New to streaming, please help.

[Pharos]

I do not mean to Hi-Jack you thread, but I greatly sympathise with this question, especially because I am in the same position, and baffled, despite a whole thread starting on another forum, designed to simplify with a best solution for once and all which petered out.

But 8 months later and to me it still looks like a mine-field full of tens of names and different approaches/systems, and with no obvious best one. The modes are seemingly endless, with people buying extra bits to interface things with other incompatible bits to attempt a solution. This may well suit manufacturers but I am not a fan of superfluity, or of wasting money.

So I want the cheapest solution which provides the best quality available, preferably lossless, for both downloading for keeps and for direct listen streaming, with the least amount of hardware of the highest quality and reliability.

My current state of play is having a Mac mini behind the TV so that I can use a Mac laptop with it, and 'echo the small screen on the TV for concerts, lectures and even Emails at ten feet. I do not want a trailing HDMI lead which I have to unplug when not in use.

I really think that there has to be an obvious best way to stream, and I will devote time in the near future to a long term effective solution for the above needs expessed.

Surely the pooling of experience and information on AoS can provide a consensus and help everyone.

[Sherwood]

I do not mean to Hi-Jack you thread, but I greatly sympathise with this question, especially because I am in the same position, and baffled, despite a whole thread starting on another forum, designed to simplify with a best solution for once and all which petered out.

But 8 months later and to me it still looks like a mine-field full of tens of names and different approaches/systems, and with no obvious best one. The modes are seemingly endless, with people buying extra bits to interface things with other incompatible bits to attempt a solution. This may well suit manufacturers but I am not a fan of superfluity, or of wasting money.

So I want the cheapest solution which provides the best quality available, preferably lossless, for both downloading for keeps and for direct listen streaming, with the least amount of hardware of the highest quality and reliability.

My current state of play is having a Mac mini behind the TV so that I can use a Mac laptop with it, and 'echo the small screen on the TV for concerts, lectures and even Emails at ten feet. I do not want a trailing HDMI lead which I have to unplug when not in use.

I really think that there has to be an obvious best way to stream, and I will devote time in the near future to a long term effective solution for the above needs expessed.

Surely the pooling of experience and information on AoS can provide a consensus and help everyone.

Dennis,

there is no obvious best way, but there are many ways. Perhaps the obvious choices are whether to use a pc/laptop for file storage or a dedicated "streamer"; whether to go for a "wired" or "wireless" approach; and, whether to for for a "kit" based on a Raspberry Pi or similar, or an "off the shelf, plug and play solution!. None are necessarily superior from a technical point of view, but each is appropriate to different needs and circumstances. Perhaps the two most important considerations are the budget and how tech savvy the end user is.

Geoff

[struth]

there is only one right way, alas everyone's is slightly, to completely different. see if you can have a listen to some members system near you;it might give you some ideas. i can stream via wire or bluetooth 4, or chromecast or by wifi. best of all worlds and use a pc mostly as base but sometimes an Ipad too. Can use either my flac/ape files or stream spotify/tidal and Tunin radio. oh yes and I have a rpi system too just for good measure.

[Edward]

<snip>

Surely the pooling of experience and information on AoS can provide a consensus and help everyone.

Dennis, I don't think a consensus can be built as Geoff says there are many perfectly acceptable ways of achieving this.

In my mind I see things in a twofold way. One can go the DIY incremental route or simply go via a all-in-one streaming solution. I chose to to the DIY incremental route which I found to be satisfying. But if I had chosen to go via a ready made solution I will, I'm sure, also have found that be satisfying.

I went to the Windsor audio show last Saturday and saw both types of solutions being used but with ready made solutions being in the majority.

Very good examples were solutions provided by Melco and Merging+Player. I was particularly impressed with the merging+player as it incorporated in a very easy to understand way local content and cloud content (e.g. Tidal) with Roon being the software used (and thus widely understood). But you pays your money. Clearly there are cheaper ready made solutions. A friend (well actually two friends) use the excellent Cambridge Audio Azur 851N.

The DIY route, by definition, is varied and many. Starting from a 3.5mm jack to ultra hi-end (expensive DACs).

[r100]

man, this is depressing.

[Sherwood]

man, this is depressing.

Not sure why? You can get into streaming for £20 with a Google device or for less than £100 a Raspberry Pi based device that will compete with devices which only a few years ago would have costs thousands!

For me that is very encouraging!

Geoff

[smangus]

I use my mobile into my amp via a Bluetooth dac cost me £20 . I use amazon tunes and when I buy vinyl now a lot of times there is a download code. Mainly use this for the kitchen and background music. Fine for me. When you look at the permutations avaible with a vinyl set up - cart, Phono stage, deck, arm etc it's way more confusing!

LOL yet I still got one.

[Pharos]

I tend to agree Geoff, but I hope that my post and obvious ignorance are not contributory.

It depresses me that a 'free market' results in a multiplicity of solutions and which to me seem to be unnecessary.
Sainsburys, a year or so ago analysed their shampoo stock, to find that they had I believe 26 varieties available. They rationalised this, and I wonder why so many, probably marketing psychology. Normal, dry, greasy, permed, and dandruff seem to be the main needs, and this excess of choice is one aspect of capitalism which annoys me.

[Sherwood]

I tend to agree Geoff, but I hope that my post and obvious ignorance are not contributory.

It depresses me that a 'free market' results in a multiplicity of solutions and which to me seem to be unnecessary.
Sainsburys, a year or so ago analysed their shampoo stock, to find that they had I believe 26 varieties available. They rationalised this, and I wonder why so many, probably marketing psychology. Normal, dry, greasy, permed, and dandruff seem to be the main needs, and this excess of choice is one aspect of capitalism which annoys me.

Dennis,

as a development economist who has spent much of my professional life living and working in the developing world I have some sympathy for your views. It is certainly sobering to come back to the UK from a country where the vast majority of people live on less than a dollar a day, to find such waste and excess. Yes, by their very nature, free markets result in multiple competing products which differ very little from each other in substance, and rely on marketing to stand out to the consumer. Production costs could certainly be reduced if the number of competing products were reduced and marketing spend eliminated. However, as a committed socialist I have to concede that attempts to replace market mechanism have by and large proved disastrous: one only needs to look at the stupendous failures of soviet era command economies. That is not to say that markets should be completely unregulated. As much as I might find the hyper expensive hifi products that have emerged in recent years distasteful, markets do encourage innovation and technical progress.

In the case of digital technology, it is now possible to acquire a music source of extremely high quality for next to nothing. As good as vinyl is, or can be, it requires precision engineering and that does not come cheap.

Geoff

[worrasf]

A really neat solution is the Chordette Gem DAC.
This has both USB and Bluetooth inputs.
I use it (Bluetooth)to stream from my iPhone and (USB) from my MacBook direct to my preamp. It works flawlessly.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk