I’ve been using WiFi in my HeadFi rig through my iDevices using Qobuz and was happy until I brought my CD transport up from my big rig to spin some discs not available for streaming. I was very disappointed to hear the CD transport sounded better than streaming through WiFi, and the feedback I got was that going wired to a decent streamer will close the gap, so that’s my next move. So, in my situation I found WiFi to be compromised. Hope this helps and best of luck.
Wireless vs. Ethernet for Streaming
We live out in the country and we have just recently been able to upgrade our wireless service to something approaching "civilized." (Our speed tests range from 70-300 Mbps, from a TMobile cell tower via the ether.) Our house is rather long and spread out, so I installed a Google Nest mesh network, and we now have a strong wifi signal, even in the far corners of the house.
I want to start streaming high resolution music from Qobuzz. I have measured the latency of my wifi signal and it's strong--latency runs between 6 and 12 ms at my stereo. But everything I read online says that streaming requires an ethernet connection. Unfortunately ethernet is problematic here, simply because it would require a run of 140' from my main router. (The mesh nodes do not have an ethernet port.)
My current digital setup consists of a Bryston BDP-2 that feeds digits to a Bryston BDA-2 D/A converter. I have ripped all of my cds onto a hard drive that is connected to the BDP-2 via a USB port. I control the BDP-2 with my laptop via a Bryston wifi USB dongle.
If I can indeed use wifi to harvest digits from the ether I am tempted to purchase Bryston's new(ish) BR-20 preamp/DAC/digital source combo. They recommend ethernet for streaming but offer several accessory USB ports.
What is your experience/opinion regarding wifi vs. ethernet? How would a long run of ethernet compare to our wifi setup? Is it even realistic to expect to play high resolution music over wifi?
Thanks in advance for any replies.
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There is nothing inherently wrong with good dependable WIFI wrt to streaming. As long as the bits get there fast enough, it doesn’t matter. Good dependable WIFI can be more than fast enough to handle streaming 4K video. Due to the logistics of my home, my only option for my streamer is WIFI. I use a relatively inexpensive TP-Link WIFI extender connecting over my 5G network. It has a wired ethernet port for my streamer. I get a dependable 150Mbps with this connection, which is plenty to feed my Hi-res Tidal/Qoboz audio needs, AND a 4K television AND my computers with video conferencing (sometimes simultaneously). There are likely lots of folks reading this who don't get 150Mbps with their wired connections. A poor WIFI connection for whatever reason (poor coverage, contention from neighbors, etc.) would obviously be another story. |
wifi works perfectly well for streamed music, if it works well... if you follow me lots of people, places have wifi that is not implemented well, too much traffic etc etc modern mesh networks, as @nekoaudio says, solves alot of the past problems with wifi |
My 2 cents: When you are using the internet, you have to make sure you aren't pushing up against the limits of data transfer. I have Verizon Fios Gigabit. It works fine. But, if there is a lot of traffic/demand, I can have Qobuz/Roon hiccup. Nothing major, but it has happened when I am playing music and other bandwidth demanding services are in use at the same time. As others have said, wired connection is the safest/most stable way to connect, but if there are no other demands, and you have a good connection, wireless is just as good. B |
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