Hi, I'd like to get a streamer to play music through my newish HiFi. Speakers are Dynaudio dm 2/7, amplifier is Musical Fidelity X150, source is a Macbook via a Musical Fidelity VDAC II. The question is, what is the best thing to add for £500 - £1000? Would it be the new Cambridge Stream Magic or is there something better? In turn, what would be the best (and most cost effective) storage solution? The main aim is to build a good library of as high res music as possible but, in truth, much will be ripped from CD. It would be great to be able to use Spotify with some convenience over the system. Last question is cables... Currently I'm running QED silver interconnects (£15 jobbies from 1999) and QED biwire speaker cable into single Dynaudio terminals. Would there be a natural upgrade there? Chord? Thanks
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Do you stream hi-res music or download hi-res tracks? We want your opinions!
Which streamer?
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Personally I'd recommend the Logitech Squeezebox Touch as a starting point. I believe this is scheduled for another Amazon Lightening Deal at 16:00 today. You can try it standalone & through your DAC & see what you think. You will need to run their proprietary server software somewhere when playing locally stored music but this can be on your Mac for now. It will support Spotify but only for Premium accounts. It will suport 24/96 natively & 192 with an additional app.
Once you've got to grips with this budget setup you can then look at more expensive options, & see if they offer you value for money in terms of features & performance. If you do want to move on then you will lose very little selling on the Touch.
Once you've got to grips with this budget setup you can then look at more expensive options, & see if they offer you value for money in terms of features & performance. If you do want to move on then you will lose very little selling on the Touch.
I would run a vortexbox with the SB touch just use an old laptp or you can buy a applicance. Works really well and auto rips cds you place in the cd tray.
How would the SB compare in quality / funtionality with the Cambridge or something similar? Would the VDAC II improve the SB sound. Voretebox looks a bit pricey is there a cheaper 2TB NAS that would funtion well PnP?
Squeezebox needs a NAS capable of running Logitech Media Server, so think QNAP, Synology, Netgear ReadyNAS, Thecus. A bargain-bucket NAS with fixed firmware isn't up to it.
A Sonos CONNECT can use a cheapy NAS, but you'll never see more that 16/44.1 from it, so CD-rips only and it would benefit from the Musical Fidelity VDAC II.
Sonos and Squeezebox are, AFAIK, well proven with Spotify Premium. Plus they're the only ones which have a the track-record of multi-zonesyncronised playback.
A Sonos CONNECT can use a cheapy NAS, but you'll never see more that 16/44.1 from it, so CD-rips only and it would benefit from the Musical Fidelity VDAC II.
Sonos and Squeezebox are, AFAIK, well proven with Spotify Premium. Plus they're the only ones which have a the track-record of multi-zonesyncronised playback.
dabarley said:
On the "Computer Based Music" forum one member ("def lugs") has put that the CA Stream 6 stands head and shoulders above the touch, but is also head and shoulders more expensive! http://www.whathifi.com/forum/computer-based-music/ca-stream-magic-vs-logitech-squeeze-box#new
I bought the Touch on one of Amazon's lightning deals recently and am amazed by it! The best £140 I've ever spent on hi-fi equipment. I guess in time you can add a more expensive DAC later and use the rest for a good NAS/more music.
I dont believe in having separate kit just for playing music, and have never seen the point of buying dacs - perfering instead to buy a good multi-purpose amp.
In the livingroom I use
- Acryan playon!hd mini2 mediaplayer (£80)
- Denon 2311 (waiting for my new Onkyo TX-NR1010 to arrive - £2000)
to play FLACs stored on a Synology DS412+, and controlled by my HTC One X.
This setup serves equally well for music and home cinema - dvd/bd rips.
In the livingroom I use
- Acryan playon!hd mini2 mediaplayer (£80)
- Denon 2311 (waiting for my new Onkyo TX-NR1010 to arrive - £2000)
to play FLACs stored on a Synology DS412+, and controlled by my HTC One X.
This setup serves equally well for music and home cinema - dvd/bd rips.
I recently purchased a SBT and a vortexbox appliance and have ripped all my CDs. I was a bit dubious at first if the SQ could match my Cyrus CD8X used as a transport with my Cyrus DAC XP+. Initially the CD player just edged it on SQ, but the Touch won hands down on convenience. I've since used some of the Toolbox 3.0 mods (see link below) and now the Touch to my ears sounds the same as the CD player when compared with both playing through the DAC.
It's easy to use, sounds good, plays HD (up to 24/96), can be controlled from any internet device (I use an ipod touch with ipeng), looks good and dirt cheap for what it does.
http://soundcheck-audio.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/touch-toolbox-30.html
Alternatively you could spend more on a Hifi branded streamer that does less and sounds no better.... Or you could try building your own streamer - this is an easy guide to a streamer that is meant to sound great.
http://www.rdhworld.myzen.co.uk/smfcu/index.php?topic=16326.0
For storage the vortexbox is great because it has an inbuilt CD ripper and is a doddle to use - this is what I purchased.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Fanless-Server-Automatic-Ripping-VortexBox/dp/B006AADOMK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1343675875&sr=8-1
It is actually possible to use the vortexbox as a streamer and connect it direct to your DAC, hence saving the need for a seperate streamer. It can output via the USB on it, but for an extra £10 I added a SPDIF connection to it, but I have never actually used it like this (It was too big for my Hifi rack, so I use the SBT). The vortexbox runs the squeezebox server so is easy to use.
It's easy to use, sounds good, plays HD (up to 24/96), can be controlled from any internet device (I use an ipod touch with ipeng), looks good and dirt cheap for what it does.
http://soundcheck-audio.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/touch-toolbox-30.html
Alternatively you could spend more on a Hifi branded streamer that does less and sounds no better.... Or you could try building your own streamer - this is an easy guide to a streamer that is meant to sound great.
http://www.rdhworld.myzen.co.uk/smfcu/index.php?topic=16326.0
For storage the vortexbox is great because it has an inbuilt CD ripper and is a doddle to use - this is what I purchased.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Fanless-Server-Automatic-Ripping-VortexBox/dp/B006AADOMK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1343675875&sr=8-1
It is actually possible to use the vortexbox as a streamer and connect it direct to your DAC, hence saving the need for a seperate streamer. It can output via the USB on it, but for an extra £10 I added a SPDIF connection to it, but I have never actually used it like this (It was too big for my Hifi rack, so I use the SBT). The vortexbox runs the squeezebox server so is easy to use.
The Vortexbox OS/ripper/server software is a free download that you can chuck on an old SFF PC or laptop.dabarley said:
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