Lowering noise floor when using the streamer

Acoustic Revive LAN Isolator RLI-1

worked for me.

Simon has posted a lot about rf chokes on ethernet cables into his NDX.  You can find his posts here . . . and those little clamp-on chokes are CHEAP.

Shivoham, I think you are hearing the effects of RFI intermodulation. I am very sensitive to this as well. I find Ethernet and SPDIf to a lesser extent noisy.. With Ethernet it is just not a case of common mode noise that chokes as Bart mentions or for extreme case, the LAN isolator that NaimUnt and sbilotta mention, but it's also a case of ensuring the patch leads and switch itself doesn't radiate, therefore choke all connected Ethernet leads and switch power supply leads and keep well away from audio mains, interconnects, FM coax and speaker leads.

You will, if like me,  notice a benefit. It was actually getting rid of RFI noise on FM that really helped me get to the bottom of this. That RFI gets everywhere.

Chokes on SPDIF cable help, and keep noisy mains away from your house.. So poor/faulty SMPS, Ethernet over mains, cheap switch mode solar panel inverters or unshielded and un choked DC solar panel cables. Regrettably the latter items can still affect you if a close neighbour has them and particularly bad. PS LED lighting is the latest EMC gremlin to enter our houses, so if you use these its worth doing listening tests with them on or off.

Simon

Simon, just wanted to pass on a thank you for all your contributions on the forum. Always very informative, interesting and helpful. 

We are lucky to have you.

Well done you.

simon .don't forget the poor quality energy saving discharge lamp

+1

Hi, Simon,

I am moving house soon, and next week was planning to have an electrician update most of the lighting to LED.  There are six halogens I am eager to replace because they sing when running.  I was hoping to add some lighting automation, too.

I see LED and CFL are both available with or without dimming capability.  The new house is chock-full of Lutron Insteon electronic dimmers, which I believe to be decent quality.  I have learned that a new spec for dimmers, "CL", indicates the are optimized for LED and CFL, while being backward-compatible with incandescent.

What are my best options at the moment?  Would you suggest I delay until there are new developments?  Are there any alternatives to incandescents with toggles that you think should play well with hi-fi?  Or should I remove all of the dimmers?  Lots of choices here, maybe all bad? 

Thank you.

Nick

Nick, Dusty, thanks for your appreciative words...

Nick what a dilemma.. I don't know what to say.. I would personally want to do a listening test before commiting, but that sounds not very practical in your case. All I can suggest is that you check with your electrician that the LED devices are compliant with EN55015-2006 plus A1:2007 plus A2:2009, and ask to see the manufacturers certification, and ideally check they are non self certified.

I understand that in a recent report (2012) by an  EU market surveillance group only 61.5% of LED lighting devices tested complied with the EMC emission limits.

Simon

Simon,

This is useful information.  Thank you.  I suppose it remains to be proved whether or not even compliant LED devices are harmless.  We shall see.  

I think I will revise my plans and take it a little slower, so that I can gauge effects of changes one-at-a-time.  The house is 90 years old,  with countless updates made over the years.  There is no reason I have to do it all at at once.

The good news is I did have a couple of dedicated circuits put in the Living Room, with Cryo-Hubbels from AV Options installed. An old Rega Brio and tuner are plugged in and running the ceiling speakers that came with the place.  Not bad sounding; rather good, actually!  What a bonus!  Meaningful noise floor tests will have to wait until I get a proper system installed in a few weeks.

Lots of fun ahead.

Nick

LED lighting has dramatically lowered our power bills.  My sense is that LED's are less obnoxious than CFL's, but I have no science to back that up.  CFL's polluted audibly -- I could hear them and their 60Hz hum.  What I think I really need at this point is much better dimmers; we have lots of dimmers, and they are 'builders' specials' cheap.

If acceptable domestically, consider not using dimmers at all. Then whatever noisy lighting devices you have most likely they will be switched off when listening to music. For all the reasons Simon outlined, I replaced all our dimmers with either timers or light level and motion sensors which seem more useful and should be quiet electrically, they are either on or off, and are about the same price as dimmers anyway. Also, if installing typical concealed ceiling floods, consider multiple circuits without dimmers and multiple toggle switches instead of a single  dimmer switch so the flood pattern can be selectively dimmed that way. One other point, if you have any older C10 fluorescent tubes with magnetic ballasts they are worth replacing with newer C8 electronic ballast types.

Cheers, Jeremy.  Good ideas.  

I confess, in the AV room in my old house, I run a Lutron IR-controlled dimmer on incandescent lamps, and heard a hum only once, before my dealer optimized the setup.  I now run an Audience PDC on a dedicated circuit, which probably helps.  Maybe I am just lucky, so far.

Nick