Hello there,
It's my first post out there after reading a lot of your reviews.
To explain my need, in short i want an easy audio streamer with th epossibility of playing youtube content on wifi straght from youtube on chrome or from my phone. I guess it will work, but will the sound be as good as possible?
If I understand the streaming from google chrome is not super good, is it the same for playing youtube from it? What about the youtube app on phone?
Thank you in advance
Here is what I used for this particular case you mentioned:
1/ Get chromecast with video function (I used the basic one) and HDMI output (so the most basic Chromecast should do)
2/ Get an HDMI extractor, that extracts audio via optical signal (and optionaly also via minijack using it's internal DAC, likely crap)
3/ Use optical to get the audio to DAC which has optical in (likely you could use coaxial)
You can know listen to audio from yt/netflix etc on your DAC.
Other setup:
4/ use set top box with option to connect USB DAC and casting to it
5/ connect USB DAC to it.
I used Shield with USB DAC and worked ok BUT some software wont cast to it and it cant be added to group.
I don't know measurements/codecs/bitrate details, I just know it works casue I used it. If you want to listen to music from youtube (not YT music), it's already medium quality at most.