Streamers are different from each other just as other components are.
I wish I had ears that could make this determination – I do not.
I have done extensive A/B comparisons – between amplifiers (I can usually detect relatively large audible differences between many amps), between preamps (subtler for SS comparisons but tube preamps vary widely), between DACs (still quite detectable but sometimes vanishingly small differences, depending on the units). But streamer differences – almost nothing compared to the others – for me.
My inability to hear may be a prejudice based on my understanding of how these things work – which may be wrong.
As I understand it, of all the components in the signal chain, streamers have the weakest theoretical basis for audible differences. A streamer's job is to pass a bitstream intact to the DAC — and on a functioning network, that's exactly what it does, regardless of price. Unlike amplifiers, preamps, or DACs, it operates entirely outside the analog domain and adds no gain, no impedance interaction, and no signal processing.
The one technically coherent argument is jitter, but modern DACs with asynchronous inputs and onboard reclocking largely eliminate whatever jitter the streamer introduces before conversion even happens. So even that argument depends on a poorly designed DAC to have traction.
Contrast this with amplifiers, preamps, and DACs, where differences are not only audible but measurable and theoretically explicable — gain, distortion profiles, impedance interactions, reconstruction algorithms. There's a clear prior reason to expect variation before you even sit down to listen.
This makes streamer comparisons hard for me. If I bought an expensive streamer, my expectations would be high and there'd be ideal conditions for motivated perception.
These are the prejudices I have which might be preventing me from hearing differences. Or, it could be my physiological hearing, which is getting worse as I age.