Aurrender N10 vs Auralic Aries G2 Sound differences

[George Prentice]

Originally Posted by rob725

Also, have you tried connecting the aries to your dac via AES or spdif instead of usb, which may sound more akin to your CD transort? The aries has very good clocks for a streamer.

I currently have the Aries connected to my DAC via USB and by optical. I read somewhere that someone liked the USB better. My USB is breaking in. Just from a quick listen to both, they sound similar. Although if the connector breaks in like most interconnects,then it will sound better.

I do not have any interest in storing files. Tidal should have all or most of my CDs, so I don’t see the point. I was able to do A-B comparisons between the Tidal version and my CD, there was no obvious difference.

As far as my vinyl... well, when I really really want to enjoy a recording, I go there. I have a very high quality vinyl collection. Under most circumstances my vinyl will out perform my digital end... but fortunately not by so much that it stops me from listening to the digital end. By the way, I barely used my Sim-Moon DAC before I added the separate 820S power supply. It pulled the DAC up very close to the analog end.

[George Prentice]

Thank you Rob for the rabbit hole explaination, that was what I was looking for. Excellent overview. It sounds like you are confirming what I am thinking: in general once you reach a certain level, by in large the streamer doesn’t make a big difference, and the Auralic is in that category. From what you said, what stands out in my mind is that noise is something that could potentially be lower and lower with better streamers. When I was considering a streamer, I wrote off the Aurrender because I would not want spinning and unreliable hard drives. I realize they shut the drives down, but I really don’t want anything that unreliable in my audio equipment... besides owning / storing bits is old school... I’ve got lots of that.

Also the Auralic does have a USB input. I correctly have it connected by optical and USB. I was hoping to be able to switch back and forth with the remote software, but you can’t. The USB is still breaking in. So far I haven’t heard a difference between the two, but I haven’t tried.

[rob725]

George, I think USB is probably the way to go in your case at any rate. The Aries seems to have a good implementation and it lets your dac control the timing.

As always, much depends on one's other components and what's trying to be achieved. Your case is most basic: you do not wish to stream locally stored files and you do not use roon, wishing only to stream from Tidal and/or Qubuz. Therefore, how well your streamer interacts with those services, how well you like its interface, if you find it's various DSP options useful and other things are all important for you. Whereas by contrast, I am using roon for control and SQ options and to do buffering on my streamer, so my streamer is pretty dumb and doesn't provide much on it's own. Since you don't stream local, dsd hi-rez is not really important, and I'm not sure your dac does much with dsd. But if you ever change your mind and decide to try some DSD files, the Aries can convert them on the fly to PCM so your dac can handle them. Similar with MQA; you can choose to let the Aries decode it, or if your dac can support it, you can set the Aries up to pass it on unaltered to the dac. If in the future, you were to decide to use roon, the Aries can do that too.

Then there are the streaming dac options. In theory, it would seem (so long as noise is tamed) that they would have the best chance to keep everything timed correctly and provide the opportunity for the best sound quality. And maybe they do; there are several highly regarded dacs that allow you to plug the ethernet cable in directly. What I find odd is that with several of them, they do not support as high a sample rate through their ethernet port as they do their usb port. Maybe there is simply not enough real estate to adequately build a powerful streamer and powerful dac in the same box for some manufacturers.

[George Prentice]

Thanks Rob,

I read somewhere the USB input is better and separate from SP/DIF / optical. I like having my streamer separate and really like my DAC... so, sounds like I am in a good place. I just ordered some Focal Utopia headphones for my headphone system (Ayre QB-9 / Woo) that is using an IPad Pro as streamer... I am shocked at how good it sounds. I’ll have to try the Aries and see what the difference is.

Thank you for your comments.

[rob725]

Wasn't suggesting you change; just sharing some thoughts as I have been looking at streamers, dacs and streaming dacs for a future project.

Given the quality of the Ayre and the work they do on their USB interface and noise control, it would not surprise me if you heard no difference at all. Are you using the tidal app on the IPP? Also, do you have the tidal HiFi subscription?

[George Prentice]

Interesting. I opened up the Aries control app on my iPad and there was all 2,000 of my albums that I have stored on my network. Nice when technology works without have to fight it. So, I guess I may access that as well. I have some high-Rez files I have purchased over the years.

[George Prentice]

Originally Posted by rob725

Given the quality of the Ayre and the work they do on their USB interface and noise control, it would not surprise me if you heard no difference at all. Are you using the tidal app on the IPP? Also, do you have the tidal HiFi subscription?

I use Tidal on my iPad. Yes, I have a high-FI subscription. The best $19.95 monthly expense ever! My library went from 4,000 albums to virtually infinity in a split second. Lots in higher quality than Red Book. What a game changer from physically collecting disks... or even files.