Dazed and confused about streamer upgrade

You can approach streamer upgrade couple of ways, pair Node 2i with a better DAC before you upgrade to Boulder 866. The DAC inside McIntosh is likely no better than the DAC inside Node2i. You will get much better sound with a outboard DAC like MHDT Labs Orchid or Denafrips Pontus II.

If you go down the Boulder 866 route, look into Aurender N100 or N10 (used), either of these would provide substantial SQ upgrade over Node 2i.

Watch out for folks who are incapable of appreciating any differences between different streamers and DAC’s :-)

Good luck!

The Boulder 866 digital is a roon endpoint so I see no reason to buy a streamer with it just use roon.  If you upgrade the McIntosh with the DAC 2 module there are a few streamers without DACs you could use. I use the Lumin U1 mini but Bel Canto and Simaudio are good as well as others. 

No suggestions for wasting $3 to $5K.
I’m not into jewelry.
I just put Sunlight in the best current DAC and it makes a <$500 Allo set sound MUCH better than my BluNode.
You can't get there from here.

I recommend an Aurender, N100SC as a good place to start. I have owned a host of PCs and lessor streamers and an Auralic Aries G2. Aurenders are outstanding products and extremely good value for sound/price. They are audiophile quality construction and execution. You can use your DAC... and see which connection is better USB or AES/ SPDIF. The USB lets your DAC retime the bitstream. Likely the non- USB will be better. Their Conductor app that is used to operate it is very highly regarded. .

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There flagship streamer is pretty much the standard at many equipment shows for sustems . It’s the kind of product you will have a very long time. When I bought my first Aurender it completely changed my attitude towards streaming. It pushed performance to the audiophile category and showed it was not just a novelty, but ready for prime time. I now listen to streaming 85% of the time and vinyl when I feel like fiddling and being a bit nostalgic. There is no reason to play a CD, streaming either sounds exactly the same, usually better because it is higher Rez (Qubuz recommended streaming service) But both analog and digital ends on my systems are equally satisfying.

I have an Aurender n100 sc. It is good and sounds better than the blue node that I have. But I also tried a Cambridge Audio cxn v2 and it sounds just as good as the Aurender. More versatile and the dac is pretty good also. $1100.00.  The Aurender is going to be for sale.