What makes One Music Server Sound Better than Another?

I advocate keeping an open mind. But those that state beliefs contrary to science and engineering are the ones that need to back up their assertions with evidence.

I disagree, you seem quite closed minded. And excuse me but none of us "need" to do anything other than listen and explain what we hear.

But I am still posting. While looking at a review for another Antipodes mentioned in a different thread in the forum here I found this quote from their CEO- now tell me if you do the same thing when you build your "fancy" servers:

Mark Jenkins:

“The motherboards are sourced from the world’s best supplier and they cost around 6 times what some of the competitors are using. We tune the motherboards to shift the frequency peaks of the noise generated by each component in order to eliminate noise nodes, so the mainboards start as an off-the-shelf board and then are customized for our use.”

Antipodes also places a lot of emphasis on the quality of the power supply, which they manufacture entirely in-house.

Mark Jenkins:

“What we did with the new power supply was to test the injection of noise into the motherboard at various frequencies to see which frequencies did the least damage to the sound quality, and then we designed the power supply board in such a way that the noise component was in the benign frequencies. This has a similar effect as a zero noise power supply.”

Antipodes CX

@jji666 

It’s downright tribal.  Am reminded of Lord of the Flies; remember what happens to poor Simon when he tries to tell the other boys his discovered truth about the beast?

I disagree, you seem quite closed minded.

Relying on science and engineering isn’t being closed minded. I have honestly and sincerely considered the points put forward by those who believe two servers with identical software configurations but different hardware would transmit two different "bit perfect" audio signals over an IP network. It is just my belief, which is backed by actual network and computer engineers (who do not sell the stuff - therein lies the difference from the marketing pieces) that this is impossible, and if computers and networks worked as you believe, they wouldn’t actually work at all for things much more mission critical than music.

Mark Jenkins:

“The motherboards are sourced from the world’s best supplier and they cost around 6 times what some of the competitors are using. We tune the motherboards to shift the frequency peaks of the noise generated by each component in order to eliminate noise nodes, so the mainboards start as an off-the-shelf board and then are customized for our use.”

Antipodes also places a lot of emphasis on the quality of the power supply, which they manufacture entirely in-house.

Mark Jenkins:

“What we did with the new power supply was to test the injection of noise into the motherboard at various frequencies to see which frequencies did the least damage to the sound quality, and then we designed the power supply board in such a way that the noise component was in the benign frequencies. This has a similar effect as a zero noise power supply.”

Lovely. I’m sure the stuff is as solid as the Rock of Gibraltar. There may be many reasons why this represents an upgrade over a standard PC running Roon: reliability, utility with DACs directly connected, a bunch of stuff.

But none of that stuff includes sending "quieter bits" over an IP network. There’s no such thing. They’re not dirty candies; they are not elusive chickens; they are the same packet of data as would be if the computer was built of space shuttle parts and encased in lead.

I am not criticizing anyone for purchasing one of these. They look fantastic. Nice bit of kit...nice bling for the system. But from an IP network perspective they can’t send cleaner packets. It’s all cleaned up by the time it gets to the streamer.

Call me all the names you want. It doesn’t change the science or the engineering. And what I meant by "need" is that if you want to properly back up your position, when it’s contrary to established science, the onus is on you. No, you don’t have to. But then don’t criticize someone trying to engage with you from a science and logical perspective.

It’s downright tribal. Am reminded of Lord of the Flies

It does seem to be. It’s just depressing that we can’t engage in a civil manner and that when someone runs out of points they turn to insults.

I am very familiar with Synergistic Research digital cables.

Your input is appreciated.  Just to point out, those are not network cables and what we are specifically discussing is if some electro-noise at the server end can effect what is received by a streamer over a network, presumably through one or several switches.