D02X...awesome! The W20 arrived at my dealer today and I'm on an airplane:-( I'll update when I'm back home. Happy new year!!

Thanks so much! Happy new year!

Congrats Dave on your Aurender W20, a beautiful looking and sounding component!

Can anyone outline the differences between the Aurender W20 and N10? I'm in the market for a music server.

Thanks so much,
Ken

Ken.......I'll give it a whirl but may not touch on all the differences that perhaps an Aurender design engineer could reveal.

The W20 comes with 12TB of hard drive capacity. The N10 comes with 4TB of hard drive capacity but can be ordered with 8TB.

The W20 has a totally different and unique DC power supply that uses three separate banks of batteries. Two of the three banks of lithium-ion rechargeable batteries occupy a large part of the W20 interior. They provide clean, silent power to the audio output circuits, essentially keeping them immune to power supply noise and utility power fluctuations. One set of the two large bank of batteries is being charged as the other is being used. The third battery bank protects the W20 from power loss. Should the W20 experience utility power outage, this third battery bank acts as an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) and will automatically power down the music server in a safe manner to protect the stored data. The Aurender N10 has two separate isolated linear power supplies that independently power the digital and analog sections of the music server. There are no battery provisions in the N10

Both the W20 and the N10 use an amazingly accurate OCXO (oven controlled crystal oscillator) with a field programmable gate array phase locked loop system. Together this arrangement reduces jitter to near immeasurable levels. Both music servers use the Aurender Conductor app via an iPad for wireless control and access to the music library and Tidal if you subscribe to that streaming service. Both music servers use a 240GB solid state drive to cache data from the hard drives for playback.

The W20 supports external word clocks and master clocks. The N10 does not have this provision. The W20 provides dual-wire AES/EBU mode that allows separate left and right channels to be fed to independent mono DAC's. The N10 has a single AES/EBU digital output that only supports dual channel operation. Both the W20 and the N10 have two coaxial digital outputs, one Toslink digital output, and one USB 2.0 output.

Both the W20 and the N10 provide support for connection of a network attached storage. This requires use of AMM (Aurender Media Manager) software. Both the W20 and the N10 provide remote Internet technical support through the Conductor App that allows Aurender's engineers to quickly diagnose and fix problems over the Internet.

Both the W20 and the N10 use the same aluminum enclosure and display with identical control functions. Both the W20 and the N10 can be ordered in silver or black.

If there are any main board or digital output circuit differences it will take an engineer to make those explanations but I believe I have touched on the primary differences. I hope this proves useful in helping you make a decision.

Hi Dan,

I want to thank you so much for taking the time to write such an in-depth explanation of the differences between the W20 and N10. This information will be extremely useful in helping me to make my decision. I honestly don't think I can go wrong either way.

Happy New Year!
Ken

Ken.......You are welcome. I agree there is no wrong way to go with the Aurender W20 or the N10. I am totally amazed with the performance of my N10. Happy shopping. ;)

Ken,
I'm on vacation with my family right now but the W20 is waiting for me back home. Out of the box, I'll listen without the clock and see if I notice a big jump in performance when I add the G-01. It's one of the main reasons I opted for the W20 over the N10. Based on what I've read here and elsewhere, the N10 is a formidable piece of hardware but I felt I needed to use the clock in case I move away from disc spinning(not likely)...I couldn't just let it sit there. Happy New Year!

Dave

Thanks Dave. It sounds like you had some good reasons for choosing the W20. I'll be anxious to hear your impressions with and without the G-01 clock. It sounds like both the W20 and N10 have a great clock to begin with. I also own a K-01X, so the G-01 clock could be a worthwhile option for me as well, if I went with the W20.

Best,
Ken

Dan, can you enlighten me about the differences between the N10 and the N100X?

docmd2010.......There is no N100X that I am aware of. The Aurender 100 series includes the following:

N100 – has 120 GB SSD $2495
N100H – has 120GB SSD and 2TB HD $2695
X100-6TB – 120GB SSD/6TB HD $3499
X100L-12TB – 120GB SSD/12TB HD $3899

The N100 series has smaller hard drives, the X100 series have larger hard drives, and slightly taller chassis. All of the 100 Series provide only USB output, half the cache SSD size of the N10.

This is a pdf brochure that shows the Aurender line of music servers and other Aurender products.

http://www.pearlaudiovideo.com/media/Aurender-Line.pdf