Ok, here's my take on the Bluesound Node.
First off, I have very limited experience with streamers, the only streamer I've ever had, and still have, is a six year old Pioneer NP01. I used this for years with it's built in Dac, very happy.
Also used it with the Dac in a Yamaha AS801, Exposure XM5, Denon PMA. 1600 and with a Chord Mojo. And to be honest didn’t find a big difference between any of them.
So I kept the Pioneer thinking not much point in changing.
Anyway, the old Pioneer has started to play up. Still works, but has an intermittent crackle..
So I decided to treat myself to a new one, the Node ticked all the boxes, not the cheapest, but probably one of the easiest to set up. And it was, it set itself up, dead easy.
I started streaming using Tidal and the Dac in the Denon PMA1600.
And to my surprise, big improvement, I wasn’t really expecting this, because I was only using the the Node as a transport. However, using the the Node as a transport was a huge improvement over the Pioneer used as a transport.
If fact, using the the Node was a far greater upgrade than any of the Dacs I tried with the Pioneer.
The sound stage is much bigger, it really jumps out at you, it's far more open. In comparison the Pioneer sounded congested and the Node has much more low level detail.
The Node is also smoother and if anything the high frequencies are more extended.
I'm not good at describing sound differences.
Just to say it is far better than the old Pioneer in every respect.
In summery, the Node is not cheap,at £549 I paid £295 for the Pioneer six years ago, I think it's cost me about a pound week.
The Node is a really nice piece of kit, it looks good, sounds good, well made and, so far flawless in operation.
And at the moment I'm only using it as a transport. I'm going to try the internal Dac over the weekend. Before this, even though the Pioneer was old I thought all streamer transports would sound more or less the same. May the newer ones do, I don't know.
Anyway HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Moral of the story
Be happy with what you have and for a few years before upgrading your digital source.