Is it my streamer or does Audirvana sounds better?

I’m always surprised that people can spend tens of thousands on a tt setup, amps, preamps, etc, then spend a few hundred $$$ on digital and complain why this digital setup doesn’t sound very good. If you buy a $1000 amp and compare it to your McIntosh 452 amp, I’m sure you will find there is a difference too. 
The 2 streamers you listed are entry level pieces. But I also think aurender stuff doesn’t sound as good as others so it’s not just money that determines what sounds good

rbstehno

I’m always surprised that people can spend tens of thousands on a tt setup, amps, preamps, etc, then spend a few hundred $$$ on digital and complain why this digital setup doesn’t sound very good.

That’s a common scenario but it doesn’t surprise me at all. There are plenty of folks (such as the ASR crowd) that trumpet "bits are bits" and that everything digital is error corrected and perfect. It’s not difficult to accept the "logic" in that belief ... until you hear for yourself that it’s nonsense.

I sounds better to me too, comparing it to Quboz Connect and Quboz via Roon to my Lumin P1. Not sure why it does or why it should but it sounds a little "cleaner", more clear, detailed but not bright. 

Who knows? The mysteries of digital I guess.

The main “issue” I have with Audirvana when playing on a PC, compared to my streamers, is the bass. The low-end notes feel light. Especially at lower listening levels (45–55 dB), my streamers render articulate, clear bass, whereas Audirvana on PC sounds softer, lacking texture and weight.

I make sure my PC is running on battery, connected via Ethernet, with Wi-Fi turned off, and all other applications closed except Audirvana. When checking Task Manager, I noticed Audirvana uses over 800 MB of memory (for comparison, Google Chrome uses over 1,100 MB), placing it near the top of the list. This suggests it is performing a fair amount of background processing or optimization. It’s no surprise there’s still no full implementation on mobile devices, as it would likely be quite memory-intensive.

I also tried inserting a DDC between the PC and DAC, using fairly decent USB and I²S cables, but that did not improve the bass performance. It still seems somewhat attenuated, almost as if a high-pass filter is applied. I believe I was running in WASAPI Exclusive or ASIO mode, which should be bit-perfect.

In any case, if you have suggestions on how to restore the bass performance, I’d appreciate it.