For those that have separate Streamers & DACS

@verdantaudio +1 Server/streamers you mentioned are indeed the cream of the crop, add Wadax to list. These designers/engineers understand highest quality rendering, minimize noise and maximally diminish jitter. Far too many lose full potential of nice dacs with mediocre rendering.

I always get the feeling many here don't get the difference between servers and streamers. Servers per se don't do rendering, its the rendering capability built into many servers that is actually the streamer, many companies call these servers, really kind of misnomer, I'd call them server/streamers. Many have found internal streamers within these servers lacking, thus, the external streamers becoming more ubiquitous. Prior to this burgeoning streamer market, various usb or other filters were seen as solutions for the rather mediocre rendering within these servers, over time we've seen the streamers taking over, the full rendering capabilities are certainly superior to both filters and internal rendering.

I still don't get it with all the recommendations for some of these servers/streamers with lame internal rendering. Why spend that kind of money for what many relegate to server only duty. Most have relatively low processing capability, forget about running any good dsp, and slows down music software processing, thus, spending more time within noisy environment. They also require a switch of some kind to integrate external streamer, more complexity means increased risk of mismatched clocks and/or RFI entrances. I could also add duplication of services, why pay multiple times for duplication of services, I could make good financial case for Taiko Extreme, Wadax, Pink Faun, Antipodes K50, custom atx build, or any custom build vs. these servers combined with all the add ons. Get the top line server/streamer, connect directly to dac, decrease complexity with top flight rendering, what's not to like!

If this route not financially attainable, build a diy server with dual ethernet ports, use as server only, spend the bigger bucks on nice external steamer, stay fairly simple (server>streamer>dac), with relatively high sound quality at sane money. If one can't diy, plenty of guys out there doing custom builds, some at pennies on the dollar of the commercial builds.

@sns Couldn't agree more.  Actually running a separate server and player, even modestly priced ones (Roon Nucleus & Bricasti M5), will outperform many server/player combos and give you flexibility in the long run.  The key is making sure the server is only a server and getting rendering duty into another computer (dual computers in Antipodes K30 & K50) or into another device (Bricasti M5, Lumin U1, Weiss DSP 501/502, etc...). 

@lordmelton  Your setup is an example of topic I raised above, You prefer your 005 with I2S vs usb, and for exactly the reasons I stated. While your Aurrender does have somewhat upgraded/optimized usb, it is not 100% galvanically isolated, does not run off dedicated lps (I may be wrong here, believe you mentioned it does have separate transformer, this with switching power supply?) , and the usb board itself does not contain a dedicated power supply (this would supply filtering,perhaps voltage regulation), I"m not even sure of the quality of the clock on that usb board. the best rendering streamers and/or server/streamers do all this. Its not hard for me to believe you prefer I2S vs usb with 005 while I prefer usb with my superior usb rendering via OpticalRendu (which has every optimization mentioned above) with 005.

And this is with an Aurrender model with superior usb rendering vs most of what I see in server/streamers.

The iFi Zen was a little kludgey for initial setup but it sounds far better than I expected. At a $399 price point I wasn’t expecting much and I’m still pleasantly surprised.

The Zen stream was an interim purchase for me as my previous streamer had died and I needed something quick. I assumed I’d be trading up within a few months of finding my next streamer.

Maybe not though. I’m still really enjoying the heck out of the iFi zen. And I’ve got a Matrix Audio X-SPDIF 2 on the way to serve as an I2S converter between the USB iFi Zen and the I2S interface on the DAC.

put a decent 12v lps into the zs and it takes another meaningful step up in sq - for the $ just crazy crazy good... people over-use the term ’giant killer’ but i think it can apply here... or at least ’giant-matcher’...

note: my use is in roon-mode, with cleansed ethernet feed into the z-s, with sotm 12v lps - i won't purport to say it beats much more expensive ones in other modes

@sns I have a double tailed USB cable with the power pin taped over at both ends, so the signal side is not influenced by any RFI/EMI.

However the 5vdc power side ground is still connected. I have tested with and without 5vdc ground but ground sounds better.

My USB to I2s DDC is powered by a quality LPS, no power from USB.

I2s RJ45 cable into my Musetec 005.

The sound is superb but the USB and I2s cables are high quality.

I have thought about optical isolation but honestly the sound I'm getting is wonderful.