Equipment Recommendations - The Home For New System and Upgrade Advice

buchaneb said:
Cool - thanks! Is the Airport Express known for being a great bargain streamer?
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For the money it is. It’s a one box set up solution for little money. It and the chrome cast audio for android do the job very well for little money. Nothing can touch them at below $50If you’re a bit more computer literate you can look towards a raspberry pi and a hifiberry dac + which will sound better and cost around $100 but require programming. Above that @displayname is right, you’re looking at Sonos around 400 (which isn’t worth that) and then everything audiophile begins at around 500 with the bluesound node and Aurelic Aries mini.
 
Joe Mac said:
For the money it is. It’s a one box set up solution for little money. It and the chrome cast audio for android do the job very well for little money. Nothing can touch them at below $50If you’re a bit more computer literate you can look towards a raspberry pi and a hifiberry dac + which will sound better and cost around $100 and require programming.
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That sounds perfect. I have been using a decade old budget home theater A/V receiver, and streaming Spotify via an old Apple TV or PS4 (HDMI), and I feel like something is missing (mostly on the streaming end). I feel like a new amp would upgrade both sources while providing a simpler solution to streaming Spotify.

I used to be a big home movie guy, but now I want to un-tether my TV from my music set up, maybe rock a dedicated sound bar for my TV, while improving the sound and simplicity of my audio only set up.
 
buchaneb said:
That sounds perfect. I have been using a decade old budget home theater A/V receiver, and streaming Spotify via an old Apple TV or PS4 (HDMI), and I feel like something is missing (mostly on the streaming end). I feel like a new amp would upgrade both sources while providing a simpler solution to streaming Spotify.

I used to be a big home movie guy, but now I want to un-tether my TV from my music set up, maybe rock a dedicated sound bar for my TV, while improving the sound and simplicity of my audio only set up.
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Yeah getting your turntable away from all that Dolby processing will reap dividends sound wise. Honestly. I’d go no further than the pi for Spotify and if you can’t be arsed with that the airport express is perfect. Let’s face it Spotify is 320k mp3s. The more expensive solutions only come into play, in my opinion, with a real high end system being fed tidal/Qobuz hi res or with a large collection of hi res music files.
 
displayname said:
A dedicated streamer really isn't in your budget just yet, and that's ok. BT, airplay, or plugging in via an RCA input will work just fine.

This isn't a technically correct analogy, but it's easy to understand. A DAC is as important as a preamp in the digital change. It changes the music from data into analogue sound. It's really only in the hifi world that we have them as seperates, but you actually have them built in all over the pace without realizing it. Your phone has one, your computer has one, CD players have them. Anywhere you access a file via disk, usb, streaming, etc, there is a DAC somewhere in the chain. In the audio world we just like to max everything out, and getting a separate DAC can allow for that.

If you ever want to get into dedicated streaming, you can budget a few hundred dollars and build a Rasberry Pi streamer. Beyond that you're looking at about $500 for the entry level Bluesound Node 2i, and on up from there. We've actually got a whole thread dedicated to this stuff: The Dark Side; Digital audio equipment recommendations and setup.

Edit: You can also do a BT dongle, that can later be replaced by a dedicated streamer. The new Aptx is supposed to be a big improvement. Just search "aptx bluetooth adapter"
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Ok thanks! Sounds like it is an avenue I am not quite ready to explore yet! Makes sense to save it down the line as a potential future upgrade. I guess what always confused me was where along the chain the conversion was taking place. So really for a DAC to be beneficial from a streaming Spotify perspective, you would need to ensure that no conversion had already taken place before the signal hit the DAC? So it would wither need to originate from the DAC or be carried into it via USB or something similar?
 
buchaneb said:
Ok thanks! Sounds like it is an avenue I am not quite ready to explore yet! Makes sense to save it down the line as a potential future upgrade. I guess what always confused me was where along the chain the conversion was taking place. So really for a DAC to be beneficial from a streaming Spotify perspective, you would need to ensure that no conversion had already taken place before the signal hit the DAC? So it would wither need to originate from the DAC or be carried into it via USB or something similar?
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Ooof, this is where it gets hard to give straight answers.
With my CD player I bypass the CDPs DAC by connecting via an optical cable. Several devices have coax too. Your TV has a DAC too, which you can also bypass via optical.
If I was using a streaming transport, I would probably prefer to link to a DAC via USB or AES, but coax and BNC would be options too. Computers normally pass the signal via USB. It's also possible to pass the data via HDMI.
My personal streamer has a built in DAC, so I use that for my CDs and for any streaming. But that doesn't mean that's how all streaming works.

It's a big digital world with a lot of options via a lot of devices. The key thing is knowing that if a digital device has a RCA stereo out (red and white) or headphone jack... then it already has a DAC. If it has digital outs (SPIDF, Coax, Optical, USB, HDMI, AES, etc) then it can pass the data on to an external DAC.
 
displayname said:
Ooof, this is where it gets hard to give straight answers.
With my CD player I bypass the CDPs DAC by connecting via an optical cable. Several devices have coax too. Your TV has a DAC too, which you can also bypass via optical.
If I was using a streaming transport, I would probably prefer to link to a DAC via USB or AES, but coax and BNC would be options too. Computers normally pass the signal via USB. It's also possible to pass the data via HDMI.
My personal streamer has a built in DAC, so I use that for my CDs and for any streaming. But that doesn't mean that's how all streaming works.

It's a big digital world with a lot of options via a lot of devices. The key thing is knowing that if a digital device has a RCA stereo out (red and white) or headphone jack... then it already has a DAC. If it has digital outs (SPIDF, Coax, Optical, USB, HDMI, AES, etc) then it can pass the data on to an external DAC.
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Well at least I feel better about being confused in the first place! This does help explain it - thanks!
 
displayname said:
Ooof, this is where it gets hard to give straight answers.
With my CD player I bypass the CDPs DAC by connecting via an optical cable. Several devices have coax too. Your TV has a DAC too, which you can also bypass via optical.
If I was using a streaming transport, I would probably prefer to link to a DAC via USB or AES, but coax and BNC would be options too. Computers normally pass the signal via USB. It's also possible to pass the data via HDMI.
My personal streamer has a built in DAC, so I use that for my CDs and for any streaming. But that doesn't mean that's how all streaming works.

It's a big digital world with a lot of options via a lot of devices. The key thing is knowing that if a digital device has a RCA stereo out (red and white) or headphone jack... then it already has a DAC. If it has digital outs (SPIDF, Coax, Optical, USB, HDMI, AES, etc) then it can pass the data on to an external DAC.
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Don’t forget i2s over hdmi 😉

One day I’ll have an i2s sacd transport to feed that port on my dac/pre-amp...
 
Joe Mac said:
Don’t forget i2s over hdmi 😉

One day I’ll have an i2s sacd transport to feed that port on my dac/pre-amp...
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I said "etc" haha. But yeah, that's just what's out today. I think the industry has finally decided we have enough for now, but who knows what will be coming in 3-5 years.
 
displayname said:
I said "etc" haha. But yeah, that's just what's out today. I think the industry has finally decided we have enough for now, but who knows what will be coming in 3-5 years.
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To be honest I think we’ll probably remain pretty static on connection types and cables, it seems that it’s the data, rather than the connections, that’s constantly evolving...
 
Thankfully, multiple digital to analog conversions generally can't happen. Going without is also difficult. The connections are different enough that, as long as you aren't too drunk, you can see easily see whether you're holding a digital or an analog cable. Analog generally has a pair of RCAs, while digital usually has a single RCA or an optical cable (in the HiFi world; let's save home theater for another thread).
Even if you do mess it up, you'll know! Feed analog into a DAC, and it will just sit there. Feed digital straight into your amp, and I hope you have the volume turned down! That would screech kinda like when a fax machine dials out.
 
apholden said:
Thankfully, multiple digital to analog conversions generally can't happen. Going without is also difficult. The connections are different enough that, as long as you aren't too drunk, you can see easily see whether you're holding a digital or an analog cable. Analog generally has a pair of RCAs, while digital usually has a single RCA or an optical cable (in the HiFi world; let's save home theater for another thread).
Even if you do mess it up, you'll know! Feed analog into a DAC, and it will just sit there. Feed digital straight into your amp, and I hope you have the volume turned down! That would screech kinda like when a fax machine dials out.
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Don’t forget USB. That’ll pass out coax and optical in the near future, it probably already has with audiophiles as it’s capable of carrying much larger amounts of data at quicker speeds.

Also i2s is very interesting as it’s the pure untouched digital stream from the file to your dac. It’d be cool to see if other brands follow PS Audio down the path of using a HDMI cable (but not a HDMI signal, just using the cable to pass the i2s signal) to transmit a direct from i2s data stream to a DAC.

I think it’s clear that with Spotify, Apple Music and the like (Max 320k/256k mp3/aac) and a modest system that audiophile level DACs are a bit of an overkill. An airport express/chrome cast audio with a built in DAC or, at most, a pi and a DAC hat will be more that enough for that quality of audio.

Now with CD/SACD and/or Hi Res files/streaming things like audiophile DACs and hi res streamers with optical/coax/USB/i2s outputs start to come into their own.
 
@Joe Mac Fair enough. At least my main point about the difficulty of mixing up digital and analog cables still stands. USB and HDMI cables won't fit an amplifier (unless it has a built-in DAC, in which case there's no problem).
 
apholden said:
@Joe Mac Fair enough. At least my main point about the difficulty of mixing up digital and analog cables still stands. USB and HDMI cables won't fit an amplifier (unless it has a built-in DAC, in which case there's no problem).
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Yeah to be honest when you get to that level of caring you don’t want your DAC in your amplifier, you buy outboard, for a number of reasons. If you’re buying an outboard audiophile DAC and it doesn’t have usb that’s a bit of a concern in this day and age. The i2s over HDMI is pretty much only PS Audio thing still, it’s theoretically the best though so it’d be cool to see it take off on a bigger scale.
 
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my M50s might be breaking or i need a DAC for my laptop (or both). because i can't hear sounds over about 12khz (and the 12khz are only when i use the "treble" setting on an equalizer). i dont think my hearing has gotten that bad that fast so what would be a good headphone with a neutral but definitely punchy sound to it and what dac would be useful to have

hopefully not too much since im going to buy these along with the 500 other things i want over the course of getting a job
 
Not sure if this is the best place to ask or not. At what point do you need to worry about too much weight on kallax shelves?
 
bdm105 said:
How heavy is a full shelf of lp's? Probably more than that?
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1 LP with sleeve is approximately 250 g, give or take a bit depending on the specific weight of the LP. So 4 LPs roughly equal a kilogram, which is 2.2 lbs.

At 29 lbs per shelf, you should be able to fit roughly 52-53 lps on it by weight. I'd say a full shelf is in that neighborhood. I think my shelf holds about 45-50 lps on it, give or take.
 
i know this is for this thread but what record mats would you recommend

VMPs cork mat is pretty bad (i had 2 shipped and both were warped), and i can't use my uturn with just the acrylic because of the angle... so i need a pretty decent mat
 
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