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If you stream music from the internet, I can't recommend this more highly

I had been using a Roon Nucleus to stream Qobuz, with my Chord Qutest directly connected to the Nucleus. I thought I was getting pretty decent sound quality. And then I got a marketing email from Small Green Computer touting some of their optical gear. The basic idea is that normal cables and connections used to stream from the internet pick up noise of one kind or another (radio frequencies and electromagnetic something or other). But fiber optic cables and their connections/interfaces do not. I don’t know anything about anything, but it made theoretical sense to me, it wasn’t a huge amount of money ($1,400), and with a 30 day return policy I figured I could always return it if I didn’t hear any improvement. Well, I didn’t just hear a slight improvement; it was like turning on the lights in a dark room. Much greater clarity and detail, much better micro and macro dynamics, better timbre to acoustic instruments -- overall just more lifelike. Two quick examples: I’ve listened to some of Steely Dan’s top songs 100s of times over the course of my life, and this is the first time I’d ever noticed a particular and very subtle sound characteristic of Fagen’s keyboard in Babylon Sister. It’s hard to describe, but it’s like there’s a slight sound of air being exhaled by it. The other example: the specific timbre of whatever percussive instrument is used at the beginning of Copeland’s "Fanfare for the Common Man" (a recording by the Minnesota Orchestra). There’s more of a metallic sound than a drum skin sound to it that I didn’t know was there before. The metallic sound starts in the center and then projects out and to the sides, like a wave washing over you. Anyway, I’m just thrilled about having stumbled upon the whole "optical" thing and felt obligated to let others know about it. If you stream music over the internet, I highly recommend giving it a try. (The product I got was the opticalRendu, with the linear power supply option, and the Fiber Ethernet Converter Bundle option.)
128x128hiphiphan
mitch2
4,030 posts
 
It is my understanding optical/fiber decoupling is best positioned as close to the endpoint as possible.  I am currently using two  TP-Link Gigabit SFP to RJ45 Fiber Media Converters and a 1M run of Multimode Duplex Fiber Optic Cable.  These are positioned after a Silent Angel Bonn N8 Ethernet network switch and just in front of my Antipodes server to eliminate EMI/RFI that may potentially be contaminating the approximately 30 feet run of Ethernet from my router to my server.  
One question I have considered is whether I would be better off placing one of my TP Link fibre/Ethernet converters at my router, and then the second just in front of my server so I could run 30 feet of  duplex fiber optic cable in place of the current Ethernet cable?  BTW, 10M of fiber optic cable only costs about $12.
Another question I have is why does it cost thousands of dollars to implement these options (i.e., the Sonore products)?  TP-Link Gigabit SFP to RJ45 Fiber Media Converters cost about $20 bucks, the fiber duplex cables are inexpensive, and you can purchase a 1 foot Cat 8 cable for $6 bucks that you can use to make final connections to your router, switch, server, and/or endpoint.  I get that having that optical connection inside the device may be a slightly superior solution, but is the trade-off of not needing a 1 to 3-foot Ethernet cable at the end of your signal chain really worth thousands?
For $12, I think I will try running fiber optic cable instead of Ethernet for my longest connection.
berti
3 posts
 
I agree totally with hiphiphan
I use a silent angel Z1 as server an an optical sonore rendu as player (optical fibers connected on an unify audiophile switch)with a border patrol DAC through roon and audivarna
I think really the optic fibers give a big improvement in clarity, space, air and relax sound
It is just addictive
It becomes very difficult for me to stop a listening session 
bertrand

hiphiphan's avatar
hiphiphan OP
72 posts
 
cycles2: To be honest, we’re talking about what is essentially a $1,400 streamer compared to your $23,000 streamer/DAC. You are waaaaay beyond where I was with my digital front-end. Common sense is telling me that the opticalRendu is just not going to be worth your while. I have to think that a very high-end, very highly lauded audio company like dCS Rossini has designed their streamer to fix the noise issues that the optical set-up addresses. And of course, their streaming/clocking functions are going to be far above the Rendu’s. I think the Rendu optical kit is mainly going to benefit people who don’t already have a high-end streamer. In his review of the opticalRendu, Hans Beekhuyzen says that even though it’s good, it doesn’t match the sound quality of his $4,000 Auralic streamer. (Although he does say it comes close, and that it offers much bigger bang for the buck than the Auralic.)

Regarding the Lumin streamer, that’s really interesting. I noticed that Auralic’s new $9,000 external master clock uses optical isolation to separate certain sections of that device. I’m confident that a couple of years from now, optical is going to be ubiquitous. It seems to very effectively, simply, and cheaply solve the issue of electrical noise.
niodari's avatar
niodari
305 posts
 
Your DAC likely is not able to deal with the higher jitter of an optical interface. Coax has less jitter.
audio2 and douglas, 
do you mean the optical converter or the optical cable? 
In both cases, a similar problem may occur in  Ethernet to optical
conversion. 
Unlikely the problem is in the DAC (T&A DAC 8) which, in general, delivers a clean  and natural reproduction. In general, one straightforwardly assumes that the more direct signal is, the better is the sound (less converters, better ...).
My internet signal comes with a fiber optic cable, are there strong arguments supporting a common opinion that WiFi  connection to a streamer would a priory be worse than the cable connection? 
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