It appears that PS Audio has decided that the AirLens is not to be another all-purpose streamer with all of the usual outputs that competes with all of the other streamers out there. Instead, it will be one whose main purpose is to work primarily with PS Audio dacs as a replacement for the Bridge II. If that means they can focus on making it the best sounding streamer for their dacs and keep down its cost by excluding the parts for unnecessary outputs, that works for me.
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Then there is the thought that the I2S HDMI cable could easily out price the AirLens… 
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My music server does not work with Bridge2 well and I hope it will work with AirLens. Otherwise, I will… I dunno yet.
Lots of great points here. Especially even without USB, there’s a number of us, including me, who are ready to purchase the AL.
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I think it’s time for a little chassis teaser 
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Never happened before: shelf rack ready with enough room, expensive cable ready in a box, orea isolators ready in a drawer. Everything’s ready for the AirLens, except the AirLens.
It seems I will still have to wait before starting this new adventure in HiFi streaming.
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I agree. I think if you have SPDIF coaxial you can bring in a large part of the market and i2s can cater for higher end too.
I’m quite ok not to have USB as part of the mix if it makes the unit quieter (but I don’t use USB for audio)…
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At that projected price point, it will be interesting for sure. Given the PSA trial policy, I might even convince myself to try one out to see if it betters my Aurender in sound quality. That’s unless I succumb to subwoofer upgrade fever first. There’s limited room in the budget for upgrades, with retirement around the corner. And the AL would require another cable purchase too, since the Aurender outputs by USB.
Interesting comment/observation at the end of this “editorial” from Michael Lavorgna over at “Twittering Machines”:
FYI/FWIW.
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Or instead of going ethernet into the DAC, go with I2S over HDMI cable. PS Audio is not just ahead of the curve on this, but they created the curve.
Question for PS Audio, not from me, but from my neighbour, will the AirLens output DSD128 over the SPDIF RCA output?
A similar question… just for curiousity… for the DS MKII thread would be, how many ways will there be to get DSD128 into the DS MKII? With I2S via HDMI cable and over twin AES???
Would love to know what rate of DSD the AirLens will output - and whether we’ll be able to experience the higher 352k MQA unfolds too!
FWIW, the AirLens will provide exactly that and I view it as PSA’s new approach for having a high quality (if not the best) Ethernet DAC interface. I think of it (and PSA has acknowledged as much) as a replacement of the Bridge II Ethernet card.
I think it will have more than one input but Ethernet will be one of them. “Air Gap” will be deployed w/in the AirLens black box and I2S and coax will be AirLens output options.
I don’t know if “Air Gap” will make the type of input to the AirLens immaterial or not, but I suspect the kit will be somehow optimized for Ethernet. 
Time will tell.
Using a computer (MacBook or MacMini or others) as a server, I’m wondering if AirLens rather than Ethernet will better work via wifi. Almost in my case, I do not use to play stored files just streaming from internet, it would permit to avoid an expensive switch in the chain with other boxes (like matrix) on the shelf and expensive cables (sorry Al) for expensive power supply.
A simple clean possible path in the next future would be:
LAN RJ45 from wall > computer > wifi (air) > AirLens > I2S > DS DAC Mk II
Pros and cons?
I use a Mac Mini and run ethernet directly into the Bridge II card. Galvanic isolation is built into the ethernet spec and the Mac Mini performs auto crossover for point to point interfaces. So if the computer is nearby, no switch is needed.
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Interesting…how so? I mean is there something about the design of the Mac Mini output that provides galvanic isolation?*
Thanks.
[*Just to be sure we are talking about the same thing: Galvanic isolation is a principle of isolating functional sections of electrical systems to prevent current flow; no direct conduction path is permitted. Energy or information can still be exchanged between the sections by other means, such as capacitance, induction or electromagnetic waves, or by optical, acoustic or mechanical means. (Galvanic isolation - Wikipedia)
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Sorry, I’m a bit confused about your assumption. Following your words, when the AirLens will be in the chain are you suggesting to let the only one ethernet cable run from the wall RJ45 outlet to the AirLens?
If so how can the MacMini (core) be internet connected? I was thinking exactly the opposite: the ethernet cable plugged to the MacMini and the AirLens (endpoint) connected to the MacMini via wifi.
My Mac Mini hangs off my house network via Wi-Fi as there is no ethernet jack available in my living room. Local files are stored on a Thunderbolt 2 RAID-5 array attached to the Mac Mini. Originally I didn’t stream, but for me Qobuz works fine via Wi-Fi and 200 mbs internet service. Sorry about the confusion, a switch would be required if you wanted both connections via ethernet.
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Galvanic isolation is in the ethernet design spec and built into ethernet chips/hardware. It’s independent of the Mac Mini or any other device providing ethernet connectivity. The PoE lines, if any, require a direct connection and cannot be isolated by transformers.
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Sorry, I still don’t understand.
Do you mean the chips/hardware in the Mac Mini is designed in a way such that it physically separates the current (and presumably hitchhiking noise) used to power the Mac’s functions from the outbound “Ethernet” signal so as to provide Galvanic Isolation?
I don’t mean to be dense, but this is the first I have heard of such a design element and it makes me wonder if it might have something to do with why many find the Mini to be an excellent music server option.
Cheers.
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Ethernet lines are transformer isolated in all Ethernet ports.
If using UTP then there is no direct connection between the two devices.