Audirvana to cambridge audio azur windows#

I can go on and on and give you a dozen personal examples from the years but I wont.īut im sure that most will argue because YOU use a Windows computer with Media Player and it sounds fine. Not just the hardware but their OS as well. Apple has always dominated the Music industry due to their superior quality.

IPads and other Tablets and phones are not so good - sorry.īut all of this is common sense and should not be a surprise.

Audirvana to cambridge audio azur mac#

So I will basically use a Mac mini with Roon or Amarra via USB DAC. Although I use Room more so which is a close second to Amarra.

Audirvana to cambridge audio azur for mac#

Software for Mac like iTunes not much better than Foobar.Īmarra for both Mac or Windows is by far the absolute best sounding software I've ever heard and still use. Software for Windows has usually not been so good either. While USB devices are obviously the best. The built-in Apple sound devices are actually rather good, very quiet. The Macs are quietist, lowest noise-floor, largest soundstage by a noticable margin compared to anything Windows.ĪS far as software and sound devices? The Windows built-in sound devices are always horrible and noisy while PCI and USB devices are always better. Specifically one with a SSD drive and a minimum of 8gb ram.Ī buddy tried a few tiny Linux machines and said none came close to the Apple products but were mostly better than the Windows boxes. And by far the Best sounding Mac is a Mini. The MacBooks (reg and Pros) are okay but not as good as an iMac. Of the Macs, the Hackintoshes were the least in audio quality and they were all expensive, high-end parts (Ive been building hot-rod computers since 1991, I've built many many dozens of them over the years). In no way are Any of the Windows computers, regardless of build, even close in sound quality to any Mac I've ever tried. HP and Dell laptops, Home built PC/Windows of High end Quality.Īpple MacBooks (pros), Mac mini's, Hackintoshes (home built Macs), HP laptop Hackintoshes. Myself and some friends have used and compared Many computers. I'm on a learning curve on this- and for those reading who have corrections or amplifications to anything I wrote- feel free. I won't know how much better the alternatives are until I try some of them, but some are mutually exclusive, e.g., from what I read (and I may be wrong about this), the Aurender doesn't like talking to a NAS and the remote only presents a file folder with track listings, not all the metadata and other stuff you'd want on a user interface. I don't offer any of this as an 'answer'- instead, I'm suggesting that it may be the wrong question.

You talk to the Sonore/Small Green Computer peeps and their answer seems to be to go optical, to isolate some of the computer crap from the DAC. I'm not necessarily in love with Audirvana especially now that it's gone to a subscription model because the remote is so bare bones and I don't want a computer screen in my listening room. some people love Roon (I gather the UI may be the best but the sound, according to several sources, isn't as good as Audirvana). Others have gone the route of a high quality DAC that will play via an Internet card and run a networked system using a pile of servers there must still be something that runs the playback software and file management but that's another 'path' that may take you away from alternatives- e.g. The problem isn't just one of expense, but once you've chosen a path, you may be locked in: a few have Aurender and like it, dramatically better than the Mac mini modded.

Audirvana to cambridge audio azur upgrade#

I run Audirvana on it and have a couple different DACs here to play with.Īlmost everybody I know who has dabbled in this has done the modded Mac mini only to upgrade to a designed for audio digital playback system.

Audirvana to cambridge audio azur mods#

I did not go to the trouble or expense of modding it to get rid of the switching power supply for a linear one, or do any of the other mods that many folks have done to improve its audio performance. I am a long time analog guy who only started to employ digital in my main system two years ago and did it on the cheap (relative to my analog front end) so I may be getting what I've paid for, but for the OP's purposes, the first question to me is why consider a general purpose computer at all? I have a Mac Mini (late 2014 model which was purchased new a couple years ago, right before the 'new' Mac mini came out). I'm willing to venture into this topic as long as you understand that I purport no expertise in things digital.