2.5Gbps Ethernet in the Sound Room... (D-Link DMS-106XT & GigaPlus S25-0802 2.5G Smart Switch). And a quick peek in the Headphone Bar & Red Cat Records.

On occasion, I get a kick out of reading the audiophile media's review of ethernet switches. These are perhaps some of the most hilarious pseudo-infomercials out there as companies try to justify their highly expensive network switches in the hopes of capturing the interest of the few audiophiles who still somehow do not realize that there's no benefit to these devices (even Paul McGowan agrees, imagine that!).

Feel free to check out the reviews of such things like the Silent Angel Bonn NX Pro Ethernet Switch (asking US$4000!), or filters like the Network Acoustic Muon Pro (asking £1,329.17!). There are also now Chinese companies that make these things for audiophiles - Gustard N18 (US$370 - only 2 ethernet ports + 1 gigabit SFP) and N18 Pro (US$530 - 5 ethernet + 1 gigabit SFP) for example; sure, they're cheaper but that's still quite a bit for what you get which is just a nice looking ethernet switch with integrated power supply and an essentially meaningless 10MHz clock input! (Timing is essential inside the DAC for precise conversion to analog output, not the network switch.)

A few years ago (2020), I talked about the Netgear Nighthawk S8000 as a great choice for a high quality ethernet switch which affords features including port priority. Hey, it's still a great little switch and I see that sometimes there's still stock available on Amazon.  Over the years, I've upgraded my home network beyond 1Gbps (and update here) so I figured let's find faster switches to try out for the sound/media room.

Here are two easily available and not expensive options: the D-Link DMS-106XT (US$200), with 10GbE high-speed port to connect to your main network plus 5 x 2.5GbE ports for downstream devices with user-defined port priority, and the very inexpensive GigaPlus S25-0802 2.5G Smart Switch (US$80), an 8-port 2.5GbE switch with 2 x 10Gbps SFP+ for those who want to use fiber networking, or possibly 10GbE RJ45 multigigabit transceivers (some very inexpensive like this).

Both are fanless - essential for the sound room.

Computer Parts: Marvell AQC113C 10GbE network card (QFly NIC-10G), PCIe x4 riser, and 7-port USB3 PCIe x1 Card.

Over the years, I've written about transitioning to faster ethernet here at home with standard copper 10GBASE-T (10GbE) cabling, beginning back in 2018. This works fine even with Cat-5e in the walls of my home (although some renovations use Cat-6). More recently, my home network was upgraded to 2.5GbE for any device that can benefit, with standard 1 gigabit/s fallback.

Last month, I needed another 10GbE network interface card (NIC) and noticed that we're now seeing inexpensive Marvell mGig AQC113C NICs available, upgrades from the AQC107 cards I have been using. So I grabbed a QFly NIC-10G (~US$75) to try out. There are other similar products like the NICGIGA (very unfortunate name), and GigaPlus.

The card offers 10G/5G/2.5/1GbE speeds and below (100/10Mbps) for compatibility. The new chip operates at only 4W running 10G speed (I believe the AQC107 is estimated at ~6W) making it even cooler-running for heavy loads.

Aquantia/Marvell AQC107 10GbE Network Cards (eg. ASUS XG-C1001C): Driver and Firmware updates and improving stability. (And more audiophile ethernet snake oil warnings.) [Update: Reduce latency for Roon audio playback.]

While this blog is primarily about audiophile stuff, over the years I have discussed modern audiophile systems including thoughts on networks. Like it or not, computer audio/video is ubiquitous and probably has become the primary source of access for many of us these days (rather than deal with physical media). Furthermore, a fast, responsive, reliable home network is almost essential as a foundational "utility" for entertainment and work. As discussed back in 2018, I've been running 10 gigabit/s home ethernet (standard copper RJ45 Cat-5e/6) with an update to the ASUS router and QNAP switch infrastructure in 2021.

In 2022, when it comes to very high-speed computer network cards, the Aquantia/Marvell AQtion AQC107 chipset devices remain attractive due to reasonable price, PCIe 3.0 x4 compatibility, and ability to run at 2.5/5 gigabit intermediate speeds (also dropping down to 1Gbps and 100Mbps as needed of course). Over the years, I've seen comments online with frustrations around the popular cards like my ASUS XG-C1001C shown above. The issues are typically described as episodic disconnects usually for about 5 seconds (discussed here, here) and then coming back online. As you can imagine, this will lead to a time-out of network transmissions.

Depending on the application, this might or might not lead to problems. For audio and videophiles, this is a problem when we're streaming video to something like an AppleTV or playing music off Roon in real-time. Other apps may be more tolerant and can just wait a little longer and retry.

Home Network: The ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AX11000 WiFi-6 Router & QNAP QSW-M2108-2C mixed 2.5GbE + 10GbE switch. (Internet jitter and "one number" audio objectivism.)

QNAP multi-gigabit switch being installed behind the basement home electrical panel.

Well guys & gals, it seems like every year, I'll post at least an article on computer networking.

I know, this isn't specifically audiophile-related but for us computer/streaming digital audiophiles, that computer network infrastructure we run at home is important and certainly being home-bound in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, a smoothly running network has become even more important for work, education, socialization and play these days.

So with both my kids now teenagers in high school, myself and the wife having to do more work from home, and the ongoing (exhausting) use of video conferencing, I figure I might as well optimize the system and hopefully forego thinking about this for a few years. ;-)

So today, let's talk about wireless, router features, and multi-gig wired home ethernet.

The top image is my new WiFi router. The 4lb, 802.11ax "Wi-Fi 6" capable, tri-band (2.4 + dual-5GHz), up to 160MHz bandwidth in 5GHz, DFS, 12-stream, 8-antennae, 1.8GHz quad ARMv8 64-bit cores, 1GB RAM, 256MB firmware, 2.5GbE-port, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AX11000; from now on I'll just call it the "GT-AX11000".

MEASUREMENTS: Going 10 Gigabits/s home ethernet (10GbE) on Cat-5e cables. (ASUS XG-C100C cards & Netgear GS110MX switches)

Over the years, I have upgraded many parts of my computer system. New motherboards go in and out, new CPUs updated, more advanced GPUs, gigs of RAM, faster and higher storage size hard drives and SSDs...

A few months back, I mentioned that one of the more "boring" parts of the computer system with little actual need for updating has been the wired network system. I have not significantly upgraded anything in many years. While I suspect many of us over the last decade have upgraded our home ethernet systems to 1 gigabit/s ethernet (1GbE), since the mid-2000's, 10 gigabit/s speed has been waiting in the wings for larger scale adoption. In business and enterprise settings, one may have already seen fibre-optic networks (for example, those using enhanced Small Form Factor [SFP+] connectors), but 10GbE in the form of standard copper modular RJ-45 8P8C connectors (also known has 10GBASE-T) has been talked about since 2006 with relatively few of us I suspect incorporating the technology into the home yet (in early 2018). The price point is only starting to dip into consumer territory.