Which company manufactures this Ethernet switch for the other?

@audphile1 

All devices which are fed Ethernet must process the data packets and cache them into a buffer before reconstructing the data stream. The buffer acts like a solid state disk without the added complexity of file systems and disk blocks!

You mention using a completely different power circuit. For most dwellings, ’completely different’ circuits are joined together at the main distribution board which is often just a few feet closer to the power station grid. They are not really separate at all. My house is fed three phases, but all the single-phase circuits are joined to the same phase.

Strictly, wireless networks are not Ethernet at all. They obviously are more susceptible to interference from the plethora of other wireless transmissions and RFI.

Hardwired Ethernet is less susceptible but not immune. The topography particularly when crossing mains is important. Ethernet can be made 100% reliable by detecting and retransmitting faulty or lost packets, but this is not what streaming does!

Your Purist Audio Cat7 cable is built as shielded twisted pairs and many other cables are unshielded twisted pairs. The effect might be fewer corrupted packets but why this might translate into ’smooth and clean, just as the artist intended" is beyond me!

Not sure what this has to do with Ethernet switches, either ...

richardbrand

Ethernet can be made 100% reliable by detecting and retransmitting faulty or lost packets, but this is not what streaming does!

Any of the quality-oriented audio streaming services (Qobuz, Tidal) use TCP/IP. If you’re running ethernet from your router to your streamer, you’re getting a bit perfect signal straight from the server farm to you, @richardbrand.

@cleeds 

Oh dear, you are way off reality here and the key to it all is the word 'streaming'.

The Internet can indeed be used to deliver bit-perfect transmission using the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol) stack. This guarantees all packets are received and error-free even over unreliable transmission components like Ethernet.  Think file transfer and downloads.

However, streaming cannot afford the time to request retransmission of faulty packets.  It does not use TCP and instead uses the UDP/IP (User Datagram Protocol / Internet Protocol) stack which prioritises delivery timing over accuracy.

There is no guarantee that the stream of packets that arrives at your Internet gateway from Qobus or Tidal is perfect, or even complete.  (You might call your gateway a modem, or router, or switch, or somesuch but it actually mediates between your Wide-Area Network and your Local Area Network).

Finally, your gateway pushes the data packets over WiFi or better, Ethernet.  Ethernet on its own guarantees neither delivery nor timing.  You need higher level protocols like TCP to detect errors, missing packets and retransmission.  UDP does not bother with these niceties.

richardbrand

The Internet can indeed be used to deliver bit-perfect transmission using the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol) stack ... However, streaming cannot afford the time to request retransmission of faulty packets. It does not use TCP and instead uses the UDP/IP (User Datagram Protocol / Internet Protocol) stack which prioritises delivery timing over accuracy ...

You are mistaken. The premium streaming services such as Qobuz and Tidal use TCP/IP protocol to deliver bit-perfect data to your streamer. Packets which fail in transmission are re-sent. My source for this information is David Solomon and his team at Qobuz.

Transmission of even hi-res audio does not require great internet speed. In the case of Qobuz, the delivery of the data is never throttled - so an entire song can be delivered bit-perfectly to your streamer’s cache in seconds, @richardbrand. The fact is that the term "streaming" is really a misnomer for those services. There is no "stream." There are just packets. But to be clear, not all services work that way, especially the video streaming services. Netflix, for example.

The premium streaming services such as Qobuz and Tidal use TCP/IP protocol to deliver bit-perfect data to your streamer.

Back in the day when I wrote software for telecom products we used Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP over UDP) for our Voice over IP data path.  I don't know if any audio streaming platforms use it.

My audio network is a combination of copper and fiber with good quality components and lots of bandwidth capability so I don't worry about my streamed music (Tidal, or ripped WAV off my NAS) making it to my Bricasti Roon bridge and DAC.

However, I recently moved my Roon Server which was physically 2 stories away from my listening room (and 2 feet from my NAS and local music) into my basement equipment rack and plugged it into my router that feeds ~10 feet of fiber to my audio rack, and I thought it sounded a lot better.   I was not expecting this...

Those 2 stories are connected via a MoCA 2.0 network (I thought this sounded better than Powerline) which should have lots of bandwidth.   So the Roon Server now goes up those two floors to get the music, but the Roon Server's output only has to go in one copper port and out the fiber port to hit my audio rack.    I'm not sure why this setup sounds better to me.