Solo streamer

@rvpiano it’s awesome to see you like the N200 and keep raving about it. Keep the thoughts coming.
By the way I expect the N200 to at least match the performance of your cd transport/player. I was close to giving up on streaming and and going back to spinning 💿 until I tried the N200. I have to give credit to @ghdprentice ​​​​and @lalitk for battling it out with me in one of my posts a while ago and recommending Aurender when I was complaining about the sound when streaming using Roon and Bricasti M3 as its end point. I didn’t think I can get the kind of boost in sonics with the N200 but it just simply dispatched the network card/streamer in the Bricasti M3 DAC.

@rikkipuu 

Whether to use coax or USB has been an interesting question for me. I have both hooked up to the streamer and it’s hard to tell the difference sonically.  I believe the USB is very slightly more appealing, so I use it.  As for cabling, I’ve already invested a lot in it.

@audphile1 

It was with your encouragement and others that made me pull the trigger on purchasing the N200.   Of course you know how that turned out. Thank you. Actually, the streamer sounds better than CD or SACD..  I think it decodes digital files better than any other source..  As I’ve said, equal to the best analog performance.

@rvpiano my pleasure!

“  I believe the USB is very slightly more appealing, so I use it.”
@rvpiano 

Glad to hear, you’re enjoying N200. Keep in mind, N200 is designed and optimized to take advantage of USB implementation in a DAC of your choice. I know you love your current DAC, my recommendation would be to try another DAC down the road to see if you can push the performance another notch or two, I am speaking this my personal experience, I went from EMM Labs DA2 to Merging and there was no contest, the Merging was on another stratosphere using the same source (N20). Merging DAC allowed me to appreciate Aurender N20 at much deeper level, it was like lifting a veil.
Cheers!