2. amps-preamps
  3. 178965-155632

Is optical mostly a waste of time versus Ethernet?

The only value I see with a fiber optical cable is if you have a long long run.

All the noise coming into an optical fiber is preserved and comes out the other side. I guess there is a value in not creating more noise while it is traveling through the optical cable. But if it's a short run of two Feet then is it really worth it.  Seems a well shielded Ethernet cable would do just as fine without all the hassle of converting to optical which is a pain in the ass.

I always thought there was value with optical but it seems they're really may not be. Maybe I'm wrong.  It seems a switch likely produces a lot of noise and inserting an audio grade switch is very prudent and going optical really doesn't solve switch noise problem.  The benefit of re-clocking offered by a decent switch to clean up the signal is worthwhile.

jumia
jumia OP
528 posts
 
  1. Seems the etherregen is a glorified fiber media converter, which may do a really good job but it's extremely expensive when only used as a fiber media converter Once you use ER as a fmc you can't really use the remaining ethernet ports because it will adversely impact the optical connection what's lots of spillover noise from the other ports. Not sure why ER doesn't do a simple network switch without optical. And not sure their fmc is very good.

 

jumia OP
528 posts
 

Who is small green computer? Kind of a curious company that relies heavily on etherregen. 

jumia OP
528 posts
 

Yyzsantabarbara

What the heck does a opticalrendu do?

Very confusing

tuberist
951 posts
 

I did swap out the wall wart PS on the second converter box as SNS described. I put in an IFi power supply….big and immediate leap in better sonics that I could easily hear, it was not subtle

sns
3,294 posts
 

The OpticalRendu is streamer for optical. It takes place of second in line FMC with streamer and usb output to dac. Advantages include one less conversion to ethernet (FMC only have ethernet outputs), better clock, less noise than generic FMC, very nice streamer with nice clock less noise on usb out, no usb cleansing devices needed. Love my OpticalRendu, one of the largest if not largest streaming upgrade I've experienced.

More to discover