Better music player alternative to Mac Air / laptop
I am currently using Apple Macbook Air and/or Ms. Window based laptop as the hardware player, and pairing either “Foobar 2000” or “VLC” with the Mac/laptop for music playing. I prefer Mac Air to laptop because it has no fan. I collect lawful 16/24 bits, 44.1/88.2 khz flac and good recordings from Youtube and store them in a solid state drive as the source.
Although I felt the noise floor from this combination is quite dark and satisfactory, I am open to a possibly “cleaner” music player alternative/device (with display preferrably) than my current Apple Mac/laptop that the audiophiles continuously claim to be “dirty.” The “player” may include both hardware and software because the software I am currently using may not be able to run on the new device. I heard Mac Mini is a good choice so please share your experience if you had it. I do not stream and I do not intend to invest in the streamer in the near future. Thank you.
If you're using an external DAC with the Macbook then there's no reason to switch to something else.
If you're using the onboard audio and are considering a Mac mini, you might want to get a late 2014 model. The latest M1 based model doesn't support any sampling rate besides 48 kHz. See this link for more details. |
You don’t need to spend anything to try out streaming. You can install the free Kodi app on your Mac - link. It has add-ons for popular streaming services like Qobuz and Tidal. It also turns your Mac into a UPnP server and renderer so your music library can be accessed by external streamers (assuming your music collection is on your Mac). You can control music playback via the web client or through an app called Yatse (if you have an Android phone). I’ve also streamed YouTube Music from my Android phone to Kodi using an app called BubbleUPnP. On my iOS devices, I use mconnect. |
Correct. I’ve used a variety of PCs, Macs, Raspberry Pi’s over the years to play back audio and I’ve never noticed a difference. I’ve even compared a track ripped to FLAC and played back over a $39 Raspberry Pi to the same track played from the disc on my Oppo UDP-203 modded with a special board (Vanity203 HD) to reduce jitter on the SPDIF interface and it sounds exactly the same.
That’s the beauty of digital data.
Here are a few links if you want to learn more about digital audio and detecting real problems with digital playback. Digital Show and Tell - Xiph.org What does a bad USB (or other digital cable) sound like? Let’s listen to some jitter effects The 16 bit vs 8 bit blind listening test
You don’t need an ASIO device to get good sound. This particular output device is meant to reduce latency, important for mixing and mastering. These days, you can use WASAPI output for bit perfect playback. Just download the foobar component, install it, and select it in the Preferences menu. |
