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Effect of Internet Service Quality on Streaming?

I’ve struggled for a long time with sound getting much, much worse around dinner time, and in some rare cases I don’t get depth, clarity, dynamics and imaging back until around midnight. Like many people I’ve attributed this to noise on my AC lines. But recently I’ve been wondering if maybe internet service quality is at least contributing to the issue in some manner. When I run tests it appears that speed, jitter, and latency are all higher at times when the sound is poor. That got me wondering if anyone knows whether one type of internet service is better than another for HiFi streaming? For example, is ADSL or DSL better, or does it matter? And what about speed? Particularly interested in anyone who has real world experiences from experimenting in this area…
nyev

Showing 4 responses by erik_squires

erik_squires
15,750 posts
 

@mvanwoert  Google "Roon buffer size" and you'll find several useful discussions about this.

Open up the Roon ap, right click on your DAC / streamer and then scroll to the bottom and look under advanced options.

erik_squires
15,750 posts
 

OP:

I prefer Furman power conditioners, and if I have concerns about he power stability I use a Furman with the VR (Voltage Regulator) feature.  IMHO it is a good trade-off to the power regenerators.

erik_squires
15,750 posts
 

High ping times are fine, it’s error rates and high jitter (> 300mSeconds) that can cause issues.  Large ping times may make a stream slower to START but once started don't add up over time. 

500 Mbps is more than enough to stream just about anything.

IMHO, only really poor streamers should have a problem with Internet conditions you’ve described. They usually have several seconds of buffering built in, which can sometimes be configured, which should eliminate all but the worst kind of connections.

IMHO, again, it’s much more likely to be a power issue.

erik_squires
15,750 posts
 

First, @noromance covers it pretty much.  ADSL/DSL is like 30 year old technology with extremely limited bandwidth.  I'm not really concerned with the physical connections, but the back switches and routers on those circuits are probably just as old and will never be upgraded.  Consider cable, fiber or 5G based Internet as a much better options.

Generally speaking though, most streamers have enough buffers that they can ignore normal internet latencies, but not errors and reconnects.  Roon for instance has the ability to choose how much of a streaming buffer you use to try to eliminate this issue. 

Next, if possible, avoid Wifi streaming.  If it's not possible to avoid it, use a phone or laptop Wifi analyzer app to ensure your router is on an unused channel.

 

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