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roon > dac basic question

I've been fooling around with some major changes to my system, considering all kinds of things, and I realized that I don't understand something pretty basic about running Roon. Does it matter if a dac is Roon ready? Isn't all the decoding done by the server/streamer?

My current set-up: Small Green Computer Sonic Transporter (running Roon core) > optical rendu > Bryston BDA2 (dac) > preamp >>>

It works just fine. I'm thinking of keeping the sonic transporter/rendu but swapping out the Bryston dac, possibly for an integrated amp with a dac. Do I care if that dac is Roon ready? Maybe another way of asking this: are all digital signals going into a dac (eg streamer, cd transport, PC) the same, essentially various binary combinations?

I hope this makes sense! I'm not so good with the technical side of this hobby. Thank you.

 

northman
dogearedaudio's avatar
dogearedaudio
295 posts
 

The simple answer is, no, a DAC doesn't have to be "Roon ready."  All that software is in your streamer.  It only matters that the streamer and the DAC have compatible output and inputs, respectively--USB, optical, coax, I2S.  As long as you can connect the two units with one or more of those options, there's no problem.

audphile1's avatar
audphile1
7,962 posts
 

In your setup it doesn’t matter if the DAC is roon certified. 

bimmerlover's avatar
bimmerlover
158 posts
 

No, in the most general sense your DAC doesn’t have to be Roon Ready. The DAC can be downstream from the Roon Ready equipment and thus be completely oblivious that Roon is used upstream. 
 

A concrete example is my setup:

Antipodes K41 - the server that runs Roon Core

to an (via Direct Ethernet)

Antipodes K22 - the streamer that runs Roon Endpoint

on to a (via USB)

Mola Mola Tambaqui DAC

The Tambaqui has no idea and doesn’t care what or that Roon is used upstream, it is only concerned with converting the streamer’s digital signal via its USB input to an analog signal it then passes on to my linestage (preamplifier).

(For a streamer/DAC combo unit it would be a different matter and that unit would have to (at least) be able to run as a Roon Endpoint.)

 

 

 

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