For whatever reason, I went and ordered a Wiim Ultra streamer today. A big sale on Amazon knocked $50 off of it.

The laptop that I use as a source has been doing strange Windows stuff as of late, so I figured it was time to move into this decade and do what all of the cool kids are doing.

The plan is to output it to my DAC and go from there.

I might get Qobuz, a year is only $180, I spend that much on music every couple of months, so it might be cheaper???

I also see that I can connect my computer from JRiver through wifi and stream all of what I have already bought through the years.

This cheap Chi-Fi stuff is going to change my ways.

CAJames,
I'm interested in how sound quality will suffer, or possibly, with any luck, stay the same.

Right now I'm going down the rabbit hole of picking a streaming service, Tidal or qobuz.
I was leaning towards qobuz until I queried about the depth of music they have available in my slightly skewed musical taste and it supposedly isn't as deep as I would prefer. It leans heavily into Jazz and Classical, not exactly my cup of tea. Not that it is a bad cup of tea for others, just as I abhor the taste of alcohol or coffee, I have no problems for others to enjoy it.

I've also discovered that I can stream from my collection on my current computers over wi-fi to the Wiim lossless. I see that as a great backup plan.

So now the big question is did I waste $279 just so that I can unhook my laptop from my DAC??

I did just get a email from Amazon that the Wiim is out for delivery, so soon I will figure out if the money was truly wasted.

I don’t have any issues with Qobuz; I have been a subscriber for at least 4-5 years now and they have improved tremendously during this time. I would say my tastes are pretty broad and to date there are only two albums that I want that they don’t have - both extremely obscure.

When people post music on this forum I generally give it a play and I can’t recall a time that a recommendation wasn’t available on Qobuz. To say that Qobuz is slanted towards jazz or classical I think just reflects that both categories have huge discography’s and not that Qobuz favors any particular style of music.

Well I got the Wiim dropped off at my doorstep and hooked it up, and my first impression was the feeling of being kinda disappointed.

The setup of the streamer wasn't too bad other than it started setting up twice on top of itself for some reason, most likely self inflicted.  
Have I mentioned that I truly dislike using my phone as a remote control. Why is it that our TV's keep getting larger and our phone screens keep getting smaller, I don't want a magnifying glass to find music, rant over!

I originally connected the Wiim to my Denafrips DAC with a Wyred 4 Sound "Digital" cable and started streaming from Pandora. Well that sucked hind teat, flat and lifeless. I mean just dead music (no not The Grateful Dead) absolutely no life to it.
OK I thought, Pandora sucks for streaming quality, I knew that already, time to up my game.

So the next thing was to hook up one of my external USB drives to the Wiim.  Well it took a little while for the Wiim to chew through a TB of information on the drive to give me a index of what was on it. Well 2100 albums and 22,790 tracks later I was able to play it.
A considerable improvement was heard, but still not close to what I had from my laptop. So then a new plan was needed.

I had read that the Wiim would work across a connected network, so after a few minutes using AI I was able to connect my computer to the Wiim wirelessly. In fact it was stupid easy to do once I read the instructions that AI gave me. The Wiim's included instructions were somewhere between weak and sucking donkey balls, and much closer to the Jackass end of the spectrum.

So after I did the DLNA connection thing the sound quality took another step in the right way, a fairly big step at that, but still not there.

I only had one more thing to try that the instructions had absolutely no information about, using a USB connection between the streamer and the DAC.  So yet again I went to AI to ask for some sort of information after seeing that there was nothing in the menu about USB output at all.
Well it turns out that the USB output only works once it sees a DAC hooked up to it and then it allows you to connect up to the streamer, weird.

Well once I got that all hashed out the sound quality has finally matched what I was getting from my laptop.
So basically what I have gained so far is untethering my laptop from my DAC.

My next step will be trying out different streaming services to see what one I like. I have a feeling that it will be qobuz but I need to look at what they actually have to offer in Texas songwriter music.
Onward and upward!

I’ve never been known for my popular ideas, Donnie, but if you did all that and got the same SQ you already have with the laptop I’d send the WIIM back and stick with the laptop. You can always stream tidal or Qobuz from your laptop if you want to dip your toes in those waters for more music options.

Yep, I get it. My last conversation with Steve he said, “once you hear better sound you can’t un-hear it.” But likewise once an annoyance gets under my skin I also can’t un-hear it.

New stuff is always fun, anyway. Part of the adventure.

Donnie….good call,  I had a Tidal subscription for years along with Qobuz and really enjoyed them both.  Then my daughter and wife were bugging me about Spotify.  So I opted to sacrifice Tidal and switch to Spotify only out of dollars and sense.   Couldn’t justify 3 streaming services plus a Roon subscription, so unfortunately Tidal became the sacrificial lamb.  

Enjoy!

Donnie, would you say the sound quality from streaming is comparable to playing files locally on the streamer?

One more thing to consider is how these streaming services compensate artists. Qobuz pays the music makers more than any of the other streaming services per streamed song. Spotify is the worst, Tidal is better, but Qobuz pays about 50% more than Tidal per stream. I've been happily with Qobuz the past few years. Only a few times I couldn't find what I was looking for. Also, you can by hi-rez songs from them too to add to your library. Don't work for them, just like 'em.

One of my great fears of streaming has been alleviated.
I found out that I don't need to pick every song out individually and put them on a playlist, I am able to pick a artist or song and then pick a playlist with similar songs.
It really opens up my listening choices and interduces me to things I haven't heard before. A huge plus.

I've never wanted to be a DJ, I'll never be as cool as Johnny Fever! (I'm showing my age there).

"As God as my witness, I thought turkeys could fly" may be the best from that show, a close second was Johnny drinking shots and hitting the buzzer faster as he went.

Anyhow, I've also got a Wiim Ultra. I use Roon on a Mac Pro at my desk and gave the Wiim a try as it connects to Roon wirelessly as an endpoint which streams uncompressed. I have the Wiim going into a Schiit Bifrost, I never tried the internal DAC or any of the other settings. This is in a bedroom for sleepy time tunes. Works well enough for that, it's definitely not the weak link in that chain. Nothin else fancy in that setup, just wanted a way to play files from the desktop to bedroom without horrible degradation or dropouts. After setting it up it's been running 24/7 for 4 months or so and never had an issue so far.

I don't use Tidal or Qobuz which I consider streaming, is playing files over the network streaming?

Interestingly enough this streaming stuff has really opened up my listening experience.
I have a fairly large collection of music that I built up over the years, but streaming Tidal has pointed out that there is so much music that I haven't listened to.
There are albums of favorite artists that for some reason or another that I hadn't bought, there are artists that for what ever reason or another that I never bought. You know the kind of "side artists" that are in parallel to your tastes but you never took the plunge into their pool.
Then you get into the stuff that you've never heard of or disregarded as not your flavor.

I'm really having fun listening to this vast array of music. I'm listening a lot more now. It really points out that I had more or less stuck myself in a comfortable corner musicly.

I couldn’t agree more, Donnie. Between streaming and radio I am always being reminded of how much great music there is out there that was off my radar. Having a great sounding system also helps appreciate music I may have thought I didn’t like before, too. This really rings true with international music- the older I get the less I feel inclined to travel but my system can be a window to other places and other cultures. There’s nothing better for me than to click play on something that I have absolutely no idea what it is and just fall in.

So now I am down the slippery slope as well.  Thanks to Donnie’s recommendation… I acquired the Ampapa D1 amplifier to use in my office as a desktop set up. The amp has exceeded my expectations in every way.  The only annoying feature (which is probably fixable in the phones settings) is the Bluetooth protocol when streaming music from my iPhone. While I am on a call and/or use Siri, the music pauses until I hang up the call.

With that being said, I opted to connect my Google Chromecast audio streamer to the amplifier which allows me to listen to music over Wi-Fi versus Bluetooth, in addition to connecting to Roon via Chromecast.  Now I am able to be on the phone and utilize Siri without having any music interruptions.  One caveat that now presents itself is that every once in a while the Wi-Fi on the Chromecast drops out and I get a momentary pause in music. It’s not horrible and it only happens every now and then but it’s nonetheless annoying.

So now I am going down the rabbit hole once again and looking at the WiiM Pro or the ProPlus that allows me to connect to Roon on my home network via ethernet.  Then I started utilizing AI to compare the DAC  sections of the Google Chromecast Audio versus the WiiM…and then I went into Left-field and compared the price range of a WiiM to a Schiit Modi DAC.  Talk about a conundrum as I am trying to keep this as low budget as possible.

Thanks Donnie…I’ll take a look at it.  As usual I’ll do a spec comparison with with WiiM product line with Ali to at least see on paper the differences.  I just saw that Darko Audio has a video review on YT, so I’ll take a look at that.  I like his reviews…pretty straightforward.

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I haven’t used my Google Chromecast in years, and brought it out of retirement for my office setup.  I can concur that I am hearing a diminished sound quality as opposed to being directly connected.  To be fair…the Chromecast Audio puck is older technology by comparison and was only like $35 bucks when it was introduced in the market.  At the time it was the best and cheapest solution to stream audio directly to an amp with stereo inputs, esp. if you utilized the mini toslink optical connection allowing you to get 24/96 Hi Res audio.  I’m going to live with my setup for a while, and see how things go.  I have to keep reminding myself that it’s an office setup.  But as audiophiles say….once you hear better sounding music….its hard to unhear it.

Well now to tell my tales of my new El-Cheapo Fosi S3 streamer, as it arrived today and quickly took all of my attention away from my speaker project.

The Jungle company was quick getting it to me and the young lady that delivered it was exceptionally nice.

It was really boxed nicely, these Chi-Fi places have really gotten their packaging tarted up like all of the super expensive guys have.

No money was wasted on any kind of instructions beyond the usual warnings about licking the power outlets or inserting cables into various orifices of your body.

I then plugged it in and spent the next 3 or 4 hours trying to get my iPhone and Wi-Fi to actually hook up with it.
I may have gotten very frustrated and used words in combinations that would make a Chief Petty Officer blush.
I am not exaggerating in the least by saying that I downloaded and deleted Fosi's app at least 10 times. It would just sit there and not hook up to anything at all. I took it upstairs and hooked it directly into the router to take Wi-Fi out of the picture, no luck.
So I unplugged everything for a hour or two to perhaps reset everything.

I then had a idea that might just work. I went out in the garage and got my 10 year old Samsung phone that I use as a music server on my garage system. It took their app better than my Apple and after a couple of minutes of poking at stuff, things began to work. At first the Fosi would only work over Bluetooth, then after 5 minutes of that it finally recognized my Wi-Fi!

I then took the risk and tried out my Apple again and finally it worked as advertised.

So how does it sound? Well it has only been running for an hour, so I'm sure it will change as it gets some hours on it.
But as of right now, it is ok. I turned on my Wiim Ultra running into my Denafrips DAC, no contest between them at this time, the Fosi is very thin in comparison.

I'm just hoping that tomorrow I will be able to turn it on and everything will work.
The things I will do just to have XLR jacks to power some silly little kit amplifiers!