I did also try running the melco through the PhoenixNet to the vivaldi, but i didn’t like it as much.
Of course I put my switch closer to my router than my Upsampler. That way the +40 foot run of fiber optic cable coming out of the switch prevents any potential nasties from impacting the signal. That cable terminates less than a meter from the Upsampler into an optical module that converts the signal back to ethernet for my Vivaldi Upsampler.
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Have you tried putting your switch after the optical module?
The fibreoptic cable won’t transport any nasties anyway so a switch before it won’t really be doing much.
At the other end, some optical converters are noisy in their own right. If you use a switch for sound quality improvement purposes, rather than as a port replicator, you’ll get the biggest impact by having it at the very last point in the chain before the streamer, whatever the cable is.
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It’s St. Patrick’s Day here in the USA, so there’s lots of conviviality, drinking, laughter, etc. In that spirit of joviality and friendliness, I do have to say Nigel that your “audiophile switch” is sure doing some heavy lifting in your audio chain. The notion that the switch, after a fiber isolation stage, can improve SQ is . . . intriguing. What is it doing, and how is it doing that? 
Spooky coincidence, it’s St Patrick’s day here too! 
Really? It’s doing what all audiophile network switches do and stopping any accumulated RFI/EMI noise getting to the DAC (it’s not doing anything digital per se).
If you have a nice special low noise optical-to-digital converter then that might well do the trick, but most such converters are not as effective in practice as in theory due to the noise generated by the circuitry doing the conversion back to digital. Installed after an optical-digital converter, the only noise a switch will have to mitigate is the noise generated by the converter circuitry of course.
If one installs an audiophile switch at the router end of things, it can stop most/all of the noise from other (non-audio) devices getting into the chain. But if I had just one switch in my system, it would be the last link in the chain. And is.
Cheers!
That’s not true at all.
While it’s true that any Ethernet Switch with a long unshielded Ethernet cable is likely to pick up EMI/RFI, and so should be close to the DAC with a short Ethernet cable. However, virtually any Media Converter, with a proper low-noise Power Supply, and any normal to-specification optical SFP - CISPR 22/FCC Part 15 compliance (look it up) - close to the DAC, with a short unshielded Ethernet Cable, will be the least EMI/RFI polluting solution, period.
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Obviously “period” is not exactly an invitation to reflect together on the mechanisms at play and explore this truth thing… but let me build on your response.
I presume you see no place anywhere in such a system (including at the router end) for an audiophile ethernet switch then, because the optically transported digital signal is as purely digital as it can be. Correct?
Agreed 100% about the importance of the low noise power supply. I said “most converters” because one should be as picky when choosing one as anywhere else in the system.
Have a great weekend
Well Nigel, the reason for “period” is that it’s not just some random opinion, it’s measured fact.
A typical Media Converter is far simpler in construction than any Audiophile Ethernet Switch. Typically based on a single Ethernet chip with ancillary power-related componentry around it. All the conversion heavy lifting is done by the SFPs.
And SFPs are very precise components; they conform to very strict specifications (in order to be compatible across many different platforms). Those includes EMI/RFI specifications, Thermal and Power-draw specifications, not to mention physical and mechanical specifications.
Within the last decade or so, SFP’s have come down in costs so significantly and preform so precisely to specifications that Audio vendors are now starting to incorporate Optical SFP transceiver cages directly into their platforms; Linn, Lumin, Melco, MSB, and I expect we’ll see more in the coming years. No audio vendor in their right mind is going to do that if SFPs generate more EMI/RFI than a standard Ethernet Switch.
So, to suggest that a Media Convert/SFP generates more EMI/RFI than an Audiophile Ethernet switch is, frankly, just the usual ignorant audiophile B.S.
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Really indeed.
I’ve owned/tried several “audiophile” switches. Not a one did a thing in my system. I had fun playing with them. And I had fun cooking eggs on both my EtherREGENs—just kidding, but they do get hot, and occasionally go into thermal shutdown—but not a single switch I tried made any audio difference. Maybe I’ve already got good noise isolation in my system, and there isn’t much to do. Maybe. Or maybe Ethernet combined with good Ethernet circuitry just performs very well on dCS equipment. [There’s probably a reason it’s their preferred input.]
Now, I didn’t go to the lengths that ASR did (see caveat below) in this review of the EtherREGEN, but I was reasonably thorough. The ASR review is worth reading, because one of the things they specifically measured was noise and noise reduction. The TL;DR: the EtherREGEN had no effect on noise (or anything else). So, unless you’ve got some measurements that prove that wrong, I would suggest it’s safe to say not all audiophile switches reduce noise. Granted, I haven’t tried them all, and I certainly haven’t read reviews of all of them. But I’ve been using network audio since 2013. I’ve had an opportunity to hear a few. All I’m asking is if there is any actual evidence, not even proof, just evidence that audiophile switch noise reduction is anything more than marketing hype or audiophile speculation. If there is, I would love to see it. Seems to me that, for anyone with the skill and equipment, it should be easy to measure.
P.S. Note the usual disclaimers: if you hear it, it’s real in your system. I’m not dissing anyone’s perceptions. You’re free to spend your money any way you want. I know some people refuse to consider anything from ASR; I occasionally find myself in disagreement, but I usually find it educational.
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I’ll reply later, @Anupc. I need a proper keyboard not a phone. I agree with/acknowledge/accept a good chunk of your assertions. You misunderstand or misrepresent my views in a couple of areas. Oh, and while I’m sure you broadly understand what you’re talking about, I have to say I find the tone in which you communicate rather patronising and angry in parts. Danger of keyboard comms, perception being reality and all that.
Later…
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Nice post @PaleRider, very balanced.
Will reply properly later when at an actual keyboard rather than on a virtual one, just wanted to acknowledge receipt!
Later.
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I tend to put things plainly as a matter of fact, especially when it comes to all things Ethernet (as I work in the industry). That may put some people off, especially when their strong views are based on audiophile myth and conjecture than fact. 
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And still differences are easy to hear when changing out power supplies on my switch, I would almost invite you to come and listen to my system.
Sighted differences are always easy to “hear”. Time and time again folks who claim “night & day difference” fail embarrassingly blind. 
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An open mind is clearly not one of your virtues
if an “open mind” means blinding believing audiophile myths without factually and measurably validating and testing it out for myself through objective means, then yes. I don’t have an “open mind”. 
Correct you don’t have an open mind
This dispute is about faith against facts (or about snakeoil against the truth).
IMHO faith is for the church and has no place in an area based upon technological facts.
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Maybe we measure wrong things that are irrelevant SQ wise…
I don’t disagree there is that possibility. For example, we (humans) can detect patterns in the noise-floor that measurements are mostly unable to distinguish from random noise - many of the improvement in things like Power cables can be attributed to such within the analog domain, but Ethernet and that part of the digital domain is a whole different ball-game, but audiophiles keep trying to associate traditional analog problem to it.
It also that doesn’t explain why people fail blind test when they apparently hear “huge” difference when sighted ← that’s usually a clear sign of “acoustic imagination” more than actual objective differences
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