Distorted Ethernet Signal

[Kirby66]

Not being a particularly IT savvy person I'd like to ask if someone could help me understand the cause of an issue that has happened a couple of times that I think I isolated to a problem with my network yesterday afternoon. My system is now digital only and the problem presents itself as the sound from the speakers being from one channel only and heavily distorted.

 

Signal Path - Wireless NBN to the house / LAN network (Cat 5 cabling) / Netgear R6400 Modem Router / Altas Mavros LAN Cable / Waversa LAN EXT-2 filter / Altas Mavros LAN Cable / Innuos Zenith MK3 ... then to USB reclocker, DAC etc etc

 

It happened a couple of weeks ago and assuming that it was a bad connection I took the opportunity to unplug everything, pull the system forward clean / dust everything (an overdue task), and tidy the snake pit of cables behind the racks which had been troubling me for some time. Problem disappeared and it all sounded great 

 

Then two days ago it happened again  !!! So this time I started to try to isolate the problem to a component or connection ... firstly I checked that I was able to play music from the server hard drive, no problem which I thought was helpful as it took out many possibilities from the server/ streamer onwards in the chain. Then I took the LAN cable from the wall straight to the streamer - problem persisted so it wasn't the relatively new LAN filter which is the only component and two cables between the wall and the streamer. At a bit of a loss I figured it must be either the LAN cable from the wall to the streamer (I tried two) or something in the streamer itself. Then, looking for anything else to check before pulling the system forward again, I rebooted the modem/ router ... bingo !!! This made me happy but I'm wondering if it means I should look to updating the router and whether it's a problem anyone else has experienced.

 

Any help or comments will be much appreciated.

[bob_m_54]

1 hour ago, Kirby66 said:

My system is now digital only and the problem presents itself as the sound from the speakers being from one channel only and heavily distorted.

That is not a fault which can be manifested with a network problem. You'll either be able to play music or not, or you'll get dropouts if it's a network problem. I'd be looking more closely at the analog section of your system.

[Kirby66]

Thanks @bob_m_54 .... that's troubling as I was hoping I'd isolated it by process of elimination. I guess I'll have to wait for it to happen and try to find it.

Without touching or changing anything other then switching from a track on the HD to a track via Qobuz - the problem was only evident when streaming ... I could swap back and forth 

[bob_m_54]

7 minutes ago, Kirby66 said:

Thanks @bob_m_54 .... that's troubling as I was hoping I'd isolated it by process of elimination. I guess I'll have to wait for it to happen and try to find it.

Without touching or changing anything other then switching from a track on the HD to a track via Qobuz - the problem was only evident when streaming ... I could swap back and forth 

Yes, I'd be looking at the "DAC, etc etc" part of your setup.. See if you can try the half split method to isolate the fault. ie halfway between the DAC output and the speakers, if you can substitute the equipment for a different output path, will tell you whether the fault is before that point, or after. Then if you can isolate it to before or after the halfway point, split again that section that seems to be faulty.. Hope that makes sense..

 

Edit: But intermittent faults can be a real PITA to find.. lots of luck.

Edited September 14 by bob_m_54

[Addicted to music]

Not a network issue.  Agreed with @bob_m_54,  with networks it either work or it doesn't.   Distortion to one channel is usually in the analog stage after the dac section.  So you'll need to do some process of elimination to the speaker end.  

Digital signals can be that distorted and still work 100%, as long as the transition from high to low or low to high is legible to the receiving end it doesnt care what it looks like unlike any analog transmission method.