Effect of Internet Service Quality on Streaming?

Sure.

I like to relax and listen to music on holidays.  Few years ago, my internet stopped working for a whole day on Labor Day.  Way to go Spectrum!

Glad I had my vinyl and CDs.

jwei said, Glad I had my vinyl and CDs.

Amen Brother!!!!!!

I suggest you ask your Internet service provider to check the signal frequently response and all the cable connections in your home. My frequency response was too high and he replaced all my inside connections.  He also corrected and rewired the cables in my outside box.  

My immediate reaction was, it’s your streamer. Then I looked at your streamer. I had a Grimm in my system for a while. It sounded very good, definitely worth the money. Sonically it was not quite as good as mine… but it was much less expensive.

But thinking about your problem. I put a very high probability that it is that your streamer cannot cope with either your power or internet connection. Aurender streamers get very heavy as the go up in performance. The Grimm is very light weight… indicating to me it is lacking massive electrical and vibration isolation. That would account for it sounding good in my system and yours when power and the internet is quiet. The Aurrender has massive electrical isolation from outside and cashing to make up for bad internet performance. My streamer sounds exactly the same at all times. While there is a very slight increase in system performance late at night… it is the whole system related to the power grid.

I recommend borrowing a Aurender W20SE. I bet the problem goes away. I would think even an Aurender N20 will significantly if not completely mitigate the problem.

Thanks all. @ghdprentice i wish it were my streamer. My streamer/server is actually an Innuos Zenith Mk3, feeding a PhoenixUSB reclocker (went back from the Grimm in the end). I had the same swings in sound quality with both products - no difference whatsoever on that front.  I also briefly owned an Aurender N20 and the problem also remained.

I will try comparing local files vs streamed when the SQ goes south next (it is great right now).

I live in a quiet, treed area with space between houses and very limited traffic, and even when there are no household ambient sounds I still get poor sound that peaks around dinner time.

I actually do have fibre service, at 500Mbps (worth getting faster service?).

Yesterday I did test latency and jitter, using the online fusion network speed test tool. Latency and jitter readings were absolutely higher during the period my system was sounding worse. But, I’d assume that maybe AC was also noisier during this “peak demand” time.

@hgeifman Thanks I will look into “signal frequency response”. Haven’t heard of that before..

System is back to sounding incredible right now. But after dinner last night was about the worst I’ve ever heard it! Muffled, compressed, no higher frequencies coming through, loss of dynamics, overall dull.

Related question - does anyone know if Class D amplifiers are supposed to be more immune to AC noise?  I’m considering some changes to my system and a possibility is that I could move to the Mola Mola amplifiers.  I am aware of the general pros and cons of Class D but not sure if they are more immune to environmental noise.  Guessing not but it crossed my mind as a possible solution.