Why do I "need" Audirvana, Roon or the like versus just Tidal App?
Hi, I stream Tidal MQA and their hifi via my Macbook Pro. I use the Tidal app on the MBpro which unpacks MQA, contains my playlists etc. In the future, I may also stream ripped cds on very rare occasion from a connected hard drive, as well as any hi res audio files I may purchase. However, 99.9% is an is likely to continue to be Tidal streaming. Maybe, just maybe adding Quboz or Amazon in the future...
I feed this from my MAC via USB out to my integrated amp and DAC (Peachtree Nova 300). I have no plans to have a separate server etc in the short term, …but may do so in the future.
I cannot understand what, if anything, Audirvana (or Roon and the like) would bring to.the table in my scenario. Perhaps better MQA unpacking? Slicker interface? Better sound quality?
I would greatly appreciate you all's thoughts on this! Thank you very much.
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How Musicians Make Money — Or Don’t at All" (2018) ROLLING STONE https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/how-musicians-make-money-or-dont-at-all-in-2018-706745/ |
Here is a deep-dive into payouts by streaming services. https://soundcharts.com/blog/music-streaming-rates-payouts#amazon-napster-and-tidal-the-top-3 |
ROON! I’ve been streaming Tidal for about a year, and love it. I got a Roon Core server/streamer ( https://www.smallgreencomputer.com/collections/audio-server/products/essential-server-player-solutio... ) several months ago, and I can’t imagine giving up Roon--ever. It takes streaming to a level I hadn’t imagined. Imagine Tidal paired with Wikipedia, where all the artists, albums, tracks, notes, lyrics are hyperlinked and/or displayable. Click, click, click and you’ve taken a deep dive into discovering more new music than you imagined possible. You can arrange playlists, sort many different ways, and organize your library. I just started ripping all my CDs to the server. $10 a month for Roon, and it’s indispensable, imo. I use an Amazon Kindle 10" tablet as my "remote". You can run the Roon CORE on a PC/Mac, a Roon Nucleus server, or a 3rd party server-streamer like mine. Wyred4Sound makes a nice one, as does Innuos. Your core holds your ripped music and the Roon Core OS, and that streams to your endpoint/streamer. You can have multiple zones in other rooms and stream to those using your server. Music throughout the house! You can do a 30-day trial, and run the core from a computer on your network to get started, and use the desktop app to control. It’s a cheap way to try it out. They have just updated Roon to v1.8 and for me it's been flawless since day 1. Some are having glitches but Roon will sort those out quickly. They have an awesome development team, and really care about their product. Ignore the naysayers. |
