Jump to content

crazychile

  • Posts

    61
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Country

    United States

Retained

  • Member Title
    Freshman Member
  1. I also have a 2009 MBP and installed a SSD from OWC, and more RAM about a year ago. I didn't notice any change in sound. It does run a lot faster but I don't know if that was the RAM, SSD or both.
  2. Hailey, Jason from Schiit has posted quite a bit on Head-Fi (not so much here), but if you read enough from him you'll get the same vibe that they realize they just aren't going to sell to everyone, and that's allright. But what Sam says is true...You'll probably know within a few days if you want it or not. AND if this DAC is at the top end of what you want to spend, as it was for me, then you really can't do much better without spending significantly more. I made the stretch to Yggy because I wanted to be DONE for a long time with regards to a dac. I don't regret the decision and I really liked it the first time I did some serious listening less than 24hrs after power up. My previous DAC was a Bifrost Multibit and it was a noticeable jump in performance.
  3. Please don't take this the wrong way. You seem like a nice guy and I'm sure there are others that have had the same concerns as you. But not everyone is meant to be a Schiit customer. They do things a certain way that streamlines processes to make great products affordable for a large chunk of audio enthusiasts. There are probably other companies or retailers that might let you audition gear for a month and then return it without a restocking fee. But usually the products are a lot more expensive than Schiits to get a similar level of quality.
  4. Schiit sneaked an update into the Modi 2U recently where they're now using a better DAC chip. You may want to check Schiit out again. In a thread on SBAF some of the guys who didn't like the earlier production units were wondering how it sounded so much better. Somebody cracked one open and noticed the new chip.
  5. Well I don't know about you guys but I will definitely NOT be buying the Bottom End Blaster from Peter Fyle Audio. That would just be wrong.
  6. My new Mac Mini arrived on Friday and I spent part of the weekend getting it set up with Audirvana and Tidal. Thanks for the recommendation, Jud! It does seem to sound a little better than my old MacBook Pro. I'm still getting to know Audirvana, but already I like it better than Amarra. I'm still stuck with USB for now but given all the USB discoveries in the last year or so, maybe there will be an affordable one box solution in the near future to bring this close to AES/EBU or coax SPDIF. I'll let that technology shake out for a while and see where it goes. Given how long I keep my Macs, maybe I'll add an Auralic Aries or something equivalent to the system sometime down the road.
  7. After thinking about this for a bit I think I might just buy another Mac Mini and go with Audirvana. I remember when I researched playback software a couple of years ago that sonically both Amarra and Audirvana were pretty close, but I didn't notice the optimization in Audirvana being as robust as it is now, or maybe I didn't look close enough. To save money I'll probably go with the stock mid-model Mini to save a few hundred. 8GB ram is what I have now, and I can always drop an SSD in the mini a couple years down the road.
  8. Jud, I have a decent glass fiber Toslink cable that I use periodically. I haven't done any critical comparisons between it and USB with my Regen, but going from memory they seem pretty close. I'm tempted to try the Auralic Aries Mini but need to look into it some more before I commit. The reality is that it will probably be a couple months before I make a change, and in the mean time I'll probably use Audirvana. This may be all I need. Plus I'm probably going to upgrade my DAC to a Yggdrasil this Summer so that should keep me entertained for a while. Thanks again for all the help. (Both Jud and Master)
  9. Funny you mention the Aries mini, because I've been looking at that a lot the last few days but I wasn't sure if it would work. I should contact them to see if the itunes library is compatible. Plus I also like that it has a coax digital output. So in theory do I have this connection scheme correct? Buy an ethernet router and connect an ethernet hard drive, my Mac (that has ethernet) and the Aries which then outputs to my DAC. Then I could still use the Mac to rip CDs to the library. And i'd use the Aries ipad app to control my library as well,as Aries imbedded apps such as Tidal or Spotify? Thanks for all the advice so far everyone.
  10. Thanks Jud. My MBP is a late 2009. i ve thought about Audirvana a lot but with that I'm still stuck with optimizing the Mac and a USB output. however, if another solution doesn't work, something like this will be my fall back plan.
  11. Hey guys, I’ve used iTunes on a Mac Mini or a MacBook Pro for over a decade. My entire iTunes music library consists of .wav files on an external hard drive (with additional backup drive). I currently run Amarra on the Mac and use USB out to my DAC. I also use Spotify Premium and am considering ditching that for Tidal. The system currently isn’t headless but I normally use the remote function on an iPad to select music library files,. I’ve also experimented with trial versions of VNC variants that would also let me do Spotify by remote. I use this Mac only for music, I don’t need it for web browsing or any non-music applications. My Macs are old and I’ve been considering an upgrade to a new Mini. But to upgrade to a model with SSD and 16GB of RAM puts me in the $1100 range. This isn’t an issue but then I have to go through all the hoops to optimize system performance, Amarra can be finicky sometimes so there would also be the expense of using another app to replace it. There are power supply and other tweeks available that would also add to the cost to bring the performance up, and I’m concerned I could spend a couple grand on everything and still have something that’s just “pretty good”. I like the simplicity of the current approach, but I want something that sounds better than pretty good and think that for the same money I should be able to do something better. So I’ve been researching some other options (Raspberry Pi, standalone network audio player, using AirPlay, etc) but I don’t know jack about home networks and all the configuration / distro options are pretty daunting. So I need some help with this. Keeping in mind a budget of up to $1500…. Must haves: Needs to be able to utilize my current iTunes Library. I don’t need to use iTunes, I just want to use my existing library so I don’t have to convert to a different file structure. I’d also like to use the existing Mac to rip CDs when I want to add to the library. From what I’ve read, my existing Music Folder can be used, but I could be wrong… If I needed to copy the existing drive to a new one that had Ethernet, I’d be ok with that. I want to be able to use an iPad to control the selection of songs. Either with a specific app, or with some flavor of VNC. Audio quality needs to exceed the level of the current system. Like to haves: I’d really like to ditch USB as a method of connecting to the DAC. I have an Uptone Regen and like it, but trying to perfect USB is a never ending (costly) battle. I’d like something that outputs SPDIF coax or AES/EBU if possible. Something that would let me do Spotify or Tidal. Although if I had to use my existing mac for this, and just run another digital input into the DAC, I could live with that. More info: The modem and wireless router is in another part of the house. I can’t run an Ethernet cable from there to this system. However, I could connect an Ethernet cable from the existing Mac to the new equipment, or from an Ethernet Hard drive to the new equipment. If it helps I could get another router for the music system but I don’t know if it’s necessary or gains me anything. So what do you guys think of all this? What should I do? Thanks in advance.
  12. I've emailed [email protected] a few times and have gotten responses within a couple of hours every time. Maybe something about the OPs email looks too close to Spam and gets dumped?
  13. I upgraded from a Schiit Modi to a Bifrost Uber. It was a bigger improvement than an amp upgrade of about the same $$ jump. Then I upgraded my Bifrost to the Multibit version. Still Mo' Betta. After headphones, I'm a huge source matters kinda guy.
  14. Yeah, it seems he really does like Schiit. So do a lot of others. It may not be to everyone's preference, but it's still not very often that someone says something blatantly negative about the brand.
×
×
  • Create New...