2. digital
  3. 129665-3592

Going from computer audio to dedicated streamer

A few days ago I purchased a Bluesound Node 2. Immediately after hooking it up I noticed a more relaxed less digital sound than I was getting from my Mac mini into my Wyred 4 Sound Dac-2. My hookup for the Mac was via a good usb cable into a Musical Fidelity Vlink192 coax into the Wyred 4 Sound. It is every bit as detailed as streaming Tidal through the Mac but is more "musical" and relaxed. An example would be on high dynamic contrasts the Mac could sound harsh and a little piercing in the highs. This was with every speaker I have owned. Not that it sounded bad overall, actually sounded quite good but I am loving this upgrade so far. No more messing with Amarra or Audirvana for me and dealing with the associated crashes etc.   
I am curious of others experiences good or bad moving away from computer audio to something else.
Also is anyone running an external hard drive with their music collection and running though the Bluesound or similar device and how is that working out?   
mofojo

Showing 1 response by desktopguy

desktopguy
334 posts
 
I got my first V-Link ~10 yrs ago (a 24/96 model). The DAC I had at the time, a Stello unit, ran on USB straight in from Windows XP desktop. As soon as I put the V-Link in the system and ran signal to the Stello via toslink, the sound became slightly less digital.

I upgraded the Stello DAC to the inexpensive but quite good Peachtree Audio DAC iTx. I tried USB straight in vs toslink, then coax from the V-Link, Again, it sounded better. Soon I upgraded to a V-Link 24/192 model + a significantly better coax cable (Oyaide DR-510), and there was a noticeable jump in quality: smoother, more organic, less edgy.

Then I upgraded the DAC to an Audio GD NOS 19 (a non-oversampling R 2R design considered "endgame" by some in the desktop audio/headphone community). That took forever to burn in, but once it did, I again compared USB straight in vs coax from the V-Link. Contest wasn't even close. V-Link + coax wins, as it always does.

And now I'm hearing some of the least "digital" digital of my life. No, it's not analog--rather, it's like some middle ground, digital that sounds unforced, organic, relaxed. I'm very happy with it--so much so that I picked up a new Audio GD DAC-19, the non-NOS version of the same DAC. It's burning in on my other computer, and it already sounds terrific...
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