Let me add a couple of things to this as well.
First, the Extreme is 3 years old already and it's normal to (finally) have some competition. Technology advances quickly these days.
When it was released 3 years ago, it was developed to run as a Roon server. And from my point of view it was so much ahead of anything else out there that it practically had no competition. No other server was even close to the Extreme. That was the original stock Extreme server, which evolved a lot over the years but more about that later.
I have been very passionate about DIY server building in past few years and have probably spent enough money to buy an Extreme on all kinds of DIY server experiments, trying all kinds of different CPUs, motherboards, memory, storage, power supplies, etc. Money well spend in my point if view because the experience I gained by these experiments is priceless. A lot of my experiments have been documented in
another forum thread. It did not take long to realize that the server in many cases makes a bigger difference than the DAC and that everything about the server matters. Every CPU sounded different. Every motherboard sounded different. RAM sounded different, storage as well. Many software settings and BIOS setting change the sound too. The list goes on.
When I thought I was at the pinnacle of DIY audio server development (I had a very special server with upgraded clocks, specialty USB and network cards, state of the art linear power supply, software, and probably hundreds of other tweaks I have learned over the years and many bells and whistles) I decided to try the hardware and software used on the Extreme. There are a bunch of standard parts I could buy from the store including motherboard, CPUs, Optane memory for the OS, NVME storage for music. And there are quite a few custom designed parts in the Extreme that people cannot buy. I managed to build my own DIY clone of the Extreme server. The biggest challenge was the passive cooling for the two Xeon CPUs. There was no commercial passive cooling solution (and I am still not aware of any). I somehow managed to build a DIY passive cooling solution for me and ended up with this ugly looking but well working passive cooling solution:
That's a picture that's nearly two years old. It's laughable when put next to a photo of the Extreme but it did the job. I had no access to CNC machines. In fact I built this mostly on the countertop in the kitchen. I even put the heatsinks in the oven to help the thermal epoxy cure properly
.
A lot of things have changed since (RAM, Optane, storage, power supply, etc) but the ugly bent copper pipes are still the same.
The Extreme hardware I used turned out to sound better than my best DIY server. And that was without the fancy ultraOCXO clocks and bells and whistles of my state of the art DIY server. So I spent the last 18 months tweaking this server. No matter what I tried, it turned out that the Taiko way was the best sounding way. All of a sudden my hobby took a strange turn. It turned from exploring technologies that don't exist in commercial solutions and building servers that are better than anything else out there to trying to chase what Taiko has done and copy as much as I possibly can from the Extreme.
I knew a dedicated USB card sounded better on this hardware and had tried the two cards I considered best - PinkFaun USB with ultraOCXO clock and JCAT XE USB card. When I powered by the best power supply money can buy those sounded better than the USB output on the motherboard. At that time my DIY server was probably very close to what the stock Extreme sounded like. I've heard the Extreme many times but have never done a proper A/B comparisons with my DIY server. But let's say I was at least 80% there, maybe 90%.
Then Emile released TAS, USB driver, and a USB card. I was very curious about the Taiko USB card and managed to get one to try from a friend who has an Extreme and purchased the Taiko USB card. I spent a long time with the Taiko USB card on my DIY server. The day when I had to remove it from my server and send it back to its original owner was a sad day. I realized how good the USB card was. Yes, in case you wonder, it was better than any of the other USB cards I've had or tried.
I reached out to Emile to ask him if I can buy a USB card. Emile told me that the USB card was only available to Extreme owners (I thought we were friends, Emile
). The USB card alone was a good reason for me to consider buying an Extreme. And I did not even use it with the Taiko USB driver / TAS. If buying an Extreme was the only way to have access to the USB card, I guess I had to seriously consider it.
With every single thing Taiko released, I found that my DIY was getting further away from the Extreme - TAS, USB driver, USB card, and next XDMS, network card, router, etc. I also visited Taiko this summer and saw some of the things Emile is working on (although I am sure there was a lot more than what I saw). It's stuff that I cannot do with DIY. You need a team of engineers, machinery, testing/measuring equipment, developers, etc. I don't have access to any of that.
There are usually two main reasons for people to go the DIY route. One is to get better performance cheaper by skipping the dealer commission, marketing, R&D and other parts of the cost you pay when you buy a commercial product. And the other one is to make something better than the available commercial products and to have an infinite number of ways to tweak your system. I was in both of these categories because I had managed to build servers that were cheaper and better than most commercial solutions. Well, that's not the case anymore. I can only build stuff cheaper but not better. I don't know how to do better, at least not at this time. And I do want to have access to all the exciting technology about to come from Taiko. It became inevitable that I will order an Extreme. I placed an order a few months ago. My Extreme is now ready and burning in at the Taiko factory. And my DIY server will go to its new owner once I receive the Extreme. I am happy to join the Taiko owner's circle. But the bottom line is I did not order the Extreme for what it was 421 pages ago in this thread. My DIY server is not too far away from that. I ordered it for the new enhancements that came in the last year and for the new technology that will arrive in 2022.
