If you have a Naim NDS what Ethernet wire do you use?

musicfan51 posted:

Would a Netgear GS605NA be better than my 6 year old Netgear switcher ? 

Who knows,  but it won't be better at all unless you live in USA as "NA" is "North America" & spec'd for 110v

You don't say what model & what "v" number your 6 year old is,   if its a FS then yes a GS will be better in performance bandwidth abilities,  but even so you might not hear any difference.    

james n posted:

I'm sure people do find positive differences. Why don't the makers of these boutique Ethernet cables take one of the Network players that seem to work so much better with one of these cables in place and measure what is happening when they replace a bog standard Ethernet cable with the expensive version and publish the results to back up their claims. If it's changing the sound to such an extent, then it must be measurable and correlated to the SQ changes noted. 

Chord say - 

A lot of the work we’ve done over the past decade has been about reducing electrical interference to a minimum, the reason being that where typically twenty years ago the average house was relatively free of interference sources, it isn’t any more.  High frequency effective shields are important, particularly if you wish to hear music in the way in which you were meant to.  

Just saying this without some meaningful measurement of how effective this shielding is and its subsequent effect on the player seems a bit pointless and one of the reasons that so many people see a lot of these products as just snake oil for the gullible. 

But why should they measure it? Do Naim provide detailed measurements of why Super Lumina sounds different to NACA5? Do manufacturers of Stilton provide scientific evidence of by their cheese tastes different to Cheddar?

Why measure it ? - to add credibility to their offering. Such claims seem to be just accepted in the audio world without question. The final arbiter is always 'does it work for me, in my system, with my ears' but some actual measurements to back up the improvement claimed by the manufacturer would be nice...

I know where you are coming from, but take Tellurium for example, which you use happily - they provide virtually no information and say all sorts of weird and wonderful things. All this 'I don't believe it because it cannot be measured' stuff is just nonsense. These things should be tried and a decision made on how they sound. Who cares about their pf or qzt factors?

I suspect these rather subtle differences between different ethernet cables (some of which by the way are not that expensive) are audible but not measurable. If they were then manufacturers of ethernet cables would be all over them like a rash as it would be such an attractive marketing tool. You can hear it now '….look what a difference our cables make form these reliable, repeatable statistics…'. Life and all things digital ain't that simple.

As Adam has suggested, I would very much like to hear what others have found from actually testing some of these cables in their systems, rather than simply using the dismissive 'snake oil' argument.

Indeed Nigel - (although i'm a simple Van Damme speaker cable user these days) Analogue interconnects and speaker cables are more easily explainable - the LCR characteristics of the cable tend to pretty much define the particular sound signature. The Super lumina you mention is not doing anything that other cables don't already do, but the shielding seems to allow the power amp itself to work better - again a consequence of the increase in general background RF energy that exists in and around most households today and the effect it has on our audio equipment. 

Ethernet cables are a bit more of a difficult sell. No matter how much difference it made, i'd want to know what goes into the design of this cable that has such a profound effect on the component it is connected to - is it the cable construction, it's ability to reject conducted and radiated noise, is it the cable terminations that make the difference or a combination of all the factors - i'd just not feel right spending that amount of money on an Ethernet cable and not knowing why it does what it does.  

nigelb posted:

As Adam has suggested, I would very much like to hear what others have found from actually testing some of these cables in their systems, rather than simply using the dismissive 'snake oil' argument.

I didn't think i was using this argument to make a point. My post noted that if manufacturers backed up their claims there would be less of the dismissive 'snake oil' responses - these things are not some sort of weird science where measurements cannot be made on the equipment. I'm all for people reporting their findings and with any of this the ultimate validation is your own experience, but i just think the manufacturers could help things along with more information and less marketing guff  

Mike-B posted:

sjbabbey posted:

Mike, I have a total of 3 Netgear switches in my network. Do you think it's worthwhile upgrading the SMPS for all of them or simply for the connection to the NDS streamer.

Hard to say, depends on so many things, e.g. if they are on the same power circuit & the distance between them,  might be worth a punt on the NDS switch SMPS & see how that goes.

It was probably me that got the forum interested in the iFi iPower SMPS so I carry a bit of baggage with that.  I found it cleaned up the sound quite nicely,  not a huge change but it was audible.  BUT (yes its a but)  I need to come clean,  the audible SQ change was when I compared it side by side with the original Netgear SMPS & a MediGrade SMPS I was also using at the time when they were all on a trailing socket plugged into the wall.   My normal set up is a fixed 4 way socket thats not so easy to get to (hence the trailing socket test) but it's not an ordinary 4 way socket;  its fed from my UPS & that has an internal isolation transformer & a common mode choke,  plus I have the fixed 4 way socket cable, the UPS supply cable & each of the SMPS (phone, BB & Netgear) 12v output cables are all overloaded with ferrite clamps.   Swapping the iPower with the MediGrade & original Netgear on the ferrite loaded fixed 4 way did not bring so much of a change in SQ,  it was very subtle & still in favour of the iPower.  In all honesty although I did keep the iPower in my set up it was not really worth it,  the ferrite & the UPS isolation collectively suppress SMPS noise to a level that is hard to fault & it sorta killed the real need for the iPower. One reason I did keep the iPower was its very impressive voltage stability,  it was rock steady with both no load & a load that was just under the iPowers claimed full watt rating.   The Netgear & the MediGrade did not get close to the same stability,  but the Netgear was the better of the two (that surprised me). 

Thanks for your reply, Mike. I'm not using an UPS and my system is on a separate spur from my network equipment so I'll probably just replace the PS to the switch connecting the NDS which is on the main ring.

ATB

Steve

james n posted:

nigelb posted:

As Adam has suggested, I would very much like to hear what others have found from actually testing some of these cables in their systems, rather than simply using the dismissive 'snake oil' argument.

I didn't think i was using this argument to make a point. My post noted that if manufacturers backed up their claims there would be less of the dismissive 'snake oil' responses - these things are not some sort of weird science where measurements cannot be made on the equipment. I'm all for people reporting their findings and with any of this the ultimate validation is your own experience, but i just think the manufacturers could help things along with more information and less marketing guff  

My comment you have quoted about the dismissive 'snake oil' arguers was not aimed at you. Apologies if this was not clear.

I agree that there are many properties of a cable that manufacturers can reliably measure, and some choose to publish some of these and others choose not to publish any measurements. The killer question is do these measurements give a reliable indication of SQ potential of a cable? My argument is that it is simply not possible to get reliable, repeatable indicators of what level of SQ is available from a particular cable. This is even more difficult to achieve when we are talking about rather subtle but audible SQ differences between cables, particularly ethernet cables. And, as we know, there are dozens of other factors that influence a system's SQ.

It would be nice if cable manufacturers could help us out here but I am not sure it is possible with the knowledge and technology currently at our disposal.

No offence taken at all Nigel - looks like i misunderstood too 

James,

I too would like to see some meaningful metrics wrt network cables. But then, I would like to see some meaningful manufacturer produced metrics around amps and speakers. If I was feeling kind I might think that the cable producers are worried about giving away trade secrets if they produce truly meaningful measurements.

I like what Hans Beekhuyzen said in one of his YouTube missive's, I paraphrase, 'When there is an issue I find that the measuring devices are excellent, when all is well, but there is a difference in sound quality, it is my ears that I rely upon.'

Simon,

Thanks for your summation of the white paper, and no doubt personal experience. It sounds very reasonable and I'm sure has elements of the full truth. I suspect that there are multiple interacting factors. I was about to list some questions, but it would simply be a repeat of what is asked above!

I have read a couple of articles where people have introduced a fibre optic break between there general LAN and the HiFi streamer claiming good results. I am loath to head down this route as I would be introducing wall warts ....do you have any view/experience?

Cheers,

M

M, indeed I am sure there are multiple interacting factors - and that is kind of  my point - little value in overly focussing on one area and ignoring an other..

As far as fibre - yes professionally use all the time - however its benefits will be diluted with Naim equipment because  they only support 10/100BaseT and no direct fibre connections currently - but perhaps future Naim equipment will support small form-factor pluggable (SFP) sockets so the user can insert fibre or electrical transceivers to suit.

Having a fibre to electrical converter on a patch lead does seem a bit clunky to me and Im sure could introduce its own compromises as indeed you suggest

Mr Underhill posted:

 

I have read a couple of articles where people have introduced a fibre optic break between there general LAN and the HiFi streamer claiming good results. I am loath to head down this route as I would be introducing wall warts ....do you have any view/experience?

I did this last year and have been pleased with the results. My reason for doing it wasn't primarily to do with sound quality, but it did seem to clean things up a bit. The required media converters are extra clutter, although they are very small boxes. I replaced the supplied wall warts with iFi iPowers.

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

As far as fibre - yes professionally use all the time - however its benefits will be diluted with Naim equipment because  they only support 10/100BaseT and no direct fibre connections currently - but perhaps future Naim equipment will support small form-factor pluggable (SFP) sockets so the user can insert fibre or electrical transceivers to suit.

 

Simon, my optical LAN works on only 10/100, and this seems to be perfectly adequate for my server, streamer, and general LAN requirements. I'm pretty sure there are gigabit versions available too, including some of the TP Link devices that other people have mentioned here. 

Another company going this route

Thx Chrissu,

I'll try, and probably fail, to fend this idea off for a while!

M

Mr Underhill posted:

Thx Chrissu,

I'll try, and probably fail, to fend this idea off for a while!

M

Good luck with that! I was intrigued by the idea that this might result in improved sound quality, but my main reasons for doing it were (a) that I live in a house that is very exposed to lightning strikes, especially via the phone line, and wanted to isolate my audio gear from this, and (b) I have internal stone walls half a metre thick, and it was possible to route the very thin optical cables through very small holes: I used a form of optical cable that is very easy to terminate, so the 2.2mm cables could be routed through the house before the bulky connectors were fitted on the ends.

Just to join in with the whole ethernet cable discussion, I've just bunged on two AudioQuest Ethernet cables, a Cinnamon between the switch and the NDS, and a Forest between the switch and the NAS.

My usual method of assessing new cables is simply to leave them in place for two or three weeks, before removing them and re-installing the originals, and deciding at that point whether or not they have offered any improvement.

Not very scientific, I'm sure, but it does avoid the "I can hear a difference, but is it better?" scenario.

So, I hope to have an opinion to contribute at that point, and see whether another forum member's "cast off's"  are staying. 

Now Dave, I want you to look after them.  

Mike_B I do live in North America! 

Ok, just ordered a used Cisco 2960 switch for $35 to test vs my Netgear FS105 with linear power supply. 

Simon in Suffolk: question is what do I do with it when it arrives? I've never used a managed switch before, so any tips on settings? This will be used only for the audio gear. 

charlesphoto posted:

Ok, just ordered a used Cisco 2960 switch for $35 to test vs my Netgear FS105 with linear power supply. 

Good move IMO,  waiting with bated breath on your report.      The Netgear FS105 that I used in a comparison test a while back was the only noticeably inferior SQ.   The other switches were all Gigabit (GS) from Netgear, TP-Link & Linksys & we could not detect any difference.

dave marshall posted:

Just to join in with the whole ethernet cable discussion, I've just bunged on two AudioQuest Ethernet cables, a Cinnamon between the switch and the NDS, and a Forest between the switch and the NAS.

My usual method of assessing new cables is simply to leave them in place for two or three weeks, before removing them and re-installing the originals, and deciding at that point whether or not they have offered any improvement.

Not very scientific, I'm sure, but it does avoid the "I can hear a difference, but is it better?" scenario.

So, I hope to have an opinion to contribute at that point, and see whether another forum member's "cast off's"  are staying. 

Look forward to your findings & opinions!!

Mike-B posted:

charlesphoto posted:

Ok, just ordered a used Cisco 2960 switch for $35 to test vs my Netgear FS105 with linear power supply. 

Good move IMO,  waiting with bated breath on your report.      The Netgear FS105 that I used in a comparison test a while back was the only noticeably inferior SQ.   The other switches were all Gigabit (GS) from Netgear, TP-Link & Linksys & we could not detect any difference.

I look forward to hear what you have to say about SQ after installing your new switcher!