (I do feel that the Razberri Pi type devices punch far above their weight, and perform quite well for what they are and how much they cost. But they do not belong in a high performance system). In my opinion, - for your great new DAC, - I would recommend looking into the products by Sonore, SoTM, etc. Again, IMO, you're going to be limiting the great performance of your Holo, and will not "get the best out of the DAC" without a high performance streamer, - and making sure that your HQPlayer PC is nowhere near your audio rack.

Hi, Sounds like you have a great system that I'd love to hear...... I disagree that the Aries is equal in sound quality. IMO, - and it's somewhat clear from the mainboards, - that Aurilic uses off the shelf computer mainboards that as one knows, are significantly inferior. Aurilic has spent millions developing their software, to the detriment of not paying good attention to hardware: which is by far the most important part of any of this. Something like the Sonore, with it's SonicOrbiter OS Swiss Army knife allows you to flip between several different server software in literally seconds. Yes, Aurilic runs Roon, and you can get LMS to go on the Aries via LMS plugins... etc. But it's not nearly as elegant as SonicOrbiter. WIth your EMMLabs gear, - I sure would want to be able make clear comparisons between different methodologies. Of course, - with your system, - my strident recommendation is to do a home eval. And at the price points, - I definitely would add the DCS Network Bridge as another test case. The Aurilic build quality IS questionable IMO, - AND, - there IS an appreciable difference in SQ, - AND, - the Aurilic is LESS Versatile.... Cheers,

Hi, I always advocate sticking with a commensurate digital file player solution as your analog system. IMO, - you are not going to get "better sound" by plugging in "cheaper" digital hardware and get "better sound" than your analog side. Hardware is by far the most important thing... I recommend getting two (one for each system) $125 Razberri Pi with DigiOne boards and then Downloading LMS onto your iMAC which you make sure that you run far away from your audio rack in another room in your house. The products made by Sonore and SoTM perform significantly better, - and they benefit again from a good $450+ (the going rate) for LPSs. But the LPS isn't a requirement, - they sound better than a Razberri Pi without a meanwell PS. But with your DAC(s) I recommend using coax SPDIF. LMS gives you better sound than ROON, and still gives you that (shite) service Tidal if you want it: more importantly, - LMS is free. PS>I bought a TeraDak $125 9v LPS on EBay and still use it as a "feeder" supply for the Uptone LPS. I didn't notice much of a difference in my main system with my old microRendu (that i no longer have) between the TeraDak and the LPS-1. Cheers ,

So sad... FWIW, one of my fav bands of all time... and such an influence on so many.... Only 73, - this is just another tragedy in a year of a tragedies....

Please don't sell yourself short. IMO, - I don't think that your question is dumb at all. I am very curious about your question, and find it very interesting... Nice system by the way. Is it your intention to replace the Bricasti streamer? Please, report back on the details of your NB once installed...... Thanks,

Really appreciate those comments. I come from "the industry" and my experiences as well as my fellow songwriters makes me sensitive to the exploitation of the majors; wherein, - it's the very tiny minority who are not exploited. I see this perspective as somewhat indistibutable, from MC Hammer, Madonna, Courtney Love, Frank Zappa, Elvis Costello, Robert Fripp, Joe Strummer etc. Besides the two (types) of citations above, - I am closely connected & associated with the Counting Crows, Cake, and Camper Van Beethoven. Some of the tales border on the comically absurd.... But hey, - you are ultimately correct, - we need current stats. When we released our first CD, we got 17 points split between two songwriters which brought me close to $1.25 per every CD sold. And that was back in the day when it still cost the labels nearly $3.25 to manufacture each CD, - all told. Later, (in the early 2000s), - large CD runs & cuts in recording and publicity went down below $1. As for Portishead, Adrian didn't sell his rights. Portishead had "reformed" and were considered a "working band." Yeah, - it would be interesting to see how much Radiohead are making right now. I would love to know to, for the sake of comparison, how much Beyoncé is making as opposed to commeasurate acts from late 90s. I remember hearing about Elvis Costello getting dropped by his label. Unbelievable.

Hi, Thanks for your comments. I could be wrong as well, - and I too would like to see some stats. I would be particularly interested in knowing how many artists out there have more than 50 or songs generating significant streaming revenue. The old model, - (when I was playing), - was that the live shows/tours supported record/CD sales and lost tons of money. Now, - "groups" artists have to make money off of touring because they loose so much money by selling downloads. Again, - more stats are needed, but there is testimonial after testimonial of artists like Adrian Utley of Portishead where he stated that their latest recorded got more than a million + plays and he received all of $43 for that... The Tidal model seems to me really mirror the Netflix model of eliminating music that doesn't have a certain level of popularity: this homogenizes everything. But to your point, - I would need to present some statistics to support the above. It would be very interesting to know how many "working bands" are out there these days, and how many of those achieve sustainable incomes and enough compensation to make multi-song "albums" on a regular basis. Cheers,

I hear you on your OP. I agree and lament the loss of CDs. I also lament the loss of all the new music. I am (i guess i have to now say) a former songwriter/musician/producer who made music from mid 80s through about 2007. This was the end of the CD era, - destroyed by the greed of the Recording Industry, and their desire to get every 1/2 penny from everyone. This ended up killing creativity, and diminishing the amount of music. Plus, and even more insidious, - it completely ruined the ability of artists to invest the time to make new, good music: (recognizing the terms "new" and "good" are somewhat relative). My main point to make is that there are many reasons, (some more significant than others), that have put this "state of the music recorded event" in the terrible state that it is in. No one can make a "fair wage" from being a full-time artist anymore, and that is really sad, - as the talent is still there, - but unfortunately, the hard-work of REFINING that talent is dead as we live in this "one hit song for $.99 or $12 a month streaming" world. My answer is to grab my fav nostalgia and pick up re-mastered recordings of early 90s to mid 2000s CDs where I can. Listen to French and International radio on the Internet for music that I like, and then try to buy the CDs on Amazon. And, go to BandCamp and download FLAC when there are no CDs.

Hiya.... Thanks again for another great post/explanation. In a past life I designed, set up, and installed network rendering systems for LucasArts/Lucasfilm to recruit 100s of PCs to render "skins" for 3D vertices in 3Dstudio Max, Lightwave, and 3 day character animations in Softimage. One of the things that I found in those early days was to have both a high performance network, - (lame compared to today), - plus as fast processors as possible, - plus high quality individual components in those PCs, and Silicon Graphics boxes. Always better to buy high quality power supplies and chip fans in machines that were running 24-7. A $3 processor fan meant a locked up machine and possibly a missed deadline. What I'm saying is that in many high performance machines: sometimes they get the added benefit of less noise? In the chip fan/power supply example: the machines were quieter with more expensive fans. Of course, - economies of scale with luxury goods high-performance audio, (on the analog side), - is way different than the costs of the parts for networking/computing: Yet, high SOME high performance (especially computers), are crazy expensive as well. Plus, - how many $30,000 DACs is Ed Meitner going to sell in a year? And Ed Meitner's dealer accommodation is at least 40% and if he sells one to a reviewer it will likely be 50% to 60% discount. Plus, - each internal component cannot be discounted by buying in bulk. And even though he may sell 1 or 2 a year, - he's got to make at least 4 or 5 prototypes, again buying a pile of parts to experiment with... So someone like EMM Labs has to make money on their cheaper, - lesser performing products that have trickled down from the attention getter, - that they've made (likely) nothing on. It is likely that you know all of this, and I apologize if I'm being obvious, and/or repeating something that you already know.... I am just saying that getting to high performance computer and networking design has it's significant differences in pricing, at the end of the day, - in the computing industry, - the ubiquitousness, plus use in other areas is still cheaper and garners savings by mass production. A Cisco 6509, 2960, a TP-Link 5 port gigabit, Melco, & etherRegen are all switches. But for their applications, some are BETTER than others. I hear you though and trust your wise approach as (especially on the networking side) your fiber implementations (although may be designed for performance) also reduce noise significantly. To me it doesn't matter that you may be both objectivist or subjectivist in your approach, - I call what you are doing GOOD SCIENCE.

Do you think that it could be worth exploring whether or not the comments are objective or subjective? Sometimes there are comments made that cite a certain measurement, - (jitter level), - being similar to another (more expensive) device and therefore the SUBJECTIVE CONCLUSION is that component B CANNOT sound better and is snake oil. So a comment like that could be considered both objective and subjective. (Keeping the whole question about what is good science or bad science out of this).

Thanks for your comment jabbr. I almost always appreciate your posts, and reasoning ability: not to mention your experimentation, and also sharing it on these forums. Setting aside the humor/sarcasm here; I can seriously ask, what is wrong with that? Personally, - no way can i afford a Meitner, DCS, APL, CHord or Berkeley top tier DAC. But I DO have a mid level- in the line APL DAC universal player that i feel punches WAY above its purchase price. I sure am glad that those companies are still in business producing quality, high performance, equipment that I'll never be able to afford but i can still hear and appreciate them/it for what they are. Whether or not some people here are afraid to examine the evidence, and even do a modicum of research into why shit costs what it costs, - (and in turn has value), - is their problem not mine. The audio world (and people enjoying their recordings as much as they do) would be pretty bloody bleak if every piece of audio gear had the word SONY stamped on it.

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