Is optical mostly a waste of time versus Ethernet?

@sns  no, that is not accurate. You still can expect incremental improvements of mature technologies, and I assume a lot more metadata will be integrated in the future to augment the listening experience.

Certainly intentions to be malicious in any posts, but if you can’t call out people on BS and at least try to have a fact based discussion, what is the point?

I did miss that you had acquire a microtik, although, I wouldn’t call that enterprise. Better than consumer, for sure, so a step in the right direction. So that begs to question, what is “enterprise” grade? Gartner defines it as follows: “Enterprise-grade describes products that integrate into an infrastructure with a minimum of complexity and offer transparent proxy support.” 

so what does that mean? Mainly that the products are not designed to operate a single unit, like an access point or switch for a consumer, rather a part of a total solution, solving more than one particular issue. And with the appropriate support structure for this. 

If you want more details on enterprise grade, Forbes defines it here: 

Isn't low line Mikrotik, this ccr1036, designed for business environment  has much capability IMO. Not saying top of line, but what more does one need in home environment. This is all in service to audio and my curiosity, not to providing network to some large enterprise.

@sns  the point why I am recommending enterprise grade equipment is due to consistent and predictable performance. It’s been tested over and over again and the support from the company and reputation of the company is behind it.

but like you said, you don’t need that typically for home use, and your microtik is fine, a bit lower throughput that I would want with 16 ports and only 16gbit throughput, which means it can’t support all ports at full speed, as that requires 32gbit throughput (duplex, each port can transfer 1gbit in each direction). These specs matter if you want to minimize jitter and latency.  

Another concern I have with microtik is the cpu vs asic/fpgu. Also doesn’t promote consistent latency and jitter. And then it is shared data and control plane, which means if you are doing configuration changes, it could impact performance. 
 

anyway, there is a lot to this topic, but in most cases a netgear from bestbuy is fine. 

We shall see. Already tried audiophile switch, sound quality diminished from my netgear wif/router powered by lps.

In any case, having fun learning about myriad configuration options with the Mikrotic.