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For me its not the same experience but fair point...

Not sure about x86 with others than Volumio... My reasons why I like RPi (vs PC), first its very cheap - 35USD (+15for power + 15 for case), when you buy good HAT its 100-250 USD more, but still very reasonable price. 2. Its fanless - this is major point for me, I can put all my music on SD card and use it as server (and now Volumio can play Tidal directly- great) 3. it consume very little energy 4. I like to tinker :), try different OS, sometimes I use it as movie player...you can change it to tube headamp or whatever...its like LEGO Its not perfect solution for everyone (it has DIY look, some knowledge of computers and linux is very useful) but with those 502DAC or Allo HATs one can have serious sound quality, for reasonable price in very small and quite form factor...And Im very interested how far can this be pushed- few years ago there was only basic HATs and software (for “audiophile” playback) was lacking seriously. There is constant development there, both in hardware and software side...But If you are happy with x86 and dont find any benefits with those HATs thats perfectly fine...I would not say that RPi platform is better than x86 platform for music, it just different way of doing it. Im looking forward to your findings about Volumio on x86. BTW when on x86, did you ever tried Roon? While Im fan of Volumio, Roon is in different game - not in sound quality department but in the way how it can transform little bit dull digital playback in to fun (with its metadata, reviews, artist profiles, social networks and media connection...Im not aware of any other software that offer this kind of experience )

Well If you have great streamer and can choose from USB, S/PDIF than maybe USB would be better (I would argue that it depend on DAC you use because they usually dont have equally good inputs- meaning that USB is equal to S/PDIF or AES or vice versa) bur RPi does not have great USB output.. Allo state that Signature has measured jitter less than 400 femto seconds (tested at buffer)...From my test Digione signature RCA S/PDIF was considerably better than straight USB from my PC... BTW almost all RPi operating systems use web interface...Moode for sure has one, DietPi has one

Well If you have great streamer and can choose from and USB, S/PDIF than maybe USB would be better (I would argue that it depend on DAC you use because they usually dont have equally good inputs- meaning that USB is equal to S/PDIF or AES or vice versa) bur RPi does not have great USB output.. Allo state that Signature has measured jitter less than 400 femto seconds (tested at buffer)...From my test Digione signature RCA S/PDIF was considerably better than straight USB from my PC... BTW almost all RPi operating systems use web intergace...Moode for sure has one, DietPi has one

From my experience, sound quality of Raspberry Pi streamer depend greatly on what HAT you use, as Dmitre mentioned 502 DAC is great (I haven't heard it personally). I like very much Digione Signature powered by batteries. If you plan to use straight path from raspberry USB to your DAC I dont think you will hear benefits compared to NUC... With great S/PDIF transport you should beat regular PC or NUC or even a lot of commercial streamers easily... Also it is very easy to change operating system in Raspberry Pi- you just swap micro SD card in few seconds- so you can very easily try Volumio, Mood audio, picore player, ropieee etc and choose one you like most. Volumio is great, probably best UI and feature set of all RPi systems - you can stream Tidal and Qobuz (but this is with 2,99€ subscription) but I was experiencing dropouts regularly with higher than CD quality streaming... So with Volumio you have best UI but regarding sound quality I would try picore player or Moode...

Hi, my Recovery arrived last week. Here are my (mixed) findings so far: Build quality is disappointing, I know this is a budget device, but it is not cheap in any way and I have to say it feels very cheap. It is mislabelled and input USB connector broke after first plug and unplug of USB cable (little bit- left part of metal casing went out when I unplugged cable- I was able to push it back -it works so far )...Could be bad luck but it never happened to me before... On positive side -Recovery is really smaller than I expected from product pictures and improve sound of every DAC (all of them budget choices) I tried (but some of them don’t work with RUR). Tested it with 6 DACs: ODAC- OK (Linux Mint), TAGA THDA-500T- OK (Windows 10, Volumio, Moode) Violectric V200 internal 192kHz DAC- OK (Volumio) -------------------------------------------------------------------- Audinst HUD-mx2 (USB powered) - does not work, Creative SB1240- does not work, Fiio X5- does not work,