Many questions I receive are by people that want to start playing music the modern way:
on some kind of file based system. But they don't know where to start. This video is
a short introduction.
The convenience and the achievable high quality
when done right appear to be attractive to many. It is to me, anyway. This video will
show you some of the most obvious choices, choices I have tried myself and reviewed in
videos on YouTube. There is far more equipment around but I can't report on equipment I
haven't laid my hands on. It is an introduction, for more in-depth information I would advise
you to buy my eBook File Based Audio aka Streaming Audio as advertised at the end of this video.
It is very affordable and you support my work. Of some products I review there will be a
link in the top right corner when you view this video in a browser. Links to all products
are also listed below this video in YouTube. Let's start with the main choice:
Since file based audio is all about copying music from the cd to a hard disk - ripping
in the jargon - and consequently playing it from there, it is obvious that computer technology
will always be involved. And that's a good thing, in general. People of my age will remember
the troubles a car could give in winter. You had to pull the choke and if you did it wrong,
too much petrol would get into the engine making it impossible to start for the next
15 minutes. Today you just turn the key or press the start button and a computer takes
care of starting the engine. My point is that you don't even realise a computer is at
work every time you start your engine. You can have the same experience when you buy
a digital player that hides all - or most - computer technology for you. It is almost
unavoidable you have to deal with a display and menu in some form, operated by knobs on
the front, infrared remote, touchscreen, tablet or smartphone. The Cocktail Audio X35 I recently
reviewed is an example of a device that does it all: ripping, storing, playback, integrated
amp, it can even function as a NAS without specific knowledge by you. It can be operated
from the front panel, the infrared remote and a tablet or smartphone at your choice.
All their products work about the same but very in audio quality and features. A very
popular digital player that can rip the music to the internal hard disk and play it back
but has no controls on the device is the BlueSound Vault 2. It is fully operated from a tablet
or smartphone or, if you like, a computer. I reviewed its sibling, the BlueSound Node
2. Works the same but has no storage and ripping facilities and no hard disk built in. The
idea is that you use your computer for ripping and storing. The Node 2 then indexes the music
on your computer over the network and requests the music on playback. This means the computer
has to be switched on. You could use your computer for ripping but store the music on
a so called networked attached storage device - NAS for short, essentially an external hard
disk that is directly connected to your home network. This way your computer can be switched
off and only the NAS stays on. NASses consume only moderate power. Where the basic functionality
is concerned, the Bluesound Node 2 is roughly equal to the Sonos Connect and the Denon Heos
Link HS2 and they all come with apps for iOS and Android tablets and smartphones. But the
Sonos Connect is of clearly lower quality - it hasn't changed much over the last ten
years - and is limited to a maximum quality of 48 kHz sampling. The Denon Heos Link does
192 kHz and has many connection options but is only slightly better in sound quality than
Sonos. The BlueSound also does 192 kHz but does MQA too and can function as Roon Endpoint.
The sound quality tops the other two. All three brands also have a model that includes
an amplifier, you only have to hook up speakers and you're set. The Cocktail audio X35 I
mentioned also includes an amplifier. Denon offers a 5.1 receiver under the Heos brand
as well. The non-HEOS AV-receivers by Denon and many other brands usually only support
digital playback using the DLNA or UPnP AV protocol. Both protocols are virtually identical
and not ideal for music streaming. You need to run DLNA or UPnP AV server_software on
your computer and these are usually very slow when you browse through your music. MinimServer
is a very good one but it takes serious study to get it working really fine. Streamers by
for instance Pro-ject and Philips use DLNA and more upmarket brands like Linn and Naim
do too. Dealers that do the more upmarket brands will often help you with setting up
the DLNA server. Further upmarket there are brands like Aurender, Meridian Sooloos, NAD
and many others. The real music lover that is not scared of ripping using a computer
but looks for a 'real consumer electronics audio player' is very well served with the
Elac Discovery DS-S101G. Just put your music files on a hard disk and connect it to the
Discovery and you have almost the best software guiding you through your music since it uses
a light version of the fantastic Roon software. There are many other systems around, some
- like Google's Chromecast and Apple Airplay which are lower or equal in quality to the
Sonos Connect - and Yamaha's MusicCast with which I have no experience yet.
In a number of cases I mentioned, a computer was needed for storage and/or ripping. If
you use the computer for storage, it means that it has to be switched on when you want
to play music. Solutions that contain a hard disk or can work with an external hard disk
- for instance connected to a USB port - don't need that. Depending on your personal situation
this can be of importance. If you use your laptop to store the music, chances are it's
in or near the living room and thus easy to switch on. But a large gaming PC in the computer
room at the third floor means you have to climb up two flights, switch it on and go
down again. That's not really convenient. Having such a power hungry computer switched
on all the time isn't advisable either, money wise. There is a technique to have the
audio equipment switch on the computer over the network called Wake on Lan, but there
computer knowledge is absolutely needed. This is where the NAS came in. NAS stands for Networked
Attached Storage and is in fact a simple computer that - initially as only task- shares the
hard disks in it to computers on the network. Over time they also started providing simple
tasks, including DLNA and Squeezebox' Logitech Media server facilities. Within the limitations
of those server programs and if your music collection is not too big, this works fine
and simple. I personally prefer a COMPUTER that shares its hard disks since they often
are more powerful and compared to the more powerful NAS'ses cheaper and more versatile.
But you do need some computer experience to set it up. A good solution for this is a compact
type of computer like the Intel NUC. This tiny computer, available with a variety of
processors, uses little power, is affordable and easy to place. Depending on your needs
you can use a Celeron processor - for instance for simple sharing - or use an i3 for advanced
programs. If you want to have the computer do a lot of DPS work as well, an i7 processor
would be the right choice. But that is beyond the scope of this video.To give you some insight
in what you need: systems that do their own indexing of your music collection, like Sonos
or Bluesound, just need the hard disks to be shared which takes little computational
power. Systems that use DLNA or UPnP AV use a little more computer power, just like the
LMS server the Squeezebox system uses. Squeezebox is no longer for sale but the standard still
is used. More on that in the next chapter. The most advanced system - Roon - does need
an i3 at minimum. This is a relatively new development: a software only product, supported
by hardware from many manufacturers. So you buy the software, install it on a computer
and use one of the digital players made by many manufacturers as networked audio adaptors
- playback stations if you like. You could also place the computer near your stereo and
hook it op directly to your stereo. This might give a less perfect sound, depending on the
computer and the connection you use, but it's cheaper. You do need a fanless computer of
course.
If you already own a digital to analogue converter - DAC for short, a cd-player that can act
as one or a receiver or amplifier that has digital inputs, you can use a so called network
audio adaptor to link the DAC, amp or receiver to the music collection on your hard disk.
Very good ones are the SOtM sMS-200 if you need a USB output or the Magna Hifi Mano Player
if you need an SPDIF or I²S output to your DAC, amp or receiver. Slightly below that
you find often Raspberry Pi based devices like the Bryston BDP π digital player and
the AudioPhonics RaspTouch that are offered as ready to use devices. It becomes real DIY
if you order the tiny Raspberry Pi computer board yourself, add an audio board and a power
supply and build it in a nice housing. Then select appropriate - often free - software
and install it on an SD card and you're set. See the Raspberry Pi for audio playlist
for more details. If you don't have a DAC or of your amplifier or receiver has no digital
inputs, you could consider buying a board for the Raspberry Pi that does the digital
to analogue conversion for you or buy a separate DAC to do that. The latter is the preferred
choice ,in general.
So you can hook up a computer directly to the stereo. If you use a silent computer - no
fans - and good audiophile software that works bit perfect, you can obtain an audio quality
most people don't have. Using a device like the Cocktail Audio or Bluesound Vault might
be a better choice for those that don't like computers in the living. Solutions like
the Bluesound Node 2 or the Elac Discovery are somewhere in-between. and simple networked
audio adaptor in combination with existing equipment can be very economical. If you are
really serious about audio and want a simple solution that sounds good, the list of Aurender,
Linn, NAD, Naim, Meridian and others might be where you find a satisfactory solution.
Top of the line networked audio adaptors, like the ones from SOtM, combined to a very
good DAC, or a DAC that has a networked audio adaptor integrated, like the Mytek Manhattan
DAC II or the PS Audio DirectStream, combined to an Intel NUC running Roon ROCK as a server,
delivers a very high price-performance. Many of the products mentioned are reviewed by
me and a list of links is below this video in Youtube. I hope this helps you further.
If you have general questions, please post them in Youtube under this video. Don't
mail or PM me and don't ask me personal advise, I simply can't spare the time to
answer them. Invest some time in reading my book and subscribe to this channel or to my
newsletter or follow me on Twitter, Facebook or Google+. See the show notes for the links.
If you liked this video, please consider supporting the channel through Patreon and see super
exclusive videos too. Just one dollar a month will do. The link is in the show notes. And
don't forget to tell your friends on the web about this channel. I am Hans Beekhuyzen,
thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com.
And whatever you do, enjoy the music.
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