I can be specific on what exactly the silver plated wire ethernet cables did for my system with my previous NUC based music server. The clarity of the music improved. The highs smoothed out- less of that glare. The first time I plugged in one of the better cables the highs sounded worse. I let it break in for a day but it still sounded worse than a cheap cable. Then I thought to turn the cable around and the sound changed for the better- much better. It made streaming sound closer to my CD Transport going into my DAC.
I have since moved up to a better DAC which then caused me to have to upgrade my music server as well. My theory is that this DAC and music server, because they both have isolation and re-clocking, they should be less dependent on the digital cables (Ethernet and USB) for good sound. Only right now my system sounds too good to tamper with it. I’m just not motivated to do any additional experimenting. You know, if it is not broken, don’t fix it. Sometime I will, out of curiosity, put some cheap cables in my system to see how this DAC and music server perform.