We Need To Talk About Ones And Zeroes

@cleeds -  I haven't done much with switches labeled as "audiophile" grade.  So, as I indicated, I don't know what they have all done inside other than changing out the power supply.  Some may be completely reengineered and use top notch jacks, power supplies, etc.  I honestly don't know.  Did I overstate my home network with Enterprise level Cisco equipment, yeah, maybe.  It was late and I was tired when I wrote it.

My home network is running on Cisco C3850 layer 3 switches (over $5K new) setup with VLANs and QoS (quality of service) to segment off my streamers from the rest of the network (i.e. desktop and laptop computers, WiFi access point, Amazon Echo devices, printer, etc.)  My router is also a Cisco Enterprise level appliance.  I picked up the equipment at an auction of a local failed business.  Unfortunately, the cable modem is a typical Motorola that is supported by my local ISP.

The only "audiophile" switch I have actually compared against my setup was an English Electric 8 that a friend purchased from Upscale Audio.  With a "stock" wallwart power supply, and pushing the data volume way up on multiple ports, it was not matching my Cisco setup.  According to management/diagnostic software, it was dropping packets at a much higher rate than I would have expected.  Sound wise, it was ok. Once I changed out to the "better" power supply that came with it, things improved dramatically, both in network performance and sound quality.  But still it did not perform better than the Cisco setup.  If I were to make a guess as to why, I would say the larger and faster backplane of the Cisco and segmenting the ports into VLANs was creating a more stable data stream to my main streamer(s), even when loading it down and taxing it's capacity.  And thus a much lower level of jitter and smoother processing.

I referenced that I have seen pictures of the internals of other audiophile switches.  I remember one that turned out to just be a Netgear GS series 8 port switch in a different colored case with a linear power supply.  Another was a DLink that was supposed to have been "modified" but only had some stuff glued to the top of some caps and chips and was marked up 500%.  And then another that was just a  Linksys that was repainted and sold with a SBooster power supply for high dollars.  

sophisticated error detection, correction, and redundancy mechanisms built into the system. Here’s how they ensure high reliability despite the presence of noise

This, and files can further be checksummed or hashed to confirm that the received copy is identical in all aspects to the sent copy.

Meanwhile, those AI are getting pretty good :)

@hbarrel -

they appear error-free to users because of sophisticated error detection, correction, and redundancy mechanisms built into the system. Here’s how they ensure high reliability despite the presence of noise...

Exactly!  This is the key to any digital network and why it actually works, whether it is a financial transaction, email, video feed, or music.  What you transmit in the beginning is what you get at the end. 

@devinplombier  Thank you. However, as I explained in a later post, I believe I was unclear and misunderstood, for I never said the streaming ITCP protocol assure transmission of anything less than bit perfect files.  I said it is not “unscathed” from an audiophile perspective in that the transmission to conversion process introduces timing errors, transmission impairments, and EMI noise. @kennyc stated it more eloquently than I … The digital data rides on an analog signal that can pick up noise.  High-end computing ≠ High-end audio where we care how it “sounds”.   Therefore, I apologize if my conclusion was unclear.  Restated, is is that audio files are transmitted bit perfect but not unscathed from factors degrade sound quality and it is the design intent of the DAC to correct or limit these factors to improve sound quality.  I also concluded it is not the DAC conversion stage but the analogue output stage that is critical to sound quality. 

Audiophile switch sellers purchase off-the-shelf switches, ditch the noisy switching mode power supply (SMPS) that came with it, repackage the switch with a small linear power supply (LPS), and sell it at a huge markup.

The LPS will in fact yield a significant noise level reduction. In other words, the product they're selling actually performs pretty well.

The only issue then is that they're selling, say, $80 worth of goods for $500, with no other expense than maintaining a website chockfull of audiophile puffery.

In a way, we can look at these people as arbitragers, leveraging audiophiles' lack of interest in or familiarity with basic network equipment.

All the more the reason to be a well-informed community - it's good for our wallets! 😃