Bluesound Node N100 (first generation) measurements with external DAC

[Rja4000]

I own quite a few old Bluesound Node N100
(Yes, the first generation Node N100)

I purchased the first one new more than 10 years ago.
Then added several, all second hand, because they are easy to find on the used market and quite cheap.
(last 2 I purchased were at 125€ and 135€ apiece)

That's a nice streamer, although quite big and not really pretty to my taste.


For critical system, I hang an external DAC to the Node's optical digital output.
But how does it measure ?

As a complement to my review of the last Bluesound Node N132 (2024), here are a few measurements

Bluesound N100 with an external DAC attached
(a Topping D50 III)

Measurements are done with Audio Precision Apx500 Flex software (9.0.2).
The ADC is my trusted RME ADI-2/4 Pro SE
The external DAC is the Topping D50 III I reviewed here
I didn't use the APU nothc filter, so the results are mostly limited by the RME ADC - and its limits are VERY high.
The D50 III is connected to the Node N100 digital output (Toslink)
The source is a set of WAV files from AudioPrecision or from REW (J-test for Jitter)


SINAD @44.1kHz 0dBFS

Jitter

MultiTone (32 tones)

That's all.
As I can't control the source from the software, I may only run some WAV files from a shared drive.

But that's way enough to figure:
This is just excellent.

So if you're looking for a top quality streamer on the cheap, and if all you want to do is stream -either from your NAS, from Qobuz, Tidal or the likes, from Bluetooth (with a dongle) or from some internet radio- find yourself a secondhand Node N100 and purchase a Topping D50 III (or anything equivalent)
and you'll have a streamer+DAC system that will cost you around 350€
and delivers state of the art quality.


Don't play with the Bass tone control, though. (Read here)



In my office right now, listening to

through the system above,
on my pretty old Genelec 1032A...
Old is good !
OK, I'm getting old as well...

 

[staticV3]

Thank you for the measurements! Excellent results.

Would it not make more sense to analyze the Toslink output directly, without D->A and A->D conversion in the chain?

I see your ADI-2/4 has a Toslink input built-in.

 

[Rja4000]

Well, I could do that.
But I've been challenged once -and rightfully so- that is was kind of cheating, because the RME is sitting in a class appart, since it is basically able to correct most gross shifts in the incoming clock.

So, and as the RME is probably not the right candidate to hang to an old N100 and build an inexpensive system, I chose to rather measure with a "reasonably" priced, but excellent, DAC.

That happens to also be how I use it.

 

[pLudio]

Which BluOS version is the N100 running? Does it still get updates?

 

[Rja4000]

Yes, they still receive updates.
That's one of the great things with BluOS.