Physically connect a Bluesond Node 2i to a downline, stand alone Chord Qutest DAC

@hilly230, Glass is better than plastic for Toslink... Coaxial is susceptible to RFI... Wifi may give you some physical isolation at the cost of increased RFI... Ethernet cable is pretty clean at cat 6 and above...

I use Wifi to/from my laptop to my local router, wired ethernet from the router to the streamer and USB to the Qutest which has galvanic isolation plus some other trix Rob Watts designed in...

For testing, and to be fair, I would turn off all MQA processing in the Node and use known quality and resolution source files to compare the two DACs... I, and many others, are suspicious of any source material from Tidal now a days...

I also wonder if your amp is doing something to the signals...  Maybe digitizing the incoming analogue for further internal processing?

Thanks for all the help guys. FYI I have cut the Gordian knot and bought a Naim Uniti Atom one-box streaming system. I guess I ran out of patience with all this.
Anybody want a Roksan Caspian M2 integrated, a Node 2i and a Qutest?
:D

All the best with the move! I am looking to get into the quandary that you have with the cables....just missing the Qutest DAC :D. Please feel free to message me if you do decide to offload your Qutest. Thank you!

I'm in the UK. Postage would be a nightmare.