There is no reference to internal drive on the Mu1 anywhere (that I could find). Yes I do see my internal drive on my Mac.
Grimm MU1 Streamer - Really "The Best"?
I've recently become interested in the Grimm MU1. While reviews of top end players from Innuos, Aurender and Antipodes and others are typically all very positive, the tone of the many pro reviews of the Grimm MU1 go far, far beyond, with some reviews resorting to using superlatives and gushing of positive system transformation and not being able to stop listening to material, etc.. HiFi Advice and Steve Huff (actually calls it "magic") have such reviews.
Given the delay in availability of the Innuos Pulsar which I'm told will be better than my current Zenith Mk3 + PhoenixUSB reclocker, I am interested in replacing my streaming setup with a one-box solution that includes a high-precision clock. The new streamer will continue to feed my Gryphon Diablo 300's DAC module, which I have no interest in replacing.
I'm actually a fan of Innuos, after they improved the sound of my Zenith with firmware updates and after I added their PhoenixUSB reclocker. I appreciate this commitment to improving sound quality which is why I was so interested in the Pulsar.
The trigger for considering an upgrade is not for improved sound, but rather, to solve some issues I have with too many Audioquest power cords coiled and clumped together. I will get to lose one of them and one of my USB cords with a one-box streamer. I've noticed my sound is very sensitive to positioning of my AC cords and find I often need to re-adjust the PC feeding my amp to get proper sounding vocals at center stage. One of my subs also seems to be picking up AC noise when the crossover is set above 60Hz. The second trigger is simply system simplification, removing one box. All that said I don't really have any complaints regarding sound, and the PhoenixUSB reclocker truly did improve the sound of my Zenith.
While the Grimm MU1 has it's 4X upsampling up it's sleeve with reviewers absolutely glowing over this feature and it's extreme ability to separate tones to the left, right, front, and back far better than the rest, I don't see that Grimm has gone to any lengths with regard to power supply management in the way other brands do including Innuos. The MU1's ultra-simplistic interior doesn't bug me, but the lack of transformers and power management makes me wonder....
Are there any updates from folks who have directly compared the MU1 vs similarly classed streamers from the competition? Did you find it to be as revelatory as the pro reviewers found it? And, how does it compare to other streamers with it's 4X upsampling disabled? Does it sound like it suffers from it's lack of power management? I do see that the clock should be very good...
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Feature request for a software update I suppose. Not an essential feature but something that would have helped me identify if the drive was actually being recognized by the MU1. Also as a convenience to monitor capacity. I only really care about sound quality so I wouldn’t dock points for this, but Innuos and Aurender have more polished and robust software for sure. Another thing I noticed was just how incredibly light the MU1 is compared to my Zenith. Maybe because it’s missing a hard drive lol…. Again not a criticism (unless they actually forgot to install the hard drive….) as all I care about is how it sounds. I noticed on the website they state conclusively right in the features list that they will provide an alternative to Roon. That will be very interesting when it happens as I would expect there is a good chance it may sound even better. But not everything Grimm says will happen does happen. Like their plan to enable FM radio capabilities. Bet a lot of people were like “but that’s the reason I bought it!”. Funny that they made a world class high precision streamer/server with low jitter and sophisticated 4X OS hardware and software but they were like nope, too hard, we give up!…. when it came to enabling the FM tuner. |
@nyev, have you ever entertained the idea of a music server/player like this? https://www.hifi-advice.com/blog/review/digital-reviews/network-player-reviews/antipodes-k50-music-server/ |
@nyev I hope it’s a minor issue and you will sort out everything easily after you are back from work. You can actually see your drive and capacity etc on the network. So I don’t think it’s an issue if everything works as it should. |
@svenjosh , I was being a bit sarcastic about Grimm abandoning plans to enable FM tuner, I’m not sure anyone at all cares and I certainly do not :) I didn’t actually think the chances were very high that they would be developing proprietary player software (although I had hoped). I think the chances may still be good that they add something like Squeeze or MPD support. I even this would be massively valued by their audience for any SQ improvements that might realize. In re-reading Grimm’s statement on the website, I am pretty sure I had misinterpreted their statement: “For customers who prefer to only run a simple playback system without Roon’s extras, we will offer a solid alternative.” I think this simply means they are suggesting the MU1 as an alternative to other servers/streamers. Not that they are developing an alternative to Roon, unfortunately!
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