Bluesound Vault 2

Hi! I’m the recent owner of a Vault 2 (have had mine for almost 2 months now) and am really enjoying it. I’m using it mostly for Tidal streaming, but have ripped my 300+ CD collection to it. You are right that it takes about 10-15 mins per rip. It is faster to “drag & drop” import from a networked PC or NAS. However, if your looking for the best possible sound, my dealer & BlueSound recommend doing the direct rip using the Vault as it will insure a perfect bit-for-bit transfer. 

Now, I can’t say for sure that there is a measurable or audible difference, but, I too wanted the best possible sound, so I took the time & ripped everything using the Vault. I will say that the rips from the Vault sound every bit as good, if not even a little bit better, than the CD’s spinning in my Denon DVD-2900 SACD/CD player.

Just my $0.02 worth...Enjoy your music!

Arvin

My average time per cd into the Vault was about 8 minutes.  Just add as many as you feel like each day.  It’s not that hard to do.  Put your favorites in first.

In in the mean time you can listen to your favorites plus there’s Radio Paradise which is free commercial less radio which sounds great with a varied selection of music. Then there is access to page after page of internet radio stations of all sorts of specific genre. No way to get bored with this device even without all of your music loaded in one shot.  Arvin did a Tidal subscription which is another option.  I’m considering this as well.  I’ve seen free trial offers from anywhere from 30 to 90 days.

 I really like my Vault.

I am considering the Vault too. Can you play and rip the CD at the same time? That helps kill time.

@ct221933,

Yes, you can rip and stream music simultaneously. 

It’s not a CD player so I don’t believe you can listen to the cd you are ripping at the same time.  You should be able to listen to already stored cd’s or stream during the process of ripping.  I can’t verify since I never tried it, just a matter of conjecture on my part.

6 to 8 minutes to rip a CD in flac or wav format.
No you cannot play the CD while ripping as it is not a player but as soon as it has ripped at least the first track you can then start playing said ripped CD.

Or listen to other ripped music or stream Tidal etc.

Took some time to rip 2500 cds....lol
But you just do a few a day as you feel like it.

Imho nearly every ripped CD comes out with metadata and artwork perfect. Only a few older really obscure albums need your physical input on your pc to fix.

For $1000 there still is not a much better easier solution that I have found yet.
17 months of usage and still happy with it.

dBpoweramp seems to do a comparison to insure a perfect bit-for-bit copy, or to report an error if one occurred.  In my experience, errors are rare.  I rip to a Mac Mini that runs Roon core 24/7.

db

Can you add vinyl to the Bluesound Vault 2, and if so, how?

I buying one to listen to Tidal Masters in full MQA 24/192. Better sound than ripped cds? Anyone ?

I have a Bluesound Node 2.  I have ripped my CDs to an external hard drive and can access them through my network with the Node 2 (and other devices).  I'd rather have them on a standard hard drive that I can easily back up and replace.  Perhaps there's some advantage to using the Vault that I'm missing.

Already started ripping my cds. It will take while but it seems to compensate the time spent.  Set to wav. But Tidal Masters MQA is amazing! Using Shunyata power cable and Van Den Hull stereo cables made a huge difference! Next test will be to import my external HD with hi def files.

Try outputting the Vault via spdif to a half decent DAC and you will REALLY hear an improvement as imho the Vaults internal DAC is its weakest link.

I run mine to a Mytek Brooklyn which handles the full MQA unfolding via Nordost Heimdal 2 spdif cable and it is a huge improvement on the Vaults output via RCA.

Enjoy!

Peporter
I sold of my analog rig but still had a few albums left that I used as a support for my Vault2 on my equipment rack.  It made the Vault2 sound more holographic 😀
  on a more serious note, the only way to add vinyl to the Vault2 would be to make a digital version of lps and then play them back from your HD via the Vault2.
To digitalization lps, there are many Phono stages or turntables on the market that off usb outputs, and there is free software to edit.  You can then use the Bluesound Software to create a playlist of your digitalized lps.  

I have a Vault 2i - I find that ripping take 6-7 minutes per CD, with the exception that some of my 24k gold masters seem to rip slightly faster and really scratched or scuffed CD's can take longer. But the average is definitely around 7 minutes. I am ripping to WAV, I believe FLAC would be similar - FLAC may take longer due to the compression involved? In retrospect, I would have chosen FLAC due to its inherent better tag management and reduction in size. But I chose WAV as the purest, rawest form of storage.

The rip is supposed to be very good - bit perfect. I have also found that some CD's are whisper quiet while others are noisy as heck while ripping. Looking at some of the data generated, it appears that this is because of jitter and things like that - where the CD is out of round, or other problems with production.

Keep in mind that all of these CD's play perfectly fine in my car and home CD players, which means that a CD player is able to "rip" these on the fly without any perceptible flaws. So the end result from the Vault is probably pretty good if it is spending this much time with it.

I have a LARGE CD collection from 30 years in the radio industry, and many of them as a music director. I have some impressive collectible CD's and some of them are irreplaceable. 

On one hand, I find it a bit time consuming, but on the other hand I hope that I am getting high quality rips of these cd's.

One VERY POSITIVE aspect of this is that I am now able to take these files and move them to any format, including thumb drives, and backup my files and I should no longer have to worry about my CDs deteriorating - which some of them are starting to do as oxygen enters the sides of the plastic and causes the aluminum to oxidize. My 24k gold CDs are not experiencing this of course. Also, some of the CDs have become very brittle with one of them breaking in two when I tried to remove it.

I also want to be able to free up the tremendous amount of space that these CDs take up in my home.

I have not tried to rip and play a CD at the same time, but you can play other songs that are ripped while you are ripping another CD.

Also, I believe you can import vinyl but I am not certain of the logistics there. I will say that Bluesound has a very robust and competent help forum and Tony W. is an excellent resource if you have questions. Honestly I do not know how they do such a good job of customer support - they are quick to answer and very helpful. I'm fairly impressed with the company.

THAT SAID, this is definitely a work in progress. The hardware is pretty solid. The software is rough around the edges. There are some un-intuitive menu items, and some things don't work how they should. And the app/program isn't very graphical. It is kind of like DOS or a command line based program rather than a GUI. 

But software can by updated, the hardware is pretty good. Lots of options for connectivity and I'm not knowledgeable about DACs and whether this is a good one or not. I have tried to find out more about it, but it is suspiciously difficult to find out details about the DAC - I suspect that means that it is not something they are wanting to put out in the open.

However, I am learning that compared to other equipment in this genre, that you get a lot of hardware for the money and it compares favorably to equipment that costs four or five times the money. Definitely a neat way to enter into the high end of this technology without spending a fortune.

I have posted a lengthy review and comment followups on Amazon.
https://smile.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/RK3JMDHTGNVYO/

I love my Vault 2i.... amazing what it can do.   It has great sound quality and convenience.  I also have it connected to my DAC but it sounds good in it's own right .    It's like the Swiss Army Knife of digital playback.   Bi directional Blutooth is a great feature too.   Today I used it to play my Magnum Dynalab tuner in another room via Blutooth.   Tonight I' m streaming Tidal .   It's an awesome machine that does everything and sounds great.