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Post by kauai82 on May 4, 2016 13:03:23 GMT -5
As you can see from my signature below I have numerous systems in the house. Since I have upgraded my office system with the Primaluna recently and have it almost paid for I am turning my attention to the family room system. I watch very few movies downstairs as the wife does not like the loudness of most move soundtracks. But I do like to stream music from my laptop running JRiver to my Sony Blu-ray BDP-S6500 then to the Marantz NR1403 then to my Tango DIY speakers that are not that efficient speakers. The Tango's are the Tweeter - Midrange version of the MTM (midrange-tweeter-midrange) Denham speaker kit that can be found on the DIY Soundgroup web site. They are very balance and neutral but because of my poor acoustic characteristics of my family room which is very boomy and large they do not sound as good as they are capable of in a better acoustic setting. I have suggested acoustic treatments to my wife but that idea did not go far. She does not like the look of them. I use the downstairs system in a 3.1 configuration because the wife says no to back speakers.
So I am some what limited in funds and what I can do in the family room. I want to stream my ALAC files on my laptop to a DNLA device. My Sony BDP-S6500 will only play ALAC files from a USB source not a DNLA. It converts the ALAC to MP3 when I use it as a media streamer. I have gone in and changed my settings in JRiver so there is no conversion of the original files so JRiver is not the problem. I am very happy with the Sony Blu-ray picture quality. So I use to think that my so-so quality of the sound in the family room was due to the Marantz NR1403, but I am starting to reevaluate that assumption. With a cd or USB ALAC the system sounds pretty good considering the room. So forum members which way should I go in my upgrade path ?
1. Buy a decent AVR receiver with DNLA capabilities that will stream ACLA from Accessories 4 Less like a Marantz SR5009 or SR5010 for around $450 to $600. I like the Marantz because I can use an outboard amp in the future if I want. Keep the Sony Blu-ray player
2. Buy a some what decent AVR that DNLA streams in ALAC and spend $350 to $400 reconditioned like a Denon and not have the flexibility of adding a amp later but save some dollars up front. Keep the Sony player
3. Keep the Marantz NR1403 and upgrade the Sony Blue-Ray player to an Oppo 103 that (at least will, I believe it will stream DNLA in ALAC from my laptop )and spend $500, maybe less with the new 4K Oppo's coming out in the fall if thy blow them out when they discontinue them.
4. Wait for Emotiva to develop a replacement for the Fusion 8100 (which I love upstairs and don't want to move ) and then find a streaming device to do what I want. But that means waiting (not my long suite) and more money than I would like to spend.
5. Hope that some nice Forum member can recommend a music streamer that is DNLA and Streams ALAC that does not cost an arm and a leg. I had a Denon streaming network paid $300 for it and did not like the SQ of it so I sold it.
Thanks in advance for the advice. Matt
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klinemj
Emo VIPs 
Honorary Emofest Scribe
Posts: 14,744
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Post by klinemj on May 4, 2016 15:26:15 GMT -5
When you say you want a streamer that doesn't cost an arm and a leg, what's your price range?
Mark
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Post by kauai82 on May 4, 2016 16:28:39 GMT -5
I would like to stay around the $500 to $600 price range.
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Post by Soup on May 4, 2016 17:24:11 GMT -5
What about a used WD Live for $50+?
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Post by kauai82 on May 4, 2016 18:14:35 GMT -5
What about a used WD Live for $50+? Not familiar with it. What is it ? How is the SQ ? Would one of the Apple streamers do the job ? |
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Post by kauai82 on May 4, 2016 18:31:22 GMT -5
Did research on WD Live+ and does not support ALAC unfortunately.
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Post by MusicHead on May 4, 2016 20:31:03 GMT -5
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Post by garbulky on May 4, 2016 21:27:04 GMT -5
wait for blu ray 4k b4 oppo purchase!
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Post by kauai82 on May 5, 2016 7:05:41 GMT -5
Thanks for the link. From what I have read jriver will work with a Roku media app. I will pick one up in the next couple of days and see if it works .. |
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Post by mshump on May 5, 2016 7:57:30 GMT -5
Would this work? AURALiC Aries Mini Wireless Streamer - Demo Item # 1ACARIESMI The link doesn't seem to work right. It is under clearance items it is a demo linkMark |
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Post by kauai82 on May 5, 2016 11:48:35 GMT -5
Would this work? AURALiC Aries Mini Wireless Streamer - Demo Item # 1ACARIESMI The link doesn't seem to work right. It is under clearance items it is a demo linkMark Thanks for the link. Yes I would believe it will work. I will try the Roku first and see what the SQ is with the Roku and go from there. |
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Post by kauai82 on May 6, 2016 12:43:42 GMT -5
Got the Roku 3 yesterday, refurbished for $70 and hooked it up and as normal was disappointed at first. The first problem was it had a handshake problem on HDMI to the Marantz NR1403. First time I have ever had that happen with the Marantz. Went direct HDMI to the Samsung 4k 55 inch 6500 series HDTV and no problem with the handshake so not sure where the problem is, the Roku or the Marantz. Set up the Roku had to reboot the Roku first and then found the Roku Media Program and with no problem it found my Laptop upstairs running JRiver Media 19. Started streaming and was pretty happy with the sound. Could tell it was decoding the ALAC file and not converting it to a MP3 but did not sound as good as I had hoped. Much better than the Sony Blu-ray. Then the problem arose that I was hoping would not happen. Streaming dropouts. Every couple of minutes the sound would drop out as the wireless system was not able to keep up. I have the Roku and the TV Ethernet hard wired to the router. But the laptop is upstairs and hooked in wirelessly to the home network. That was the weak link in the network speed wise. I could hook the laptop to the Roku but then the wife wants no part of the laptop in the living room. She and I have iPads to do the surfing of the net when downstairs. The women has a phobia to wires of any kind !
When I was testing the Roku 3 I discovered that the Samsung was picking up my laptop on the home network. I discovered to my surprise that the Samsung HDTV has a very nice media streaming capability that I did not know about. Very nice interface and sounded pretty good. It was converting the ALAC to MP3 and for most casual listening would be acceptable to the vast majority of the people for their streaming needs. But unfortunately for me it fell short of my expectations. I needed (or as my wife would say "I wanted" ) the best sound possible out of the family room given the rooms acoustic limitations.
The Roku 3 has a USB input so I decided to try my portable hard drive from my laptop to see how that sounded in the family room system. Bingo the Roku found the hard drive and found my music files and boy did it sound good. Much better than trying to stream the music. The music finally had the dynamics that I was looking for. It did not sound as good as the Primaluna or the Music room systems but much better than I had hoped for with my bottom of the line Marantz NR1403 receiver. Very happy for the first time with the family room systems sound quality. I have since switched out the portable hard drive for a 128GB thumb drive plugged it to the Roku 3. I tried the thumb drive with it plugged in to the Samsung at it sound very good, but not as good as through the Roku. I prefer the interface on the Samsung TV as it looks nice and works well, but the Roku sounded better so I will put up with the simplistic UI.
Just a note on the Roku 3 using it as a streamer. Turn off the screen saver on the Roku in the settings screen. It has a tendency to lock up the file transfer from the thumb drive when it starts up. Hope this helps people that want to interface a hard drive or thumb drive to there audio system and wants a easy way to control the media files ie. shuffle the playing of the music files from an external drive. The problem with the Sony Blue Ray was I could not shuffle the songs and it gets old listening to the same music in the same order with the thumb drive. Not bad for a $90 (new price ) and it will keep me happy until Emotiva puts out a new AVR in the next six (I hope ) months.
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Post by Soup on May 6, 2016 14:24:12 GMT -5
What about a pono player? It plays ALAC files.
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Post by MusicHead on May 6, 2016 14:37:13 GMT -5
Glad that the Roku worked! Strange the issue with the dropouts. I have a super old Roku HD (just to give you an idea, the video output is 720p) which I also use to stream content from my main computer over my home Wi-Fi network. Mainly not music, but TV shows or movies which I record via a HDTV OTA tuner installed in my computer. I use Plex to do that and I have never experienced dropouts even when streaming 1080p recorded HD content transcoded by Plex and streamed at the maximum bitrate allowed.
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Post by kauai82 on May 16, 2016 11:01:04 GMT -5
Glad that the Roku worked! Strange the issue with the dropouts. I have a super old Roku HD (just to give you an idea, the video output is 720p) which I also use to stream content from my main computer over my home Wi-Fi network. Mainly not music, but TV shows or movies which I record via a HDTV OTA tuner installed in my computer. I use Plex to do that and I have never experienced dropouts even when streaming 1080p recorded HD content transcoded by Plex and streamed at the maximum bitrate allowed. Finally traced the drop out issues on the streaming of Music to the Roku 3 to a handshake issue with the HDMI cable. It was the reason that I could not get a steady stream of music. Bought a new cable and threw the old one away and now I get great sound from the Roku 3 with no dropouts. Now to wait for the Oppo 4k UHD Blu-ray unit to come out in the fall. |
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Post by MusicHead on May 16, 2016 12:58:59 GMT -5
Glad that the Roku worked! Strange the issue with the dropouts. I have a super old Roku HD (just to give you an idea, the video output is 720p) which I also use to stream content from my main computer over my home Wi-Fi network. Mainly not music, but TV shows or movies which I record via a HDTV OTA tuner installed in my computer. I use Plex to do that and I have never experienced dropouts even when streaming 1080p recorded HD content transcoded by Plex and streamed at the maximum bitrate allowed. Finally traced the drop out issues on the streaming of Music to the Roku 3 to a handshake issue with the HDMI cable. It was the reason that I could not get a steady stream of music. Bought a new cable and threw the old one away and now I get great sound from the Roku 3 with no dropouts. Now to wait for the Oppo 4k UHD Blu-ray unit to come out in the fall. Glad it worked. My Roku has been super reliable for all these years and still going strong. Once I get a new TV (hopefully a 4k OLED  ) I am definitely getting their new top of the line box. |
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) I am definitely getting their new top of the line box.