Sound4 Impact
Lane Frisch
What we excel at, above everything else, is audio signal processing. Launched back in 2007, SOUND4 began with analog technologies and went on to achieve groundbreaking results in the digital world. Having an instant impact on the market with a string of innovative products. The launch of a set of FM/HD processing tools was quickly followed by the release of networking audio-over-IP solutions.
Further recognition came in 2012 with the release of our Web Radio product range which received a Cool Stuff Award upon its presentation at NAB 2012.
Today, SOUND4 is a household name in the competitive, fast-developing world of broadcasting technology and enjoys a deserved reputation for proven quality and reliable service.
Alltogether SOUND4 products are developed and produced in accordance with the latest ISO 9001 quality control standards.
I had issues where the devices connected via the BJC cables would lose their connection. I would replace the BJC cable with another brand and the issue would not re-occur. I would put the BJC cable in another place and similar things would happen. It makes zero sense to me, but the solution was always the same, replace the BJC cable and all problems would cease. I am pretty much done trying different brand Ethernet cables. Bah.
What gets me is that we are talking ones and zeros that do not know what frequency of sound they are ultimately coding. You could in theory change the coding so the ones and zeros coded different frequencies. If the cable was affecting the signal, which I consider 0% likely, then different coding would affect different frequencies. Saying a cable affects bass is attributing analogue characteristics to digital signals.
I would love not to hear swaps. Be it noise or jitter. Something is changing perceived frequency on analog outs of my DAC. The DSP of the room os not done with ethernet. Yet fix bass and the ethernet cable bass balance changes.
Ethernet uses a frame based transmission protocol. The data is sent in discrete packets embedded in routing and control information. On receipt the data is checked to see that it matches the CRC check code, and if not the packet is rejected and a resend requested. Only the data from good packets is moved to a buffer in the receiver, from which it can then be clocked out. It is only at this point that jitter could become an issue. Apart from the cable acting as an antenna outside its data transmission role, or the processing in the receiver generating slightly different RF patterns, it is difficult to see how a cable change could affect sound quality.
I sish I could understand it. Bit unfortunately I hear it. I do agree with some of the postulations that LOS throughout the digital chain makes sound different. I changed from fiber optic inty provider and heard streaming differences.
This was Audio Bacon last review of a cable. He gets called every adjective thought of in comments. But i have heard same type differences even in cheap cables. I am not ready for 1 K cable yet. Likely I might want, two each after I heard one. His claim that ithe cable before DAC is most important seems plausible but I have heard just as dramatic changes before the router.
I do think there is lots not understood on why sound is different. Maybe it is dropped packet errors and the reassembled data or noise. I get all systems are different as are peoples hearing. Even room acoustics changes make my ethernet cable preferences change.
To summarise I decided to keep the SOtM dCBL CAT7 cable. In my system, dCS Bridge > PS Audio DirestStream DAC > Primare A.60 amp > Harbeth SHL5 Anniversary model, I found this cable clearly sounds better than the Chord Signature Super ARAY cable. Compared with the Chord cable it conveys more space, with richer tones. Sounds are more natural, particularly on piano & voices. Strings have more warmth and detail. Transients have greater impact with better bass definition (attack, solidity & decay). Overall it improved the illusion of being present at a performance. Most of my music library consists of acoustic classical music and jazz so this is important to me.
Other conclusions I came to were (1) swopping two of the better cables between the first and last legs made only a small difference to sound quality with placement of the better cable in last leg giving marginally better SQ, (2) there was little to choose between the Meicord and the CatSnake cables: the Meicord had more clarity while the CatSnake had more bass but was slightly woolly in comparison.
I must admit I did not expect to hear such a significant variations in sound quality from swopping around ethernet cables - it is of the same order as I heard when I replaced the Netgear switch with the EE 8Switch, so I guess I will need to repeat the exercise for the cables in other parts of the LAN. Of course I should add the caveat that these results are for for my system, in my listening room, with my music and my ears.
Yes I used Bridge II. The change to the dCS Network Bridge gave a significant improvement in sound quality with greater transparency, better PRAT and more realistic tone. Furthermore when I subsequently removed the Bridge II board from the DAC I got an additional, smaller, improvement in sound quality and this was apparent for all the DAC inputs I use (I2S, SPDIF, & Optical). I guess the Bridge board was generating noise.
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Figure 2 Schematic representation of the experimental protocol. Two batches of Venus verrucosa larvae were reared at 15 and 20C. After 11 or 7 dpf and 25 or 15 dpf, depending on the batch, veliger and pediveliger larvae replicates were sampled and sieved to determine the impact of temperature on their physiological state. The veliger and pediveliger replicates were separately exposed to two temperatures (15 and 20C) and four sound levels (control, low and high pile driving, and high drilling) for 9 and 15 days. At the end of the experiments, larvae were sampled and sieved to determine the potential interaction between the two factors.
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