Source first.....you’re not kidding!

Posted by: Finkfan on 08 August 2018

After work today, Wenger2015 and I went back to my place to have a little listen to my supercharged 272/555. We listened to a few tracks streamed from the Nas and it was very clear that this was a considerable improvement over the bare 272. We then listened via the CDX2. This too sounded better than before, as we expected. Wenger then asked to hear the 555 on the CDX2. Within seconds it was connected and powered up and........another wow moment! Now, there was a wow moment when I went from streaming on a bare 272 to 272/555 into 250DR. Everything is so much better. But playing music via CDX2/555 into 272/250DR is as big a jump in performance and sounds much better again, stunning in fact!

This does presents me with a big dilemma....How do I get streaming from my Nas to sound this good?? Can it?? One thing is for sure, until streaming sounds this good, the CDX2 stays. As adding a Linear power supply to the Nas has been dismissed, that only leaves the humble Ethernet cable doesn’t it?? 

Suggestions on where to go from here welcome

Posted on: 18 August 2018 by Allan Milne

 

ChrisSu - sorry, I agree and mis-spoke The US and Core act as servers that can also stream directly into a a separate DAC. Still maintain that this is the most appropriate comparison with a CD player though.

 

I'd also still maintain that the network streamer single box is only required if you want to use the internet streaming services, otherwise the US/Core with external DAC is more flexible, allowing DAC upgrades quite separately from the streaming platform.

The OP's observations on their listening experiences would seem to support the DAC as being significant and why I've kept the separate DAC/US boxes to allow a DAC upgrade in due course … of course I might still go for an N372

Allan

 

Posted on: 18 August 2018 by Innocent Bystander

Given the developments over recent years I would define streaming as playing a music file from a store somewhere. It can be a local store, connected via a network or direct cable from store to DAC (whether the renderer is attached to the store, or attached to the DAC as in a Naim streamer, or it can be from a remote service across the internet. I differentiate these as local streaming or online streaming. Streaming differentiates the direct playing of a file from playing a It from an encoded disk (CD) or tape, etc.

As for Naim “streamers”, I think Naim products are called network players, not streamers - or at least the ND5XS was when I had one...

Posted on: 18 August 2018 by Simon-in-Suffolk

Streaming simply means playing back sound where the source of the sound is elsewhere. Streaming as a term originated way back before the internet and networks in the 1920s and was a way of distributing commercial  music and announcements without using radio... what was sometimes also called piping music... 

These days streaming with digital audio tends to imply a client server relationship... the client is a media player, and the server can be a CD transport, a file system, a media server, either local or remote. So for example playing and controlling a CD remotely is an example of streaming.

Other than that it becomes product and vendor specific... with Naim their streamers are client media audio players using specific network application  protocols such as UPnP/DLNA, http media transfer, Airplay(2), and Naim call the devices interchangeably on their marketing material both Network Players and Streamers.