First I want to apologize up front for my long winded tale
of woe. But first a little history on how I got here When I first got into hi end audio about 8 years ago
the one thing I said I would never, never do is use a
computer as a source. This is because I hate computers and
the computer gods hate my back. But a few years ago I
decided if I want good SQ, computers were the way to go. I
got a modded Mac mini and started out with Pure Music but it
won’t do DSD at the time and was too cliché . Next I
tried Jriver and it was an improvement in SQ but when I
tried to up sample it got so cliche that I wasn’t able to
listen more than a minute before something went wrong, of
course it doesn’t help I’m a complete computer idiot. It
got so bad that I didn’t listen to my system at all for
over 3 months. The aggravation it created was so bad that if
I just walked into my room, during that time, my body just
cringed from being reminded of all the hours of aggravation
it had given me, not the kind reaction I want from a system that
I have this much time, effort and money in. I had given up
when the audiophile gods decided to smiled down upon me.
By chance I read about this guy, on an other forum, that was
selling a complete front end, press a button and play music.
So I figured what have I got to lose , I contacted Mike
Davis of Mivera Audio and after he explained what he was
doing I decided to give it a try. His set up consist of a
sever running Linux , connected through a switcher to a
streamer using optical fiber then USB to the Dac which is
optimized to play only DSD 256 . He was out of Dac so I
started with the sever and streamer using my existing Dac,
he installed a windows program because my Dac doesn’t have
a Linux driver. The improvement in SQ was nice with a
blacked background. We started with HQPlayer using Roon, I
had read about Roon on a couple of forums and had decided I
would not like it, but Mike said to give it a try and
after a week of playing around with it despite my best
efforts not to, I really like it. This was a diffident
improvement in SQ over my Mac with Jriver. A couple weeks later the Dac arrived and there was
anothe increase in SQ, more detail and my bass was
more impactful .Next I tried Daphile, it’s still beta so
there was an occasional cliché but not bad and the SQ was
slightly better. Daphile released a newer version that up
samples DSD so I tried it. The SQ ,especially up sampling
DSD 64 to DSD 256 is incredible, I’m hear detail that
blows me away. but what I’m really loving is how it makes
my flac and AIFF files sound, granted not quite up there
with the DSD flies but better than I’ve ever heard
them.I’m playing my favorite music from the 70s, 80s and
90s and really enjoying them.
I know your going to say well the sever is a computer so
whats the difference. Well to a computer idiot like myself
this set up requires no computer skills.To change the
operating system all I do is change a thumb drive on the
sever and a SD card in the Dac and hit play and it works
every time. Roon is coming out with their own up sampling
program which I hope is at least as good as the Daphile
because I prefer its’ file management to Daphlies’ even
be willing to give up a lithe SQ for the Roon.
I have to say one thing about Mike and his customer
service, on the other forum that I first read about him on,
one of his customers’ said that he was a little OCD when
it came to customer service, well he was wrong, because
there is nothing little about it. He does what ever it takes
to make sure you are satisfied. I was using my old DAC as a pre to
control the vol but his set up has no way of doing that,
so he built me a Bent Audio tap X controller to add to my
amp.
His set up has taken my system to whole new level. I
highly recommend both his products and his customer service.
He is getting ready to run a North American tour if you want to try out his gear or if you want to know more about how the system works with the up sampling server, fiber optic isolated streamer, and DSD DAC you can go to his website.
http://www.miveraaudio.comI need to also thank Danny of GR for my speakers because what ever I’ve done to my system up to now they more than keep up.
