Streamers - Auralic, Aurender, Lumin, others...

Regardless of the connection the streamer makes a huge difference. It is all about power management, electrical and mechanical isolation as well as circuit design,. You have a good DAC, you need to mate it with an equally good streamer. My rule of thumb is that the investment in your streamer should equal you DAC which should roughly equal the preamp and amp. Each needs to be painstakingly researched an chosen to be in the right sound family (one you like... mostly DAC, preamp and amp) and compatible with each other. I came to this conclusion over time when I would upgrade different parts of my system until they where they seemed compatible and synergistic with no component holding the other back and the investment level tended to be in the same ballpark... For my main system today this is true for my main system all electronics as well as my headphone system.

So, research and invest in a great streamer.You will be happy you did. 

Gonna have to respectfully disagree with random formulas for allocating your $ to a streamer.  Do your research, follow advice that makes sense to you for your system, and save $ where you can.  Good luck!

@mdalton 

Doesn't sound like we disagree, but have different priorities.  I am trying to ring out the maximum sound quality possible at a given level... not to save dollars. So, we have different priorities. Makes sense. 

Gauging performance based on price is no longer in fashion. If you have disposable income and want to chase the last 5% or 10% of performance, by all means, go for it. But if you don’t—and you believe in diminishing returns—spend your money wisely.

Even a respected reviewer from The Absolute Sound who owns ultra-high-end gear worth over $100,000 has said that a $1,000 streaming device like the Note Icon can compare fairly with a $37,000 combo such as the Aurender N200 with the Berkeley Alpha Reference 3 DAC and its DDC. Take it or leave it.

Chasing 5% or 10% performance… absolutely. I am an audiophile… the highest performance is my objective. That is to the limit of my financial ability. Nothing wrong with having other priorities. Maximum performance per dollar is also a perfectly good strategy.

I am not gaging performance based on price. I am gauging performance based on sonic quality as a result of massive effort put in to find the very best sounding component at the same level as the other components.. Then looking at what the price was. This brings me to the generalization. I believe the relationship is probably based on design time and build quality… probably.

I suspect that it is likely driven by the fact that getting the last ounce of performance out of a device requires massive power supplies, huge effort in electrical isolation, massive weight to mechanically dampen and  isolate. So typically that really good sounding component weighs more and is bigger and has a lot more design time in it. It also remains better than the completion for longer.