They are most assuredly not. Many of us like the simplicity, reliability and high SQ of transports and DACs, traits often not found in server-based music systems. We eschew the myriad of acronyms, server and software hiccups, crashes, droputs, firmwares, updates, backdates, minute-by-minute obsolescence of server-based music, especially through USB. At least early day CDP's were reliable!
Neal
Neal