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#1 Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2017 11:37 pm
by shane
Some time ago my daughter's partner inherited my old Heybrook HB3s. He's been using them with a nondescript Wharfedale amp fed from the headphone socket of a late 2013 MacBook Pro using Spotify, but now wants to try to take things up a level. He's using my A&R A60 for the moment and I will advise on a suitable replacement, but I don't know enough about digital and streaming to advise on the input side. What is the best streaming source? What would people advise for a suitable DAC? Budget is fairly limited, but he's a handy bloke who's forgotten more about computers than I could ever hope to learn so setting up software won't be an issue. All advice gratefully accepted. The mac has an optical output.

#2 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2017 11:47 pm
by pre65
I know it's not made any more, but a Squeezebox touch is simple to use and good quality.

The inbuilt DAC is pretty good as well. :)

If the Macbook has wireless it should connect OK (I think).

#3 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 12:19 am
by cressy
I use a mac mini on the optical output into a beresford dac for this.
The macbook should be abit better doing it this way.
Alternatively a USB dac can be had relatively cheaply and I would imagine either would be better than the headphone socket in terms of sound quality.

Or as phil sats an sb classic or touch, piece of piss to set up and use providing the WiFi network is up to it, or he is prepared to plug the laptop into an ethernet cable.

I had drop outs all the time with the sb touch over WiFi but not one when i ran a long ethernet cable to where the laptop tended to be sat most of the time

#4 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 8:05 am
by The Stratmangler
Ant

Don't forget that the SB Classic requires another device on the network to perform serving duties (ie another computer, or a NAS).
With the SB Touch you could use its embedded server to run it with an attached HDD, provided that your library isn't too large.

IME/IMO the SB Touch is the better sounding device using the on board DAC, and it's the same when it's being used as a transport.

#5 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 8:11 am
by shane
He's really only interested in streaming at the moment rather than storing files, so I guess an off board DAC would suffice. Are any of the Chinese eBay DACs any good? A Beresford may be over budget.

Is there much difference between the various streaming sources? Currently using Spotify.

#6 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 9:04 am
by The Stratmangler
I've no experience of the Chinese DACs on Ebay, so I can't comment.

As far as the streaming content providers go, Tidal HiFi sounds the best, but that's because it's streaming CD spec material.
You'd need to have Chrome installed in order to play the higher res material via the web player.
Then there's the matter of forking out £20.00 a month subscription.

#7 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 9:22 am
by cressy
The beresford I use is the tc7510 rather than the new ones, the old ones tend to be pretty cheap these days so may be worth a look

#8 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 10:13 am
by Neal
SB touch command a good price these days, if you want to go that route consider the RPi and something like max2play. It can run squeeze server locally so you only need the storage attached to the RPi itself. Lacks the display of the touch but is faster.

#9 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 1:51 pm
by simon
As Neal says you can use a Rpi as a renderer, and you can use one as a server too with a plug-in USB HD for your library. You can use the same pi for both but it's asking a lot of it. It's all a bit hairshirt for most users though, and not what shane's son in law's after.

As an aside, I have plans one day to build a DIY Touch with touch screen and embed it in to a "wireless" type all-in-one for the kitchen, but I'll probably never find the time.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Wall-Mo ... pberry-Pi/

#10 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 2:11 pm
by gninnam
Another Option is the RPi and a I2S DAC board - very cheap and sounds pretty good!

I use the IQaudIO DAC Plus with Volumio - I can play music off a USB drive and NAS plus works with Spotify a treat.

#11 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 4:12 pm
by shane
Pi + DAC looks interesting. He's I wizard with Linux, so right up his street. I take it that volumio runs on the pi, using the Mac to control it?

#12 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 6:07 pm
by simon
Maybe it is what he's after then :-D. Seriously though a Rpi and DAC offers high quality sound for very little money.

I don't use Volumio but I think you can control it from a smartphone.

#13 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Sat Jan 28, 2017 1:44 pm
by gninnam
Configure Volumio to stream the files from MAC. Also from Spotify.
Use any Web browser to control Volumio so from the MAC, phone, PC etc.
Simples.

#14 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Mon Jan 30, 2017 1:52 pm
by Mudshark
Sorry no comment......Streeming aint hifi.

:mrgreen:

#15 Re: Streaming advice needed.

Posted: Mon Jan 30, 2017 2:24 pm
by Nick
Mudshark wrote:Sorry no comment......Streeming aint hifi.

:mrgreen:
Rubbish, data is data, of course unless you use some broken definition of HiFi.