Innuos STREAM1 Music Streamer

The STREAM1 is the compact half-width chassis that sits at the entry of Innuos's Stream Series. A 13th-generation Intel quad-core processor, eight gigabytes of industrial DDR5 memory, a real-time kernel, and the modular output architecture that lets the customer choose where the digital signal leaves the box. The chassis is small enough to live anywhere in the room; the engineering inside it is the same Innuos engineering that fills the larger chassis above.

The story begins with power. The CX Power architecture, developed by Innuos in collaboration with Dr. Sean Jacobs, divides the streamer's internal rails into independently regulated domains — separate supplies for the processor, the storage controller, the clock, and the output stage. Each domain is fed by its own low-noise regulator and isolated from the others. The medical-grade switched-mode supply that ships in the box is the floor of what the STREAM1 can do; an LPS1 linear supply slides under the chassis as a future upgrade and lifts the noise floor further still. The STREAM1 was designed with that upgrade path in mind from the first sketch.

The output is where the customer's preferences enter the design. The STREAM1 is built around a single Digital Output Module bay that accepts one of four boards. The Standard DAC board delivers RCA, optical, and coaxial S/PDIF up to 24 bits at 192 kilohertz — the right answer for the customer running into a vintage integrated amplifier or a DAC that prefers a clean S/PDIF feed. The Performance DAC board steps the internal conversion to 32 bits at 768 kilohertz with native DSD512, output to RCA, for the customer whose system is built around the streamer's analog out. The PhoenixUSB board delivers a regenerated and reclocked USB feed to an external DAC, lifting the timing precision of the USB signal to a level a stock USB host controller will not reach. The SPDIF board adds AES output for the system running a balanced digital chain. The board is installed at order time and the customer's choice depends on the DAC the STREAM1 will sit upstream of.

Storage is internal. An M.2 NVMe drive in the base bay holds the customer's library — two terabytes or four terabytes, pre-fitted at order time, with an expansion bay for the customer who wants to grow the collection later. The whole library is indexed by Innuos's Sense operating system; the customer interacts with the music through the Sense app on iOS or Android, which handles Roon, HQPlayer NAA, AssetUPnP, and the major streaming services without exposing any of that to the listener. The job of the app is to disappear and let the music come forward.

Networking is wired — two 2.5-gigabit Ethernet ports, bridged, for the customer who wants the streamer on a clean wire to the rest of the network. The chassis is 240 millimeters wide, 200 millimeters deep, 80 millimeters tall, and weighs 2.4 kilograms — small enough to share a shelf with anything else in the system. The aluminum fascia matches the rest of the Stream Series for the customer building the front end one chassis at a time.

What the listener hears is what serious digital sources are supposed to deliver. The noise floor falls away, instruments sit in the air rather than against a slight glassy backdrop, and the music breathes the way analog listeners describe their best front ends. The STREAM1 is the lowest entry point in Innuos's current line and it is built with the same engineering discipline as the chassis above it.

Available at both Alma showrooms by appointment. We are happy to configure the STREAM1 against the DAC and the room it will live in; the modular architecture rewards a conversation about the rest of the system before the order is placed.