Ric

I don't have much to add, except a "me too" to frustrations using the Tidal desktop app on Windows 7. HiFi (not Masters), and nearly every new track has a little bit of crackling/static at the beginning. Drives me nuts, and it's been there for several new versions of the app. There's not enough configurability in the app to get it to stop. I tried MQA, and came the the same realization as Mr. Northernbreed. Garbled playback every third track, limited or no increase in quality in most cases, and just too much fussing with "does this sound better than that?". I'm skipping MQA for now.

I tend to agree. I love Tom Waits, but not for the sonic clarity or depth of soundstage. I bought the plastic thingies and that's good enough for me.

Really? I was there Saturday and Sunday and both days they had a Bifrost/Saga setup. I saw pictures from Friday and it was the same setup then too. There was an Yggdrasil set up in the headphones area. I asked Mr. Stoddard if they had a Freya at the show and he said they didn't bring one. The AXPONA review on Stereophile's website even says he wanted to stick with an affordable setup; the whole thing costs less than an Yggy.

Has there been any talk of adding Deezer or Spotify support? So I can get rid of my gawd-awful Tidal account?

I'm having this problem. Using LightningServer, my albums all show up, but many (like 30%) don't show any tracks. They do show if I browse to the same album by folder, and they appear if I use Kinsky or Kazoo and point them at LightningServer. Anybody have a solution for this?

THIS. Couldn't agree more. I have been using a Sonos for years (sound quality is excellent through my DAC), and now I end up comparing all other apps to the Sonos app. It's not perfect, but it's intuitive and it just WORKS. I'm still using my Sonos more than my Aries because the app is so usable.

Probably nothing, if Minimserver is giving you the same feature set as using LightningServer. But if you're using a NAS or DLNA server that doesn't, the ability to mount the network drive via SMB is absolutely essential. That's my case. I've had my Aries for several months now, and honestly I've barely used it. With the interface to my NAS's DLNA server was unusable, and my other network player works much better. I'm hopeful that the new update makes my Aries useful.

The 2.0 version is semi-usable still (or is for me); if you select an album, you don't see the artwork in landscape mode, but if I rotate the iPad to portrait mode, it appears. I can click on them and add them to the queue.

The Android version was mentioned, see:

There's been some mention of SMB support for the Aries/Lightening, but I can't find much information. Is that still in the works?

Hi John, I can't say for sure, there's not a lot of documentation on minidlna that I can find describing its feature set. I installed version 4 (which I assume means 1.1.4). It does allow for a web interface which seems to let me search for various tags, but that might be completely different functionality.

ted_b, yes, I started with Fuppes (the default). It was much worse; still only allowed file view, and didn't display FLAC files at all (only mp3), and it kept crashing and requiring me to manually delete the database so it would rebuild. Switching to minidlna was not very straightforward but it at least got me so I could listen to the Aries at all.

bplexico - it behaves the same with other control points as well. It's fully the fault of my NAS's UPnP software, I assume. I'm a little bit surprised that it doesn't support the tags in a way they understand, it's great NAS software otherwise. There doesn't seem to be a Linux equivalent to nas4free or freenas that would run minimserver either, other than a full install of Linux. What a pain.

I apologize if I missed this in the previous 900 comments, but is Miminserver the only DLNA server that allows for Library view? My NAS isn't compatible with Minimserver (nas4free running minidlna) and all I can see is Folder view. I set up minimserver on my laptop, and from there I see Library view like I expect to, but this is not a long-term solution.

Does anybody know what case is used in the Carbon build at Small Green Computer? It looks like a Streacom design but I haven't been able to find it. Chris Connaker CAPS Computer Audiophile