Wow, great, a HiFi Rose Dac.
I haven’t heard from my dealer when it will be available !
I’ll be looking for it too.
Yes I have all Hifi Rose electronics on one system now. My plan is to try the Piega speaker and have identical system like shown at AXPONA , and I still keep my Mcintosh , Weiss set up when I feel more like relaxing sound.
Hello,
If the subject is high-end music, wireless is out of the question. I have tried many things with wired and fiber. I can easily say that fiber cable still does not replace a quality cable. I tried this option again on my new devices that I bought 2 weeks ago and tested the fiber cable. I can say that the details are negatively affected with fiber compared to wired. I could last for about 5 minutes and then I went back to wired.
The ethernet cable I use is AQ Diamond, streamer RS130, dac Denafrips Terminator plus, power amp mastersound 845, pre Kinki EX P27, speakers focal micro utopia.
For your information.
No offence, Tweakhane, I can only agree with you that fiber cable isn’t perfect. Also, just like ordinary wire cables, different fiber cables sound differently. And it’s more difficult and time-consuming to find a good fiber one as there aren’t fiber cables made for HiFi yet. Users have to search by luck.
Your Diamond cable is surely a premium one. But price-performance wise, fiber cable is superb.
Despite the fact that I currently use wire LAN cable from switch to 130. Fiber connection was still remarkable to my ears over less-quality LAN cables. I am still exploring.
I had a PSU upgraded G2 which was excellent. I traded for an Aqua LinQ that was superior. Then traded for a RS130, which beat both.
When i added fiber optic connection through SFP to RS130 it did appear to add slightly more resolution
Great. Glad to hear that.
You may try different Fibre Optic Cables. They sound different too. So far I found the Corning Fibre the best.
Hi renderjoe,
I am new here and I wish to ask your input about the RS130/8351s combination.
I have two 8351s in my living room that I feel I’m not doing justice to. Right now my setup is Tidal streaming via wifi, record player via analog in and TV hdmi which all go inside a Bluesound Node. Then going out via optical towards a Hosa ODL-312, and then via AES towards the Genelecs 8351s.
As I am considering upgrading to a high end streamer, that covers all these inputs and digital output, I am looking closely at the RS130, but I want to ask you some questions, if possible.
If I am to get a Rosa RS130, do I still need external clocking in order to be in perfect match with the Genelecs high sensitivity, like your Mutec? Does the RS130 allow downsampling at different levels, like say 96khz specifically? Do the Audioquest cables and AC conditioning make a noticeable difference? Finally, did you try to include a ethernet switch, if yes, how is the difference?
Thank you in advance!
Hi massivecattack,
first of all - congrats to your Genelec 8351 speakers, they are great. I had the 8351A and now the 8351B (significant update to the A version!), these are great speakers!
Regarding the Genelec 8351B and the streamer connection.
I used the Genelecs in both ways, with analog signal (Auralic Aries / Vega) and digital signal (Auralic Aries G2 & Rose RS130), both ways produce great results with the Genelec, but I prefer the digital signal, because of cleaner sound (in my oppinion) and because of technical concept (no additional AD/DA conversion on the genelec). But you can color the sound more as you like with a D/A converter.
Regarding your questions:
-
do I still need external clocking in order to be in perfect match with the Genelecs high sensitivity, like your Mutec? → no, you dont need, because I think the Genelecs are not very sensitive against jitter, but the Mutec does improve the sound, it is audible but not massive. For me the Mutec is genius because of his flexibility for re-clocking & switching between different inputs / protocolls for feeding the Genelecs, e.g. I switch between digital AES Output of my RS130 for music to Optical S/PDIF from my TV with just one press of a button. And if you want you can resample to 96kHZ hardware based…
-
does the RS130 allow downsampling at different levels, like say 96khz specifically? → yes, it does, but I did not test it or compare the sound quality against ROON resampling or hardware resampling with the Mutec. But I use ROON resampling to 24/96 of everything, because the Genelec use a internal signal processing of 24/96 (and 24/48 for bass)
-
do the Audioquest cables and AC conditioning make a noticeable difference? → oh yes, they do. The biggest surprise for me are the Audioquest power cables, I never expect such an audible difference. The AC conditioning does some more magial things to the sound. The AQ AC conditioning & cables are a no brainer…
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finally, did you try to include a ethernet switch, if yes, how is the difference? → I did not try a ethernet switch, because the improvement of RS130, Mutec and AQ AC conditioning & cables for me sounds so perfect, that I do not have the urge to invest money & time in more finetuning. I could believe that there is some more potential, especially with the RS130 (optical fibre LAN/USB, external reclocking), but this probably last 5% could be so money & time consuming…
If you read all my post, I was very unhappy with the RS130, because of the bad software. But Rose improved a lot and today I think they are competetive (not the best, but absolut ok). Soundwise the RS130 is absolut stunning, the look, the material quality & build quality is exceptional.
Summarized - the Genelec 8351B, connected digital with AES with the Mutec, connected digital with AES with the RS130, and using a good AC conditioning with good power cables (I can recommend AQ) is a very clean & straight solution that works flawlessy and can be the last digital equipment you need…until 8351C, new Mutec and RS140 is launched… 
Hi renderjoe,
Thank you so much for the detailed reply. I also have the 8351Bs and they are indeed incredible speakers, hence my quest for that flawless set up
Just to get more insights from your setup that sounds amazing. Which Mutec model are you using? Do you control all volumes from the Mutec? I have a similar case where I would like to have the TV part of the setup as well, but the RS130 can’t get signal from the TV as far as I understood.
Also the Audioquest, which cables and which AC conditioning models are you running? Do you have experience with other brands, like Isotek maybe?
When you say the Rose RS130 is not the best but absolute okay, do you mean just the software part? If not, do you believe I should look at other streamers without doubling or tripling the budget?
Again thank you so much for the guidance
Hi massivecattack,
I am using the MUTEC MC3+USB Re-Clocker. The volume for the Genelecs is controlled by the GLM-Kit / Remote. The signal from the TV goes directly into the MUTEC (Optical SPDIF) and is switched on demand on the MUTEC (TV audio using Optical SPDIF input, Hifi audio from RS130 using digital AES input) - just a click on a button on the MUTEC.
For AC conditioning I am using the Audioquest Niagra 1200 with AQ Monsoon to the wall outlet (Furutec) and AQ NRG-Z3 to the RS130 and the MUTEC. The power cable to the Genelecs is selfmade because of the longer distance and because I have to put the cable thru a hole in the wall which was to small for a big plug, for the cable I use Supra LoRad 2.5 Silver Anniversary Edition with SinnOxx BL01 Gold plugs - a high quality and economic solution. I didn´t try other AC conditioner, but read a lot of reviews and the AQ Niagra 1200 was always on top of the affordable solutions. And in my experience it make a difference (I tested it with standard power cables step by step with upgrading power cables to the AQ power cables, each step made a improvement, as a whole system it is a big improvement).
Regarding the RS130: EVERYTHING on this device is great - sound & build quality, connection flexibility, improvements thru external enhancements like clock & fibre. If I have to highlight one of these, its the exceptional sound quality. My only complaint at the beginning was the software quality (not the stability, this was always very good - but the usability and the features). But there were a lot of updates and actually the software is absolutly ok - but not on top of streamer software. Because I mostly use ROON, this is not important for me - but believe me, you can use the Rose streaming software without need of ROON, it is completly acceptable & stable. If you can & will afford ROON you get a better user experience on top. And looking for a streamer with douple / triple the price of the RS130 - I would not, because the RS130 is probably 95% of what is achievable for serious money.
Hopefully I can help and give you some helpful information!
Regards, renderjoe
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Pretty much the same thing everyone says. Thank god I use roon. I would have been really made if I got this expecting to use that for streaming alone. Unit might have gone back. I support software (not nearly as complex as this) but in any case no matter how simple it is, if the user experience sucks, people will not use it.
And yes with Roon the RS130 is fantastic.
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Hi renderjoe,
Thank you so much for sharing the detailed setup.
A last opinion question if I may. If you are in my position and you have a vinyl collection with a vinyl player (analog rca / usb - and you don’t mind changing it if necessary) you wish to include in this setup, what would you do/get, and how would you set it up?
Optional, I also have a Meze Elite and an Aune S9C Pro as part of my audio setup, I can run them separate via USB from my ipad (Tidal) when I get the RS130 but in case there is a setup that can include the Elite in the mix, it’s more than welcome.
Thank you!
I have to disagree with this. There seems to be this perception on this forum that fiber cables can sound different. That is physically impossible. Fiber cables transfer LIGHT. It is physically impossible for any well made fiber cable to impact that transfer of light in any way that will affect sound quality. Now transceivers absolutely can have an impact as different transceivers work better (or in cases don’t work at all) in different products. They will absolutely have an impact. But light is light, there is no way to alter light unlike bits or analog signals, with a cable.
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Fiber Optic prevents noise which thus provides better sound quality than cables that permit noise to interfere with the audio signal. (Noise like Radio Frequency Interence which comes from smart devices, etc.)
That is true. But it is also true that transcivers can not change the bits (if they work within standard) and cable can not also alter bits. Main difference is possibility of transfering ground plane modulation. But on well designed products and home electric network they should be no difference at all between any short lenght digital connection. We do not live in last century, today DAC technology is very prone to any incoming noise.
@Burle if this is true why not just use a RPI for streaming and a cheap Topping DAC? Audio Measurements (sic) Review has several glowing reviews for Topping. Bits are just bits, right?
RPi is a superior streamer. The 150/250/520 at least look nicer than Toppings and come with some warranty support…
i think you have hard time to understand basic digital audio terms. I was talking about digital. Yes, whatever source is bit perfect is the same as the most expensive digital transport on the world if they are connected to a DAC with a memory buffer. As the data from one server (this text, for instance) always flows error free to another point in the network, so is the same for the data going serially over S/PDIF from one memory (in streamer) to another (in DAC). The sound is determinated in analog conversion. It is not possible to alter the digital sound in pure transmission network. Because, you are right - bits are bits all the way until conversion. So, if you did not understand, DAC quality is very important, but until signal is in the digital domain nothing in the cables can not alter it.