We do not understand each other.
Peace.
Good evening.
Ok, NP - I'll say this just to close out my idea...
An "audio Streamer" operates in this fashion:
A Network input (via a NIC - Network Interface Card using Ethernet or WiFi from your ISP) sends the streaming service network signal from your internet connection (Modem/Router) to the streamer's "Processor" or computer - this is usually a small SOC device ("system-on-chip" - the computing processor, the OS or software, and some memory - similar to the main processor in your PC/Mac, but much smaller and less powerful as audio doesn't need much processing speed or memory horsepower).
After the Network interface, the SOC Processor decodes the data that your streaming service sent (usually in a "FLAC container" for lossless 16bit and 24 bit content) and then coverts/"opens" that FLAC container to extract the native PCM audio content, for all "HiRes" streaming services (Amazon, Tidal, Qobuz - for Wiim streamers) -- the streaming services content is always limited to
24/192 MAX
This PCM audio data is output from the SOC processor as
"I2S" PCM audio (always limited to 24/192 MAX rate) - which carries the L/R channels of audio PCM data + clock signals - and then this I2S PCM audio+clock signal is sent to the Wiim DSP engine for PEQ and Bass management, then DAC stage (ESS9038 for main L/R analog output, and an as yet unknown DAC for the Subwoofer output) and then to the analog audio buffer sections for impedance and voltage gain adjustments to send to your amplifiers/subwoofers.
The USB and SPDIF (Toslink+Coax) Digital outputs go from the I2S output of the SOC processor thru interface devices (likely an XMOS USB interface for the USB Digital audio output and a SPDIF "Transceiver" device for the Toslink & Coax outputs).
Since the internal SOC audio and DSP Processing/software that
Wiim uses is limited to 24/192 as a MAXIMUM DATA RATE (as NONE of the streaming services offer higher rates than 24/192), Wiim has limited ALL it's various analog and digital outputs to 24/192 MAX sample/bit rates --
even though the ESS 9038 DAC and the XMOS USB interface can decode/send higher rates than 24/192.
Now, I hear some of your ask about playing files via DLNA/Squeezlite, etc. -- as these files can certainly be at higher rates than 24/192 -- my assumption here is that Wiim's SOC processor will resample these to 24/192, as that is the max rate the Wiim processor and it's various DSP and audio interfaces are set to work with.
I invite informed corrections or additional details to any of my comments above....
