[rudy49]

Just look at what you said there...36hrs! I have a streamer that costs over 1,000 dollars and it has never run for that period of time without some kind of hiccup! No with the lights being out that indicates a loss of power, or a reset. I think you need to be realistic, I'm not sure about anyone else but I find it hard to believe you are listening to music for 36 hrs straight, but too each his own I guess.

It is not apparent it's the ZS, it could be the app losing connection, a tiny power hiccup, The mac itself, actually many things, but being your insistence that this "early production" second unit you are using is doing the exact same thing, are you seriously going to still hang this on iFi!? This is your second unit and the exact same issue? I don't think so.

I asked you to do one simple test, you still have yet to do it, I will gladly respond to the email you left after you tell me how long the unit streams using one of the radio stations from within the app itself. You seem to have no problem counting the hours that it ran on everything except for using the App and Unit itself. Once you remove the other variables in the chain, I will be glad to respond and help you.

Please could you tell us the exact circumstances as to the connection loss. This is not an uncommon situation for something in a connection chain to drop out. So I would like if you could as we try to help others, please let us know, when, what, how you were listening when it drops connection. Even as far down to if you are upsampling the stream to like 1.21 jigawatts,

I have had streamers that don't like that even My cambridge gives me fits on occasion, especially with Tidal streams. I pretty much only listen to Spotify out of the house so I can't speak to that.

Cheers!!

to be clear i do not listen to music non-stop for 36hrs, i just meant that in within tow days after the last firmware update i did not have any connection issues. sorry for the confusion, second day post update many connections issues. some would happen anywhere from 10 minutes to 1 hour into the stream. further i have been asked to connect the Mac directly to my router via ethernet cable. i will have to search for an adaptor since i looked in the box and Apple did not include one. curious to know what this would prove since the stream after the ZS disconnects continues to stream on the MacBooks internal speakers. the stream will continue even if the lights go out or the lights stay on the ZS. either way i have to re-boot the ZS. would this not indicate a problem with the ZS loosing the stream and or power and not a problem with the router? but i will proceeds with your suggestion and test this hypothesis for what its worth. as soon as i can track down an adaptor. thank you.

 

[DBB1]

Thanks

The update seems to have helped, although I did loose a connection once after I updated.

Can you answer another question. I found that the ZS will not play a pcm file above 48khz without down-sampling to 48khz. Same with dsd. Can this be remedied? Don't the specs say it will?

 

[ClieOS]

The update seems to have helped, although I did loose a connection once after I updated.

Can you answer another question. I found that the ZS will not play a pcm file above 48kh without down-sampling to 48kh. Same with dsd. Can this be remedied? Don't the specs say it will?

I was streaming 24/96 MQA file two days ago, no problem there.

 

[DBB1]

For anyone reading through this thread you may be put of buying the ZS as focus often is on problems and issues encountered.
I would just like to say that I have been using the ZS for 1 week now and I can honestly say it's the best bit of audio equipment I have purchased in a long time.
Set up was simple, updates straightforward and I have had no connection problems at all. I stream via Tidal Connect and Spotify Connect with zero drop outs, freezes or crashes.
SQ is superb and a massive step up from my PC source. Love the convenience of now not needing to use my PC and I can control everything from my phone app. I've been listening to music more in the last week and most importantly I've been enjoying it more. Ultimately this is goal of any audio upgrade so I can wholeheartedly recommend this product.
Well done ifi for bringing a great, affordable streamer to the market. You've certainly got a happy customer here.

For ref: ZS connected via ethernet, running in position 1. All-in-one mode, connected via USB to RME ADI-2 DAC.

How did you even know to update the firmware first. This knowledge would have saved me some trouble. It wasn't until I discovered this forum that I learned about the necessary firmware update.

 

[DBB1]

I was streaming 24/96 MQA file two days ago, no problem there.

Good. So I now know it's possible. Thanks.

 

[Mr BubbaHyde]

How did you even know to update the firmware first. This knowledge would have saved me some trouble. It wasn't until I discovered this forum that I learned about the necessary firmware update.

It's right in the iFI app, or in iFi.local under the settings icon.

 

[jasonmeister]

Just powered up the ZS after a 3 week hiatus due to some needed home maintenance. I managed to update to the latest firmware and it’s been downhill since.

Connection lost during playback of the first track on Tidal Connect. Got the second track playing and, again, connection lost. I’ve repeated this with ~10 tracks. Each time playback goes for about 120-150 seconds, then the music stops; the right ‘large’ light goes dark; and the ‘small’ light on the right starts blinking. This happens with Tidal Connect (which would be about 90% use case for me) and Spotify Connect. I’ve also enabled WiFi (which ordinarily I would not use) with the same result.

I had hope that these issues would be sorted by now. This is rather frustrating. As mentioned earlier in this thread, I’m comparing this to my previous all-in-one system which did not have these issues. It is not an issue with my network or setup - I can stream from my PC for hours with no interruption and I’m literally taking the USB and Ethernet cable used with the ZS and plugging these into the PC.

This device (my unit, that is) has problems. It seems that there are different user experiences with this product. Some are having an excellent experience; others, less so. I truly regret these issues as I was very enthused by this device initially and I’m still holding out hope that the problems can be resolved.

I’ll report back with regard to how iFi are dealing with this.

 

[SoundSquare]

OK so i jumped on the Zen Stream as i've always been looking for a streamer to replace my JRiver PC which is not the most convenient. I received the Stream tonight.... and i'm sending it back. It doesn't do anything more than a RPI + Volumio solution. Just much more expensive.
The RPI + Volumio was a big disappointment for me for a simple reason : you can't shuffle your entire library ! That's such a basic feature that Volumio and clones were never able to do. So same disappointment with the Ifi Stream, i'm so disappointed that they used Volumio instead of developping their own proprietary app.
Another issue, i attached a USB drive with 60 000 flac and dsd files and the Ifi Stream only reports 11 000 files. I've tried rescanning the whole database several times but no, it doesn't want to index more than 11 000 files. Shame ! The same USB drive works perfectly with JRiver on a PC.
So this thing is expensive and useless. Very far from the all in one solution Ifi is advertising.
Another issue, none of the two leds on the front of the unit would turn on. They remain off all the time.

 

[DBB1]

OK so i jumped on the Zen Stream as i've always been looking for a streamer to replace my JRiver PC which is not the most convenient. I received the Stream tonight.... and i'm sending it back. It doesn't do anything more than a RPI + Volumio solution. Just much more expensive.
The RPI + Volumio was a big disappointment for me for a simple reason : you can't shuffle your entire library ! That's such a basic feature that Volumio and clones were never able to do. So same disappointment with the Ifi Stream, i'm so disappointed that they used Volumio instead of developping their own proprietary app.
Another issue, i attached a USB drive with 60 000 flac and dsd files and the Ifi Stream only reports 11 000 files. I've tried rescanning the whole database several times but no, it doesn't want to index more than 11 000 files. Shame ! The same USB drive works perfectly with JRiver on a PC.
So this thing is expensive and useless. Very far from the all in one solution Ifi is advertising.
Another issue, none of the two leds on the front of the unit would turn on. They remain off all the time.

Just wondering, did you try networking the JRiver pc via DLNA to the Zen Stream? That has worked for me.

 

[SoundSquare]

Just wondering, did you try networking the JRiver pc via DLNA to the Zen Stream? That has worked for me.

what would be the point in my case as i want to get rid of my jriver PC ?

 

[myshark]

Just powered up the ZS after a 3 week hiatus due to some needed home maintenance. I managed to update to the latest firmware and it’s been downhill since.

Connection lost during playback of the first track on Tidal Connect. Got the second track playing and, again, connection lost. I’ve repeated this with ~10 tracks. Each time playback goes for about 120-150 seconds, then the music stops; the right ‘large’ light goes dark; and the ‘small’ light on the right starts blinking. This happens with Tidal Connect (which would be about 90% use case for me) and Spotify Connect. I’ve also enabled WiFi (which ordinarily I would not use) with the same result.

I had hope that these issues would be sorted by now. This is rather frustrating. As mentioned earlier in this thread, I’m comparing this to my previous all-in-one system which did not have these issues. It is not an issue with my network or setup - I can stream from my PC for hours with no interruption and I’m literally taking the USB and Ethernet cable used with the ZS and plugging these into the PC.

This device (my unit, that is) has problems. It seems that there are different user experiences with this product. Some are having an excellent experience; others, less so. I truly regret these issues as I was very enthused by this device initially and I’m still holding out hope that the problems can be resolved.

I’ll report back with regard to how iFi are dealing with this.

This problem is due to the bufferred playlist i think. ZS need time to unload the bufferred songs n reload the new songs. Solution is to try to play/click the new song again n click connect again. After that it isually workd fine.
Usually it does not stop streaming in the middle of the playlist.
Both playback settings at maximum.
Had my ZS in early July n switch on almost 24/7 . nearly 3 month now streaming from hdd, tidaln spotify. I am retired n listen to music all day n all night.
Enjoy.

 

[DBB1]

what would be the point in my case as i want to get rid of my jriver PC ?

I'm new to streaming. You feel the sound quality suffers to leave the pc with JRiver in the chain ? I did get improvement over just using the JRiver pc and no streaming.

 

[myshark]

what would be the point in my case as i want to get rid of my jriver PC ?

attach hdd to the ZS n sell your pc.

 

[DBB1]

attach hdd to the ZS n sell your pc.

Which sounds better? Have you compared?

 

[SoundSquare]

attach hdd to the ZS n sell your pc.

did you actually read my post ?
ZS doesn't index more than 11 000 files from my hdd which has 60 000 files, when attached to it.

I'm new to streaming. You feel the sound quality suffers to leave the pc with JRiver in the chain ? I did get improvement over just using the JRiver pc and no streaming.

it's not a matter of sound quality. There would be no difference as they both send the signal to the same DAC.
It's just that i don't want to have a PC running 24/7 just to play music anymore.