Got my Music Streamer II today...

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by Puma Cat, Sep 14, 2010.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. SBurke

    SBurke Nostalgia Junkie

    Location:
    Philadelphia, PA
    Received mine today and have had limited time with it so far, but setup was remarkably easy, basically four or five mouse clicks, about 30 seconds. I expected it to sound good and it exceeded expectations.
     
  2. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    Cooll, you got the Streamer II also? What are you using for a Music server?

    I'm listening to mine as I type this....it sounds great....I am really impressed. It's not quite as good sounding as the Oppo, but's it's really close; it's 85% of the Oppo BD83SE. Good enough to pour a Margarita, sit back, relax, and listen to music for the evening and really enjoy yourself. It sounds really good through a nice Conrad-Johnson system and a pair of big Dyns.
     
  3. SBurke

    SBurke Nostalgia Junkie

    Location:
    Philadelphia, PA
    I have a Sony laptop, and I run MediaMonkey on it. Just about 75,000 tracks (with new ones added everyday as I continue the ripping campaign), mostly on a 2TB external drive. Used Windows 7 to select USB => MusicStreamer as sound device, which Windows recognized automatically, and that's all it took.

    I have no trouble believing the 83SE has a slight edge -- I'd love to have one of those, particularly now that my Pioneer SACD/DVD-A player took a dive on me last night. Then again, if I had the dough I should probably upgrade my speakers first. It's funny, though, I've gotten so used to the sound of my very modest, entry-level Klipsch, I'm just very content. Plus, I don't even know anymore where I could find a local hi-fi shop, so I haven't been exposed to anything better in a while!

    I did a little A/B of the MusicStreamer II versus my old HK CDR2, which was a pretty swell CD player for its time, and the MSII was at least the equal of it -- if pressed to come up with a difference at all, I'd say there might have been a little more detail to the guitar on top of Professor Longhair's piano ("Jambalaya (on the Bayou)," 1971). :cheers:
     
  4. Baron Von Talbot

    Baron Von Talbot Well-Known Member

    How exactly do you configure your iPod Touch to remote control your iTunes folder on the Mac ?
    Or do you use it with your external HD with SERVER software ?
    I guess you need a special app for that (to get that you need to be a member of apps and give your credit card info to apple I guess ?
    What apple constantly ignores is that many germans (me included) do not use credit cards, lol .... well if necessary I could buy a gift card.
    so please x-plain - mac mini alu with snow leopard and iPod Touch 3G ready - USB with a V-DAC to the HiFi...
     
  5. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    Huh? Who is your question directed to, Baron?

    Most of the apps for the iPhone/Ipod touch are free...including the Apple Remote app.
     
  6. maraisdecygnes

    maraisdecygnes New Member

    Location:
    Princeton/NYC
    Mine took about 10 days to break in and smooth out.
     
  7. Or (my current "obsession") a Naim Uniti or UnitiQute.
     
  8. maraisdecygnes

    maraisdecygnes New Member

    Location:
    Princeton/NYC
    It's pretty darn easy really. The apple site explains it pretty good here:

    http://www.apple.com/itunes/remote/

    For itunes store this app is a free download but you will need a CC to register on the itunes store and they will test charge it for $1. Perhaps you can use a debit card.

     
  9. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    Yes, mine seems to be getting better daily.
     
  10. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    There ya go.....
     
  11. Download the free Remote application from the App Store. Or, if you use VLC, download the VLC Remote app. There are similar apps made by Naim and PS Audio also on the App Store.
     
  12. HiFi Guy 008

    HiFi Guy 008 Forum Resident

    Location:
    New England

    Congrats on your now owning the HRT Music Streamer - I like mine very, very much. No, it's not one of those "better than a cd player" usb DAC's, but the sound is very close to some great players, and I believe yours will improve with time - maybe even bettering the Oppo.

    Btw, the Mac will most certainly stream 24/96 files to the HRT - I'm doing it right now on an old G4. Just use VLC as the front end instead of iTunes. Listening to Mahler's 8th right now and it's magnificent. (Although I'm doing this via usb - not wirelessly, I don't think that should be an issue.)

    http://download.cnet.com/VLC-Media-Player/3000-2139_4-10210434.html
     
  13. TONEPUB

    TONEPUB Senior Member

    Location:
    Portland, Oregon


    Germans don't use credit cards? How do you travel anywhere?
     
  14. Macs should work fine with FLAC files, in theory anyway. Use a program like VLC and FLAC playback is a breeze.

    I have a FLAC plugin for Quicktime that doesn't work very well for some odd reason. That's why I convert all my FLAC's to Apple Lossless. VLC continues to play nice with FLAC's, however.
     
  15. maraisdecygnes

    maraisdecygnes New Member

    Location:
    Princeton/NYC
    Lossless sounds fine to me and saves a little room on the drives as well. YMMV of course.
     
  16. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    The Austrians don't either...it's kind of strange, I find. I had a GF who was raised in Vienna, and when we went to visit her parents; and we went shopping one day. We spent an hour to get to, in, and out of the bank to get 100 Euro. She had spent it in about 2 hours, and then didnt' have any more cash left, and the bank was closed by then. I asked her why she didn't use her ATM card, and she said, "We don't use cards in Austria...". :confused:

    Decidedly anachronistic.
     
  17. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    So, Eric, you can use VLC to play back FLACs directly, w/o converting to Apple Lossless?
     
  18. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    My musisc streamer keeps getting better and better with burn-in...it just went snap, and now I've got wonderful "hall ambience", comparable to what the Oppo SE is giving me.

    I A/B'd it against the new $480 Arcam rDAC today at my LSS and I preferred the little Streamer to the Arcam.
     
  19. Yes, no problem whatsoever.

    If you want to play FLAC's natively in iTunes and in other QuickTime-enables applications (including the Mac OS X Finder) there's also a QuickTime FLAC component available here, but I have had mixed results:

    http://tomyeah.com/flac-and-ogg-support-for-itunes-import-and-play/

    It plays back some FLAC files too slow, and overlays a lot of hiss on other FLAC files. With some FLAC files, it plays them normally.
     
  20. SBurke

    SBurke Nostalgia Junkie

    Location:
    Philadelphia, PA
    Anybody else get an occasional loud interference noise, sort of like what you'd get if you turned up the TV volume and put it on the wrong channel? This has happened a few times to me. At first I thought it was because I was multi-tasking on the computer while playing back tunes through the device, but now I'm not sure that's it. It's pretty easily resolved, temporarily, but of course I'd rather it not happen at all.
     
  21. maraisdecygnes

    maraisdecygnes New Member

    Location:
    Princeton/NYC
    Mine has not. You might want to try a different USB cable (I was recommended the Belkin Gold series by Kevin Halverson ($10 @ Amazon)) or email Kevin.
     
  22. Puma Cat

    Puma Cat Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    East Bay, CA
    I've just been ripping them to Apple Lossless via XLD and putting them in my iTunes Music Library.

    Unfortunately, the hard drive in the old black Macbook bit the dust last night. :shake:

    Fortunately, all the music files are resident on an external Firewire drive! :edthumbs:
     
  23. Natt

    Natt Forum Resident

    Location:
    Acton, Canada
    Or put a powered hub between your computer and the streamer - that can help too with USB devices.
     
  24. Baron Von Talbot

    Baron Von Talbot Well-Known Member

    We do use cash teller machines or what the exact name is. As long as your account or small spending credit is positive everything is okay no worries. But the moment it is not anymore you're done dead and the card will be kept....lol...
    The consequences are immediate.
    Some do use credit cards, but it is not as easy to get one as in the states.
    You must have a steady job since a few years with guaranteed income of 30 k plus per year or something like that (depends on which carrier) and then the interest is pretty high and you have only few places that accept them without charge.
    The whole spend / save ratio is different.
    Some people must save their money - if not americans couldn't live on credit that high..

    Money is what matters most in life and you have a huge difference in character and temperament from nation to nation when t comes to that...

    BTW those large deals with houses cars etc. are made with insurance companies or your bank for certain special interests - nothing to do with credit card holders.
    Those investment bankings are really large over here..
     
  25. SBurke

    SBurke Nostalgia Junkie

    Location:
    Philadelphia, PA
    I'll probably put in an order for a nicer cable and see if that resolves things. For a tenner you can't really lose.

    I don't even know what a powered hub looks like -- what is it, and what does it do?
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.

Share This Page

molar-endocrine