I have been using a Mac Mini since 2010 for playing audio on my system and use TosLink since everything I have is from CD and is 44100 samples/sec stereo 16-bit. I am one who can't hear the difference in 256 MP3 and the original WAV and I guess that is a blessing. My main system in the living room is a Rotel RSX-1560 Receiver from 2009 (which replaced a Yamaha DSP-A1 integrated amp from 1998 that started flaking out) with JPL HP-520 speakers as my mains. This system works well for me for 2 channel stereo (with the surrounds off) and for home theatre as well.

I have worn out 2 Mac Mini's listening to music. I have to confess the iTunes low quality 128kbps podcasts still sounded really really fantastic with my upsampling DacMagic and tube amp. It's great listening to music just alone on the couch without the lights on in the middle of the night... after smoking a joint.

I use Mac Mini and Audirvana as well (with Tidal), with an iPad mini as remote, but the Mac/Audirvana combo is a DLNA server to the SoTM sMS-200 ultra neo streamer, in turn connected to the DAC via USB. This is a huge improvement over running USB from the Mac.

Thanks Paul. You gave me some great new ideas how to add my Mac mini to my audio system. Will try it and compare it with what i know about ROON.

I swear I’ll never catch up to all the content you’ve put out. Thank you Paul. I hope someday real soon to visit you, your company and those awesome speakers. 🤝👏👌

Paul, if you opted for Mac mini with maximum RAM possible, you surely have not paid "a little more" for the upgrade. RAM and storage upgrade cost an arm and a leg on any Mac. Only the base models Mac computers could be considered a great value. It has always been like that on Apple computers, regardless of the generation. And if you use it for playing music only, you most likely did not need that RAM upgrade. BTW: I really like your videos😁

Bitperfect hasn't been updated in five years and in buggy as hell on newer macs. Audirvana has now switched to a subscription model which I won't even consider. For those reasons, both are now non starters for me.

Only saw the first 4 seconds and the man already convinced me. I'm getting a Mac Mini... for playback.

I regret selling my 2011 Mac Mini, since it was pretty spec-ed out and had a disc drive. Ugh. Now I want one!

Paul how do you wake up the Mac mini when it goes to sleep with an IPad?

Audirvana is a good product and great to hear Paul and PS Audio recommend the software's use via USB. Regretfully Audirvana's UPnP/DLNA feature does not function properly with PS Audio's Bridge II. A great shame for those who have invested in the Bridge II card which is sonically better than USB. Given PS Audio has recommended and promoted Audirvana, it would be greatly appreciated if Audirvana and PS audio collaborated to make the UPnP/DLNA function work properly with the Bridge II. So come Paul and Audirvana - please work together and sort out the UPnP/DLNA functionality!!!

I use a dedicated intel NUC loaded with Daphile for Qobuz streaming on my headphone rig, cheap and very good results.

isn't one benefit of a toslink the fact that it electrically isolates your source?

This is literally my exact setup for the MacMini in my system as well. Nice video - thanks Paul

Checklist: Audirvana 👍🏽 Curious cable 👍🏽 Qobuz 👍🏽 I have a 2015 MacBook Pro with maximum ram too At least I’m doing a few things right. I have moved on to Allo DigiOne streamer via a coax cable, the electrical noise which I didn’t notice before has gone! The sound is much cleaner

I wish someone would do a fast turorial on all of these streaming components, from start to finnish that is. there are loads and loads of tutorials on youtube that focus on single components or just software, and they tend to be lengthy videos containing lots of rambeling. I mean jeez, I am just 42 years old and I feel that i´m falling behind in this area.

Paul many many thanks for this content. I have just set up the Mac mini as you have described and it is wonderful. (Audirvana / Screens). Perfect. 👍

Wow, A lot of great information! Thank you Paul McGowan

iTunes used to be great, I used it with Audio Hijack as it captured the audio as it came in (not how Windows does it) but when Apple went to become a music 'service' company iTunes is no longer simple to use. Sad.

This is 4 years old? Wow, you what? You can still get a Mac Mini for $500. I just bought one, M2 CPU, 8GB RAM. Still runs spectacularly.

i just got Rooned. loving it. running it on my MacBook pro. streaming Tidal. i need something to send flac. music files to my Roon core, but do not want to spend $1500 on a Nucleus.

Beware advice coming from people whose demo audio is distorted. "This USB cable sounds excellent". That being said, thanks for the software info.

Would be great to get an update from Paul on this segment.

I was waiting for you to answer the original question, because I have the same question. My older Mac mini used atoslink

I used to run a Mac laptop plus Audirvana direct into my dac via USB and it sounded dull and lacked dynamics. I had given up on computer audio until a friend put me onto what I now do. I now run an ethernet cable from my PC running Roon to a Sonore microrendu (plus linear power supply) and then connect via USB to my dac. The sound is now in another league.

How do you switch it on and off without a screen? Just switch off the power supply?

Adding a solid state drive is important if you’re going to run the MacMini as a Roon server. Makes it much faster, especially when updating the database which happens often.

Wow, A lot of great information! Thank you Paul 👍

Toslink can do more than 96. And yet i never met one single person out there who can tell the difference with any higher 😏

Wow, exactly the information I needed. Thanks for taking the time to post this!!! Happy Listening : )

My solution is a PC with JRiver 24 and a Yggdrasil DAC. I use a USB connection. I control it with an iPad using JRemote. Works great. I have 3100+ albums mostly FLAC files with some HD and mp3.

Hello. Not clear about your signal chain/connections. You have iPad, Mac mini, Qobuz, Audirvana, Screens, dac, amp-pre amp? , speakers? Where are the apps installed? iPad or Mac mini? How is iPad connected to Mac mini? What is ipad used for ? What is connected to what using usb? Confused. P,ease advise. Want to understand this. Also, if an app like Amazon Music Hd Ultra, is installed on an Apple TV or an Amazon Fire stick 4k and these are connected directly to a Yamaha Avr or to a Sony smart tv which is then connected to the avr via toslink (older Yamaha avr)…does the Apple TV or the fire stick 4k mess with sampling rate/frequencies etc like you say the Mac mini does?

You're a very helpful internet video; could not make it without ya!

Audirvana 3.5 is great and I highly recommend it. Using some rebuilt tube mono blocks and a mac I find the sound to be best ever using Audirvana 3.5 and it's worth the one-month free trial. Disagree with Paul about toslink as it's DAC dependent. I use a modest but excellent Schiit Audio Modi 3 and for this model, the toslink is a superior sound over USB. I've tried USB and oversampling but it's not as clean. On other DACs that may differ but on the DAC I'm using, it's the toslink which produces better results. (I also have a metal weight atop the Modi 3 which is a crazy improvement tweak for that model.) Haven't used a mac mini in a while but I may do so again. I'm curious if the new Mac Mini with the M1 chip would see any improvement versus older models. The advantage of Audirvana is it bypasses the Mac OS Core Audio. So if you use Tidal or my preference as Paul's: Qobuz, you will hear the distinct audio improvement. It makes the Mac OS, mini or other choice far less important. Many are using Audirvana on Windows too. The application Paul references on the Mac OS is "Screen Sharing." It's built in with OS Mojave and Catalina. I'm not sure if older Mac OS use it but I believe earlier versions do. It works rather well so you can run a direct connection to your DAC/ audio system with a mac mini and control it using Audirvana on that mac or another one remotely. The Audirvana Remote app also allows you to control everything too, say from a iPhone or iPad. I've used those too. Very nice. Update: 2021 New DAC, RME ADI-2 and Paul is correct: go USB. The old Modi leaned toslink, but unique to it. No contest now with vast improved replacement. Audirvana went to Studio, sounds great.

I would love to hear Pauls take on Chord Electronics, and why the architecture in the Directstream would be a better choice. Genuinely interested as i am trying to decide between the Chord Dave, and the Directstream.

Does anyone use VOX player? I heard it's an excellent free player that uses the bit rate of the song itself?

"Never use Toslink" > I use a $300 USB cable Well that's 8 minutes of my life i'll never get back, thanks grandpa

Basic question here but do you connect the audio interface / dac to the Mac mini.

Why the amount of ram should affect to the quality of the audio?

Hi Paul, I'm from Turkey. I've been using Mac mini for 2 years and wonder which USB port should I use for audio? I got mid range setup and can easily hear the difference among the 4 ports. BTW I'm not using the other 3 ports since the interference affects the sound quality. Thanks in advance.

Very helpful video! Thank you!

That's great Paul. The tablet interface is real cool, but a Mac Mini as the best value for money? No, build one. You can use a small form factor case with some kind of a low end Ryzen CPU, an SSD and large hard drive, it'll probably be much more affordable, especially in the long run as certain parts obsolesce. You could even make it a hackintosh, provided you don't have any qualms with violating Apple's terms of service.

Paul, macOS has screen sharing feature. You don't need a 3rd party app.

Roon server and a quality NAS drive is the best I’ve found, take the laptop out if you can.

Toslink supports 192khz audio, its what I'm using atm.

Hi Paul I also use a MAC mini to stream audio from Amazon HD. You mentioned that you can't get greater that 44kHz from the USB port on the mini. I get 192kH output from my mini by using the Audio Midi setup in the Utilities folder. I connect via USB through an Earstudio HUD100 DAC into my amplifier. The DAC uses color lights to show the bitrate from 44.1 kHz to 352.8kHz. I can verify the bitrate of music I'm playing on Amazon for each song.

Why not Roon? It is GREAT!

True; I experienced Windows 11 the other day and got around it pretty easy as a Mac user 😉

Actually that is a great mention. PS should match the Sprout to the shape of the Mini so they can be neatly stackable.

Thx Paul, I’ve been using mac mini (same version as your’s) for a couple of years now. Didnt know that USB sounds better. I ill try it with your application that you’ve mentioned.Question for you and I do hope you can answer this one. My streaming provider is Tidal and between songs there is always a clic with my DAC.... cannot find info on the forums for that one.. do you know anything about this? The only info I found is that important not the only one with this issue. It seams that a lot of DAC tend to do this. Its if they lost the track or stream between songs.. thank you in advance for your response. BTW I use XLR cables :)

Aaaah no, I'm listening to you via Toslink! (PC into a Marantz SR-14EX) My main reason for using Tolink is for ground isolation netween my noisy PC and the amp. I'm currently kind of stuck in 44.1 KHz 16bit land, as most of my source audio originated from CD's, if I ever get the money to up the quality of the reast of my system, then I may have to lose the Toslink.

Paul a little over his skiis here.

Do you need a monitor for the Mac Mini?

How are u controlling the Mac mini .. do u have a monitor? I know dumb question

Great video. Thanks for the pointer to BitPerfect and Audirvana for the Mac. I never liked the idea of the way a Mac resamples the audio. I have seen TosLink devices that will handle 192/24, but I still wouldn't use them as you are converting from copper to optical and then back from optical to copper for no reason. USB is simple. Qobuz is not available in my country, and Apple Music Lossless is difficult to work with. Currently I am streaming Apple Music Lossless from my iPad through USB to an external DAC. That works, but no remote control.

Running full digital with high end components to have a Uber Clean sound then using a turntable with old recorded music that has lots of Snap Crackle & Pop within.!!! Audiophiles.!! I prefer a cleaner sound as majority of the last 2 decades of recorded music on CDs are Produced to DDD although many older recorded are DDA through its process, the total bandwidth threshold is much wider than download digital, albeit a good quality high end DAC can give a uncompressed sound but all of this is only noticeable on the type of speakers used and the processing unit within the media it’s played through... You can go crazy nuts just trying to figure what people are using...

Paul, I use mac mini as my music library with exact same set up as yours and love it. I am a Microsoft guy at work and a hard core Apple guy at home. I have 16gb of memory on my Mac mini. But 8gb RAM is fine too. I don't think more RAM improves sound quality. I checked the Curious Cable website and checked the price. If I get it with 90% off on the original price, I would call it cheap. :)

How does he use it without a keyboard and monitor and mouse

Ohh yea he just opened a can of worms

Audirvana 3.5 just dropped 👍

Funny thing that the guy who programmed the windows 7 audio interface said, if you play a flac at 100% Volume and your audio output is set to the same resolution as sour source file, the playback can come out bit perfect, as if you use Asio or whatever.

Thank you very much, that was very helpful

Curious cable not that expensive? The cheaper ones are USD 350. Doesn't that pretty expensive for a USB cable? Great video though. Lots of good information here.

Try adding a high end power cable to your Mini Mac.

Hallo... i think it is interesting, i have mac mini and i don’t use it now cause i use my iMac.. so my question is, do u use monitor to pic song ? Cause when we use TV , i heard noise... so how ?

Why would you use a Mac mini when you have a $6000 streamer/dac Paul?

screens or audirvana remote? 🤷🏼‍♂️

I'll take optical over usb any day. But, Paul, if you used a plastic optical cable, what do you expect? If you use a quality Optical 3.5 to Toslink glass cable, that is better than usb. And I don't care that you paid $400 for a 1m usb cable (I just searched Curious cable) Optical will pass 192/24 files. My chain: mac mini with JRiver mc24 > Borosilicate glass Optical > to Oasis Plus aptX HD transceiver > Amiron Wireless OR pass thru to Marantz sr6013/dac > hp out (DT1990) or to Parasound A21. The JRiver player passes bit perfect audio.

Thanks Paul !

Hey Paul. Thanks for the great video, as usual. I am too using a Mac Mini for hifi audio, with Audirvana, and an Audioquest Carbon USB cable. I have also an Audioquest Jitterbug plugged on the USB, to further prevent jitter or other electromagnetic noise. I did some tests (with and without), but I'm not sure either if i should keep the jitterbug On or not. The jitterbug doesn't have the same USB connectors quality as the USB Carbon. Audioquest themselves (I contacted them) are not sure about what's best. What do you think? Do you have a Jitterbug plugged on your Mac Mini?

Hi Paul, thanks for the video. What is your opinion on using VLC to listen to high-resolution music files routed to a DAC via USB on a Mac mini? That's primarily how I listen to music on mine. Also, is there a way to completely bypass the Mac mini's internal audio and volume control for a pure direct digital signal to a DAC via USB?

What are those two black boxes next to the rack?

Thanks for that video, Paul. I very much appreciate you taking the time to share your knowledge. I am now also using the Mac Mini with my PS Audio DAC. I hope to be able to upgrade to the DSD version, but need to save some money first ☺️ I have been using Qobuz for some time already, and it really is the best Streaming I know. Kind regards from Duesseldorf, Germany from Nam

Nice baby lullaby

Curious cables not expensive?? 300, 400?

Thank you Paul for your informative video. This answered some questions I had about set up and play back of digital music. Thank you!

Curious USB cable - $350 for .8 meter cable, $390 for 1 meter. Qobuz $24.95/month for high-res streaming. Audirvana HiFi mode $75.

Why play music wirelessly with a high end system through apple products if they don't support aptx?

Pure Music, from channel D, in "memory play" sounds really good through iTunes giving the listener the opportunity of hi res music playback. The song is loaded into ram before it plays,, less fatiguing listening👍

Cable going to a 5.1 Audio Gear card. My new Mac mini does not have an optical output. I’m told I need a USB sound card. I don’t know which ones to use????? I’m feeding inexpensive Logitech x-540 speakers. Could you please advise? Thank you very much, I’m l;ost in this new tech world.

$400 USB cable. Hah.

If I use a MacMini with a powered dac that has only hdmi or coax or toslink inputs, how do I get there? Is it true that USB is limited to 44/16? What component will I need?

"I don't like winblows". Couldn't agree with you more. However win 7 was very MAC like

Paul, I wonder if you have tried the Lanrover on the Mac USB interface, and if it sounded any better.

If I use a MacMini with a powered dac that has only hdmi or coax or toslink inputs, how do I get there?

Hello Paul, caln you tell how your mac connected exactly to the system, directly to DAC, or to streaming device?

Great video! I immediately purchased bitperfect and will look at audirvana. However I use the audio out (aka headphone jack) on my Mac mini and this goes to the aux input on my amplifier. This does not seem to be mentioned. I think it sounds great but perhaps my ear is not very critical. Is the reason to use the toslink or usb in order to use an external dac?

I’m new to all high quality streaming I was wondering if I wound benifit if I used Audirvana on standard KZfaq would that be a substantial difference

Is streaming tidal via a Chromecast plugged to a good dac no good?

I dont understand 90% of what you said (youre very much technical and use words I dont understand) If I buy a macmini should I connect the speakers to the headphone jack? Thats what I do now. My speakers are connected to headphone jack without any DAC (I didnt know what a dac was until few months ago) since 2012. The sound is very good. But there are people (on the internet) saying that the new macmini has bad sound quality when connected to headphone outlet and that you should use the HDMI outlet, but speakers dont have a way to connect to any HDMI. They use headphone or RCA cables (not hdi, usb nor thunderbolt). I dont use any DAC, just my speakers dirctly to the headphone jack (to Macmini 2012) like I have been doing since my first computer (And it sounds very good). What I worry is that if I buy the new macmini the sound will not be good ( a 10 year newer mac with worse sound quality than the old) and I will have to purchase weird gadgets to get the sound I have now with no weird gadgets, DACs, etc attached. Sorry for my english and non technical knowledge. I hate itunes and just use VLC player with downloaded flac and mp3 files.

have you tried roon on the mac mini?

by the way, bit perfect is working on dsd perfect as we speak, therefore, buy audirvana onl if you don.t have the issues i had with the app, and first, try to see if they have any kind of assistance working

Roon and BluOS on iPad for me.

What about Denafrips Pontus II with Mac Mini, would that be a good combination?

👍, saludos desde tierra azteca.

Hi Paul, did you try Qobuz on Audirvana and how did it sound?

ITunes is the only playback software I’ve found offering me the ability to listen to music the way I prefer. I listen to my entire library of many thousands of songs each randomly, before repeating one, automatically. I also have variations on this based on genre and other parameters easily custom programmable. A Mac Mini runs it and Pure Music plays the files ( in Hog Mode” and “Integer Mode”). It sounds just wonderful to me.

Audirvana is rocking me right now!!!! Super fun pushing music all around my house to my DLNA/UPNP devices. The iPad Audirvana Controller app is very cool! If they also had an Android app available I would really be set. Time to re-rip my CDs to AIFF! I maybe need an additional iPad now, one for upstairs and downstairs. Do you get album artwork to show up in the app or anywhere outside of iTunes?

Update for M chip Mac Mini please.

Paul. A few years ago when you published the how to for the mini, you mentioned that you had found a guru who did mods that were needed for best sound. What happened?