I think that’s relative, yes it certainly improves it.
But it’s dangerously easy with a mid priced PSU, and a more expensive hat to creep into the bottom of better options (used pricing).
I ran mine with a n IFI IPower Elite for a while and yes a win, wouldn’t put it in the night and day category, and depending on where else that $300 might go, I’m not sure I’d recommend that spend.
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Yes, when you start talking about throwing $300 around for improving source a lot of options open up. Power supply? Pi2AES Lite? New streamer? I actually quite like my rPi running PCP but it feels a little silly running a phone charger-powered micro computer into f-ing Lampi Amber DAC.
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Awesome the pi’s work well, I run one with an Allo DigiOne hat on one of my setups. Have you considered something like an ifi X power @ $100 to power your pi? It’s not an LPS, but it is reasonably good and would be better I imagine, than a phone charger walwart. You would not be spending a lot, would be making an improvement, and more importantly probably feel better about your source, which you enjoy. It may allow you some breathing room and time to investigate and/or save if needed, for a more impactful source upgrade.
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Good plan
I think the biggest game changing gear I had was Susvara. Once I built a system around it, I was lost and felt like this couldn’t be the end. At that point I had Rockna Wavedream, Goldpoint, and AHB2. I then started to take my desktop speaker setup a little more seriously and felt that with the front end upgrades, my Dynaudio Focus 110s were more enjoyable than the Susvara. That basically made me give up on headphones and spend the money I had from Susvara to move into a more speaker-centric setup. Haven’t seriously looked at headphones since then.
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Couldn’t think of where else to place this but it’s all really game changing as far as the technologies, the electron microscope video is great but he’s also got images of CDs, DVDs and a stillborn analogue audio disk format that I didn’t even know existed before this! Worth a watch.
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Probably the most shocking thing I can remember is replacing my old power conditioner with the Shunyata Denali V2 + Sigma 20A cord.
This would sound like a cheap ad, but OMG. Like… OMG. How can this be happening??? It was one of the most dramatic and immediately obviously changes regardless of price, as if I literally upgraded multiple components all at once. FWIW, my home office system is in a room w/ a lot of other computers/monitors/networking etc stuff on two 15A circuits, so maybe it was ‘noisier’, but the day-to-day variation suggested a big component of my neighborhood electrical noise was at play as well. Well… not anymore after the Shunyata went in.
If I ever had to rebuild an entire system, getting a Shunyata Denali or Everest would almost certainly be one of the first steps. I can’t think of any other components I have ever owned where I can say that.
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