Advice for ethernet cabling with a HDX

I think the main thing to avoid is tight kinks in the cable, which can damage the thin wires quite easily or affect performance. I've got a couple of Chord C-Stream cables which are nice and sturdy, but quite stiff, with a minimum bend radius of 50mm, which makes routing them a bit awkward. Bog standard Cat5e would be much easier. 

Thanks for advice. Shame that I need to pass the cable around a door, the Chord Ethernet cable has had good reviews but with a 15m length pushes up the cost somewhat. I have metal bar under the door which might be a routing but protecting the cable might prove difficult. Any other ideas welcomed...

I have a 15m run of 'ordinary' Cat6e running underfloor and around skirtings to get between router & NDX. I think it was £7.50.

Works a treat...I still hear inky blackness...

G

Assuming your HDX is playing locally into an amp, I can't see that the Ethernet cable is that critical. All it's doing is accessing online metadata and the like during ripping, and iRadio if you use it, so there's no effect on sound quality playing your music files. So ordinary Cat5e should be fine. 

Thanks for your input, yes looking at things objectively I suppose that all I am accessing is metadata plus Internet radio so the quality of the cable might not be as critical as I first thought. I do tend to listen to the Internet radio for a high proportion of my time. My HDX is played through an amplifier.

I agree with Chris and anyway I really personally doubt that there is any difference in sound quality between different Ethernet cables even for streaming. You can buy cat 6 cheaply on the well known auction site for almost no money.  Works fine for me where the run between my Unitiserve and the SuperUniti in my study is about 40m with four Netgear switches en route.

best

David

I am also running about the same length of network cable through the living room and I also slightly bend it around corners, of course not 90 degrees. I did not have issues with flat cables but recently upgraded to CAT 6e round cables of good quality. On the way from the router to the HDX (2TB version) I have some other clients such as TV, bluRay Disc player, Apple TV and such I have made good experience with managed switches to handle the traffic. My NAS for HDX backup is on a different floor and only connected through Powerline which caused backup issues when the HDX used to be directly connected with the Powerline adapter (latency?).

But since I run the HDX through the switch first, there has never been an issue again and I am very happy with the setup.

Hope this helps

Chris

I'm using cat5e, about 15m for my Superuniti.  It's all you need. dont waste your money on anything else. 

Hi NicNap,

I use Belkin or Chord C-Stream cat 5e or above.  C-Stream from the streamer (NDS) and server (NS01) to the switch and NAS drive and Belkin between the switch and the router.

The advice about avoid tight turns is the most important - I've seen network cabling run in a new Virgin Megastore rejected because of tight turns causing degraded performance.

By all means run under the carpet periphery, but protect from any pressure from footfall or furniture legs!

Talk to any experienced network guy (or girl) and they'll tell you that network throughput can be affected adversely by poor adherence to the installation standards (bends, proximity to mains & phone lines etc etc), so take care where and how you run the cable.

Some folks have said that the colour of the CAT5 cable affects it's performance - this, in my personal experience, is a load of hogwash - pick any colour that takes your fancy or matches your carpet or décor.

Hope this helps (a bit )

Roger  (ex IT person working for many years with network installations in large retail stores around Europe)

Best advise I've seen around these parts for a while Roger re the bend radius.  I recently fixed a friends Cyrus system where he had installed Cat-5e around the skirting boards & door frames between rooms. He could stream 16/44 but 24/96 was buffering.  Nice neat job it has to be said but as an ethernet install it was crap,  the Cat5e twisted pair geometry had collapsed on the bends.   

Drewy,  I've just moved from Cat-7 to Cat-6 & up to last week as a cable sceptic I would agree with you,  now I know a there can be a difference.   Meicord Opal Cat-6 from NAS-Switch-NDX & Lindy Cat-6 Router-Switch,  all hanging loose.

As an engineering architect who us s subcontractors for cable and fibre installations, the three considerations for me are

1) bend radius. For Cat 5,5e,6 never less than 4x radius or 1 inch .. Which ever is the greater. No kinks

2) Appropriate EMI routing. Keep cabling at least 30cm away from mains wiring, light fittings, wifi access points etc. If closer to a point source use a radial path away.. IE connecting to a wifi access point.

3) Try and use a hub and spoke (or where resilience is required multiple hub and spoke ) setup and keep cascades to a minimum. Keep total inc patch lead point to point connections less than 100m (not a problem for typical home or small office)

4) ensure no more than approx 12mm of cable is untwisted at the connector join.

The good news (with regard to network EMI) is that I was at device futures workshop this week where new network standards and connectivity options were being presented... I am fairly confident over the next 5 years we will start to see on consumer devices electrical Ethernet replaced by fibre.. and already many just use wifi, and we may see fibre for higher bandwidth connections on such devices.. These also may be based on PON fibre standards optimised for bursty high bandwidth transmission... The motivations for this..albeit speculative are fascinating.

So those putting in structured wiring.. Please use trunking.. As you may well find fibre replacing copper within 10 years.. It will be easier to replace if routed in trunking.

Simon