Hrt - music streamer?

Hello Music Lovers-

Does anyone have any experience with the HRT Music Streamer II DAC series?

I want to hook it up to my laptop to feed the main sterio system in my LR.

AT $150 it seems a bargain though it only does USB. Also in the running are the V-DAC for $300 and the DAC Magic for $400.

Appreciate your sharing your experience and opinions on this!

OK - I decided to take one for team and buy and try the HRT Music Steamer 2 DAC for $150 at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/HRT-Music-Stre.../dp/B0038O4UFQ

I will try it out over the next week and run some side by sides. lossless: Marantz CD Xer vs HRT+Laptop; 256K VBR: IPOD vs HRT+laptop.

Hello there music lovers-

Here's what I found hooking up the HRT Music Steamer 2 USB DAC with my laptop into my good 2.0 stereo system. (Focal Chorus Speakers, Cambridge Audio Azur 640A integrated Amp, Marantz CD changer.

One thing I noticed is that the volume output of the HRT is much less than that of the CD Changer.

With the USB DAC playing Itunes from the laptop, here is what I found.
1. At 265K MP3 VBR, virtually no difference between the IPOD via the Cambridge Audio Ipod Dock and the Laptop/USB DAC.
2. Barely any difference between 256K and 320K MP3 VBR on the Laptop/USB DAC combo.
3. A small difference between 320K MP3 VBR and Apple FLAC (lossless)
4. A clear difference between the Apple lossless from the USB DAC and the same song from the CD on the CD-changer: Marantz CD changer was the hands down winner.

The Music Streamer 2 USB DAC was way better than the laptop motherboard sound output.

Net-Net - A fun $150 experiment, but if I decide to keep going down the hard drive music server route, I'm going to need a better DAC: either the V-DAC or the Cambridge Audio DAC-Magic.

Hope this was helpful and interesting.

Enjoy the music.