[esteban]

I had one as a courtesy loan from my dealer. I wanted to like it, but felt it was obscenely overpriced for what it actually offered and did. And clunky. Impressive built quality and looks, but the interface and overall functionality were, to be blunt, a mess. I'm used to my Oppo 105, which pretty much plays everything you throw at it without any issues or glitches or complicated set-ups. The Aurender felt like going backwards to me. I do not need the fancy app, and I felt as if that was the only component that the Oppo did not offer me (the Oppo's control app is rudimentary in comparison, but gets the job done perfectly... and I'm sure the upcoming Oppo 115 will fix this, anyway).

The perfect example of why I felt the Aurender was a little on the pointless side was presented to me when I tried to copy my +/- 2TB collection of music to its internal hard drive. The Aurender only has a USB 2.0 port (which I did not know...), so copying the files would have taken me literally 1 or 2 days... I then tried the ethernet port, which was supposed to be a gigabyte one... but no luck, either. The transfer rate was even slower than USB (and I have a very good router)... Probably a driver or similar issue, but after a while I gave up. These things are supposed to make life easier, and not the opposite.

Keep in mind that this is strictly a "server/file-reader/transport", without a DAC, and there is NO remote included, either. You really are at the mercy of the app.

I'm sure newer models in the Aurender line will address these issues, but, frankly, the more I test and experiment with other devices, the more I love my Oppo.