Raspberry Pi's are an underrated source.

[tesarpa]

Maybe somebody here can answer my questions, very hard to find answers:

1. I don't mind paying a bit more, is there a DAC-less streamer that is clearly better than both PIE2AES and Digione signature that I should look at for use with Hugo2?

2. What's the best way to connect the PIE2AES to Hugo2 for maximum sound quality?

3. What's the best way to connect the Digione Signature to the Hugo2 for the best sound quality?

4. Will I be able to stream bandcamp/youtube/jriver flacs from my Macbookpro to these streamers? I haven't really heard anyone talk about using these services with these streamers.

5. I understand that the Digione signature needs 2 PSUs, does that mean that 1 Shanti can power it or do I need to purchase 2 battery packs? Bit confused about the power situation.

6. On the software side, given my use cases above what do you guys recommend, volumio, Ropiee, something else?

7. Since I already have a Hugo2 would it make more sense to get the 2go? How do devices like PIE2AES and Digione Signature compare to the 2go?

Thank you

Can't answer all of your question, but some I can:
ad 1) I believe PI2AES is appropriate for use with Hugo2. I don't think more expensive streamers would bring significant SQ improvement.
ad 2) I tried optical and coax, they sound the same. My vote is for optical, as it should be more immune to interferences and connector issues.
ad 4) There is generic AirPlay option in both Ropiee and Volumio, but it supports max. 16/44.1 in audio resolution. In fact it shouldn't present any real problem for YT videos, bandcamp etc. Higher resolution is available only from Mac application supporting DLNA or ROON.
ad 6) Ropiee is rock solid, but it expects playback control on external application (for example on Mac - Spotify, ROON, Browser etc.). Volumio includes control application which you approach on volumio.local via browser or from iPad/iPhone. And Volumio plays FLAC files directly, as well as internet radios.
ad 7) No idea. I wouldn't expect big differences in SQ. Depends if you potentially replace Hugo, then separate transport (streamer) is an advantage.

 

[Ike1985]

is how much work and upkeep it all requires. It seems like there was something broken as often as not, which just made it more if a hassle than it was worth: from the re-clocking crystals in the HiFiBerry interfering with the Wi-Fi on the Pi board, to my iTunes "server" not waking for Wi-Fi, to the Spotify add-on suddenly crapping out, to randomly no longer being able to SSH into Volumio... Troubleshooting a system is one thing (and can even be kind of fun), but when I just want to listen to music, it's really freaking annoying.

s opposed to a BNC coaxial connection). TOSlink optical is a connection shape of the optical cable ends designed by Toshiba, but it’s still an S/PDiF standard.

un? it's supposed to be the MK2 of 1960s 2

Can't answer all of your question, but some I can:
ad 1) I believe PI2AES is appropriate for use with Hugo2. I don't think more expensive streamers would bring significant SQ improvement.
ad 2) I tried optical and coax, they sound the same. My vote is for optical, as it should be more immune to interferences and connector issues.
ad 4) There is generic AirPlay option in both Ropiee and Volumio, but it supports max. 16/44.1 in audio resolution. In fact it shouldn't present any real problem for YT videos, bandcamp etc. Higher resolution is available only from Mac application supporting DLNA or ROON.
ad 6) Ropiee is rock solid, but it expects playback control on external application (for example on Mac - Spotify, ROON, Browser etc.). Volumio includes control application which you approach on volumio.local via browser or from iPad/iPhone. And Volumio plays FLAC files directly, as well as internet radios.
ad 7) No idea. I wouldn't expect big differences in SQ. Depends if you potentially replace Hugo, then separate transport (streamer) is an advantage.

Wow thank you sir.

 

[chriseggroll]

I am very happy with my Pi4 as a streamer currently! I use Volumio at the moment and I like it, except for the constant "encouragement" to go for the paid version. I tried out an OS called Archphile which was based on Arch ARM instead of Debian, but it seems to no longer be updated. Really anyone can install an ARM based distro and install MPD, but getting the nice MPD web page for controlling things is not something I really want to do! I also tried Moode for a while but it would just randomly crash at times and I didn't see a cause in the logs anywhere, so eventually I went back to Volumio and have had no crashes at all. Volumio also has an Android app so I side-loaded it onto my Android TV so I can see what's playing while I listen, though controlling it with the remote doesn't work very well.

The music is stored on my WD NAS and it connects to it via wifi with no issues at all. The NAS has the capability of running Plex or Twonky for UPnP but I'm not using that at the moment. The UI for Plex is pretty annoying to me and it always seemed like it took a long time to find the settings I wanted, and Twonky would just randomly stop working and I'd have to restart the service on the NAS. I have compared playing music on the pi4 to using UPnP from my Blu Ray player via toslink but I couldn't really tell a difference with the speakers I use. I do wish all the USB ports for the pi4 were all on one side just so that it's a little neater from a cabling standpoint but I just have two connections anyway - power via the USB-C and the one USB out feeding my DAC.

 

[JazzVinyl]

Super happy with my Pi-4 streamer as well, use cmus as all the music in an a NAS attached to the router. I have a Pi-4 (has a DAC-HAT) that sends the music to the Living Room stereo/speakers. And use a Pi3 with a "Digi-Hat" that sends ones and zeros to a dedicated DAC then to a tube headphone amp, then ZMF Aeolus.

Can control either Pi via any Laptop (all mine are Linux) and have an SSH app on the phone and can control either Pi remotely via cmus-remote and .bashrc alias'...

Software is all free and works a treat! Wrote a bunch of scripts to help make playlists, etc... Cmus takes some practice, but is very customizable with a super fast interface to my very large music collection. Never makes a mistake, and is easy on the CPU.

Been doing this for years. 100% sold