WiiM Pro - Review & Measurements (Streamer)

[Yorkshire Mouth]

I can't do much for you...
the situation is not difficult to understand...

Trust me, I fully understand the situation.

 

[gwing]

Trust me, I fully understand the situation.

That's a lot of trust. Experience shows that that anyone, in general, claiming to fully understand anything seldom does.

 

[nanook]

"Whenever a theory seems to you to be the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have understood neither the theory nor the problem to be solved."

Karl Raimund Popper: Objective Cognition. An evolutionary design, Evolution and the tree of knowledge

 

[magreen]

If connecting digitally there is no difference between mini and pro. That nonsense about jitter is just more audiophile FUD. In the test here, Toslink out achieved 140dB plus of SINAD, just as it should.

Consider the pro though, if you might want to take advantage of the PEQ room correction. I would.

Going back to the discussion of Pro vs. Mini. Your post (and others) says no difference if connecting digitally--are you suggesting there's a difference in the analog out of these two?

My situation is I have a Pro and a Mini, for use in two different rooms. I'm ecstatic the Mini was given 10*2 PEQ and, more recently RC. So RC is no longer a differentiator AFAIK (unless the Mini's RC/PEQ isn't as good for some reason?). I currently have only one external DAC to use between them. So, one device gets digital out and one uses analog out/internal DAC. Which to use with analog out? Any difference between them--e.g., could the output circuitry of the Pro be more robust?

 

[morillon]

Going back to the discussion of Pro vs. Mini. Your post (and others) says no difference if connecting digitally--are you suggesting there's a difference in the analog out of these two?

My situation is I have a Pro and a Mini, for use in two different rooms. I'm ecstatic the Mini was given 10*2 PEQ and, more recently RC. So RC is no longer a differentiator AFAIK (unless the Mini's RC/PEQ isn't as good for some reason?). I currently have only one external DAC to use between them. So, one device gets digital out and one uses analog out/internal DAC. Which to use with analog out? Any difference between them--e.g., could the output circuitry of the Pro be more robust?

The analog output is very comparable between the two for cause..it's the same just barely more neat on the pro but limited... the digital output is on the other hand a little more and the pro benefits from the chromecast

 

[gwing]

Going back to the discussion of Pro vs. Mini. Your post (and others) says no difference if connecting digitally--are you suggesting there's a difference in the analog out of these two?

My situation is I have a Pro and a Mini, for use in two different rooms. I'm ecstatic the Mini was given 10*2 PEQ and, more recently RC. So RC is no longer a differentiator AFAIK (unless the Mini's RC/PEQ isn't as good for some reason?). I currently have only one external DAC to use between them. So, one device gets digital out and one uses analog out/internal DAC. Which to use with analog out? Any difference between them--e.g., could the output circuitry of the Pro be more robust?

Yes, the pro and pro+ have a better DAC which reaches the 'audibly transparent' level. The one in the mini isn't as good.

If you have just one external DAC can you use that with the mini and the analog outputs from the Pro? The DAC in the Pro is sufficiently good that there is no point getting another external DAC for it (unless that DAC would also provides other features you want).

Edit - sorry, it is indeed the pro+ that has the better DAC, pro DAC is the same as on the mini. So your options for improvement would be either another external DAC or replace one of your existing Wiims with the pro+.

 

[morillon]

same dac in mini and pro... very limited, and same adc to ( very limited too).. (but toslink in and coax out with pro... and chromecast)
pro+ have very different dac of pro

 

[antcollinet]

Yes, the pro and pro+ have a better DAC which reaches the 'audibly transparent' level. The one in the mini isn't as good.

I believe the mini and Pro have the same DAC. It was the Pro+ that improved in that area.

Having said that - I fully expect that almost no-one in real world listening, will be able to tell them apart. The Mini and Pro are good - just not state of the art.

So, @magreen, it makes no difference which of your mini or pro you connect to the DAC.

 

[magreen]

Thanks. I was aware that the mini and the pro have the same DAC chip. But I read somewhere that DAC sound quality (in general) depends not only on the chip, but also on the implementation of the surrounding output circuitry and quality of components. So is there any reason to believe the Pro (with its larger housing, beefier CPU/RAM and more inputs/outputs), would have a better implementation of the DAC chip+circuitry+components than the Mini that could affect output?

 

[somebodyelse]

The measurements for the analog out of the Mini and Pro are pretty similar. No reason to think one is better than the other.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/wiim-mini-review-streamer.33099/
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/.../wiim-pro-review-measurements-streamer.42300/

 

[antcollinet]

Thanks. I was aware that the mini and the pro have the same DAC chip

When I said "same DAC" I meant just that, including all analogue components needed for a DAC. Not only the same DAC chip.

As pointed out by @somebodyelse , the analogue performance of both devices is basically the same. So it is reasonable to assume they have copied the entire DAC circuit. Even if they haven't copied exactly, then any changes have not made a significant performance difference.

 

[Venkyrenga]

Comparing Wiim mini and Pro as a digital transport, is there any improvement in Pro's digital out?

 

[Purité Audio]

No.
Keith

 

[magreen]

When I said "same DAC" I meant just that, including all analogue components needed for a DAC. Not only the same DAC chip.

As pointed out by @somebodyelse , the analogue performance of both devices is basically the same. So it is reasonable to assume they have copied the entire DAC circuit. Even if they haven't copied exactly, then any changes have not made a significant performance difference.

Ok, thank you, and thanks also to @somebodyelse, for the replies and information.

It sounds like these two devices are essentially the same for my purposes then, now that they've received all these upgrades over the years. Fascinating.

 

[somebodyelse]

It sounds like these two devices are essentially the same for my purposes then, now that they've received all these upgrades over the years. Fascinating.

The pro has some extra connectivity options and capabilities, but if you won't use any of them there's no point paying the extra for the Pro. There's a table at the bottom of the Pro overview page so you can see what's missing. Squeezelite for LMS isn't on there, but I think all but the Mini have that too. Did they miss anything else?

 

[magreen]

The pro has some extra connectivity options and capabilities, but if you won't use any of them there's no point paying the extra for the Pro. There's a table at the bottom of the Pro overview page so you can see what's missing. Squeezelite for LMS isn't on there, but I think all but the Mini have that too. Did they miss anything else?

The big differentiator for a long time, which isn't in that table, was 10*2 PEQ and RC on the Pro. They had said the Mini couldn't do those due to low RAM and CPU grunt. Then they added 10*2 PEQ on the Mini. Then they added RC on the Mini. So here we are with two very capable devices, with pretty much just the connectivity differences that you point out.

 

[Mort]

The bigger question to me has always been the place of the pro vs pro plus.

 

[somebodyelse]

The bigger question to me has always been the place of the pro vs pro plus.

Better DAC performance. ADC clips at 2V instead of 1.2V but otherwise has similar performance to the Pro and Mini. The ADC can also do up to 24/192 instead of being fixed at 16/48, but it doesn't have the performance to make that really useful.

 

[Mort]

Right I'm aware of the differences. The question is 'why'? Why have two very close versions? It takes a lot of effort to produce another entire model.

Moot point now.

 

[morillon]

At the time of its release, the Pro was a sort of revision of the Mini, offering more inputs and outputs, and Chromecast, same adc dac , but better processeur/memory/ethernet... the software evolution came later...