Improvement to Bluesound Node 130??

[John Parkey]

Greetings everyone. A company in the UK, Fidelity Audio, offers several enhancements to the Bluesound Node 130 (and to a number of other products). These range from a standard and a reference PCB board replacement alone or with various low-noise, linear power supplies designed to match.

Do any of you have any experience with these Bluesound Node enhancements, and if so, how good are they? I am having a lot of trouble finding any meaningful reviews of the sound improvement (or not).

The reason I am looking at these is that Fidelity Audio claims their PCB boards actually enhance the digital streaming functionality of the Node such that both the internal DAC and any external DAC will sound noticeably better. I have several high quality external DACs and am on the hunt for a quality streaming platform.

Thank you.

John

 

[markmcmuz]

It seems that you are determined to solve a problem you may not have. I have a Blue sound Vault and have never felt the need to open it up and modify it with xyz. If you think that Bluesound is not up to what you need there are other better/more expensive streaming devices.

 

[cpt_paranoia]

The clock module alone costs £269. And they have to fit it, so add shipping costs.

If you have a decent external DAC, its clock recovery (assuming SPDIF) should deal with interface jitter. A lower jitter clock may improve the internal DAC, but that's a 5122 (IIRC), so not really anything that special.

I don't see any before and after jitter test or SINAD plots, so I'm inclined towards snake oil here.

 

[John Parkey]

Thank you for your replies. I am going to pass on this product. I called their shop on the phone and left a message asking them to email me as to when they would be available. Then I followed up in email twice. Have heard nothing back. I wish them well but not a fit for me.

 

[cpt_paranoia]

A lower jitter clock may improve the internal DAC, but that's a 5122 (IIRC), so not really anything that special.

They've used a PCM5242 for the Node 130. That's specced as a 32-bit/384kHz DAC, but the 32-bit is only the delta-sigma interpolator; you won't get more than 19 effective bits out of it in reality; DR/SNR is 114dB, THD+N 94dB.