Network Switches

You will not be missed by me, at least, because frankly, you are technically ignorant. You are the guy trusted to put in network equipment and run cables.  You are not the guy trusted to design the audio equipment, nor the guy trusted to write the protocols for the audio, or anything that gets into anything technical in depth.

1. I never ever said I would not have my perceptions put to the test. I call out false claims when I see them, but have to admit to potential sources when they exist.
   
2. With almost no exception is anyone claiming here that the switch is changing the "fidelity" of the digital audio stream. You are saying that.
   
3. I clearly, in terms you should be able to understand, communicated how changing packet rate could induce a change in the noise signature in the end-point equipment. Not the data being received, but an analog noise signature via pumping of the end equipment power supply rails. Perhaps you do not understand what I am communicating because you do not have the knowledge to understand it?
   
4. It has clearly been communicated here to you as well, how, noise can be injected via ethernet connections could influence end equipment results. Not the digital transmission which is fairly noise immune, but injected noise into analog sections. Ethernet transformers are actually fairly wide bandwidth offering a path to noise injection.

You say people don't want to learn, but other than slinging insults, you have not communicated one iota of information, nor have you even refuted the actual arguments presented w.r.t. analog noise injection, potential for noise pumping, etc. You just keep repeating the same things over and over again that no one seems to be even disputing.
Bye Mike.

mike201913 posts10-31-2019 11:32am

I must say that I find it amusing that one of those claiming that cables and switches can enhance digitised audio can ask for 'evidence' when refusing time after time to have their perceptions put to a proper test. very droll

Experience and qualifications ? I am the guy with years of experience trusted by recording studios and TV studios.... and you are the guy who thinks that a switch can change the fidelity of a digitised audio stream passing through it........... hmmm

Natural selection will eventually put these bogus switch and cable manufacturers out of business by removing their patsies as, presumably, it is the same people who believe the cable and switch manufacturers rather than believe experts and facts who will also believe, for example, the ads for Miracle Mineral Solution rather than believe the FDA.

They will carry on drinking very expensive bleach to their last breath, while telling the medical experts that they don't know what they are talking about.

I give up. some people just do not want to learn.

I have just found a forum where pseudo science and ridiculous claims are forbidden

I won't be here to see your reply but thanks for a (reasonably) civilised discussion :)

(and I am still looking for anybody to explain how a cable or a switch can adjust or change or enhance a digitised audio file passing through it. Just take a while to think about the impossibility of that claim)

thanks

see y'all

Steve, the guy that designed the etherRegen has designed many of the chips used in standard switches, so I think his credentials and experience far outweigh any here or the doubters who claim these things don’t matter.

Also ethernet is not just for streaming audio. All my music is on local drives.

Another crazy thing that illustrates how counterintuitive audio quality can be is that UpTone has found that the etherRegen seems to benefit from breakin. (When comparing a prototype to a newly assembled one)

This seems to make no sense (at least to me as a non engineer), but yet it is.

Perhaps there is something else about the prototype vs assembled version that can explain the difference.

Also the level of system does make a difference in whether or not someone may receive a difference. There is so many opportunities for coloration and loss of resolution in a system (especially the analog volume control and digital volume control)

From a video perspective there are details not readily visible on a 55” monitor that are visible on a huge projection screen, and I would liken a highly resolving stereo to the large screen when details are exploded and now audible.

Just last night I was listening to Springsteen’s Seeger sessions (a well recorded acoustic album) and was comparing a 16 bit WAV file with the 24 bit flac. (All 44.1). The WAV sounded better. Once I unpacked the 24 bit flac to WAV, it now had more detail and was more intimate than the 16bit WAV. This is using a Mac Pro tower with 64 gigs ram and 6 cores so the computer isn’t using much of its horsepower decoding the flac.

Much of audio is counterintuitive, and with no (or lacking) explanation and yet these differences exist for people with the systems and the aural experience to hear the nuances.

From what I can gather from the links to the 3 switches mentioned in the OP the sotm switch is not a managed switch but a basic level 2 switch so I can’t see anyone being able to manage changing packet rates. I haven’t found as much on the other 2 but they look to be basic level 2 switches as well, perhaps someone has more info on them.

Mitch2 10-31-2019

I would like to know why I would need a switch as discussed here, where I would use it, and what it would do for me. My knowledge of switches is basically non-existent, hence the dumb question.

@mitch2, in simple terms I would put it that a network switch that is typically used on an Ethernet network in a home environment can be thought of as a port expander. The Ethernet ports of multiple devices can be connected to it, and it would provide a path for communications between any two of them. Typically it would determine the device to which to send data “packets” it receives from one of the devices based on local IP addresses that are assigned to each device by a router. The router being one of the devices connected to the switch. Although routers commonly include switch provisions themselves, supporting several ports.

Obviously you don’t need that port expansion functionality in the application you’ve described. But as you’ve seen I and Atdavid have proposed explanations for why some audiophiles have reported finding that inserting a network switch into the path between their router and their audio system’s Ethernet port has been sonically beneficial.

In your case my guess, and it’s just a guess, is that since your DAC communicates with the upstream device it is connected to via I2S chances are that inserting a network switch further upstream won’t be worthwhile. But as a very inexpensive experiment you might consider purchasing a metal-enclosed network switch, such as the Netgear GS305, and inserting it into either of the two upstream Ethernet connection paths you described. A similar predecessor of that model was reported by two members in the thread I linked to in my initial post in this thread to have provided significant sonic benefit when inserted between their router and their Bricasti DAC.

Best regards,

--Al

I would like to know why I would need a switch as discussed here, where I would use it, and what it would do for me.

@mitch2 
Buy a cheap second hand Cisco 8 port switch from eBay and connect it via Ethernet to your router. Connect your streamer etc to your network switch rather than directly to the router.   The result may surprise you.