You mean no disrespect but then go on to chastise those who hear differences for not knowing the difference between USB and Ethernet implementations.
I can’t help think of all the EEs and component manufacturers who claimed (and many still do) using different power cables could in no way make an audible difference as long as they were of the proper size for the load.
I wasn’t really chastising actually.
Would you agree that people who believe that Ethernet cables can/do make a difference are generally more likely to hear a difference when they test out different Ethernet cables?
It depends upon whether those who believe they cannot make a difference are truly willing to listen and assess, and of course on the system in question.
Though I believe Ethernet cables can sound different, I too have heard many systems in which they did not and/or the differences were not worth the cost.
I’m pretty sure most of us here at dcs.community have an open mind, and have experience trying different Ethernet cables.
As I stated elsewhere, I actually own and use the $1,500 AudioQuest Diamond RJ/E Ethernet cable, which I’ve listened to subjectively, and objectively measured (and no, it doesn’t make any difference whatsoever to the sound quality on either my Vivaldi stack, or my Bartok 
).
The flip-side to that are those who believe they hear a difference, but refuse objective proof that there is in fact no audible differences.
Human hearing is not infallible. This video might be illustrative;
Indeed, but I reject current “objective” audio proof as a scope or frequency analyzer cannot yet adequately explain why we hear the way we do.
“Objective” proof says digital audio is better than LPs, but that is very much not always the case except to test instruments.
Why did you purchase the AQ cable if you can hear no difference, and why do you keep it?
Sorry Bill, all your reasons are subjective ones, not objective.
Because I was curious. And I kept it because it measures really well though it didn’t make any difference.
I know, I said I was a subjectivist.
I believe in what I hear, and that’s the bottom line.
Given the number of components of various types I did not buy despite really wanting to, and the number of cables I did not buy, I trust my hearing pretty well at this point.
I don’t bemoan you your reliance upon objective science, but I won’t belittle you for it either and would ask for the same courtesy.
If you want to say you heard and measured no difference, that’s awesome.
When you change to saying because you measured no difference there is no difference, I will argue that vehemently.
That having been said, I might very well not hear a difference in your system, either.
There’s literally billions of dollars spent in R&D across nearly 50 years that explains and proves how Ethernet/TCP works to ensure information integrity in the presences of noise. It’s not about me testing or being objective.
Entirely your prerogative to trust your ears more than all of that overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
You’ll have to excuse me for finding it very hard to understand that kind of trust in ones (fallible) senses 
But nobody has ever tested this for audio, how Sony and Phillips once spent a lot of money on audio research…
But for now, I’ll just use Belden CatSnake. It would be interesting to compare it with your Audioquest))
Come on arzojaan… there are literally 1,000s of papers and technology developed for transporting audio over Ethernet & TCP/IP. Developed over decades now! 
You don’t have to take my word for it! Just Google the words “Audio” “Ethernet” or “IETF Audio Ethernet” or “AES Audio Ethernet”. How do you imagine UPnP that dCS uses works?
Streaming Audio over Ethernet/TCP is only new and fresh for Audiophiles. 
Perhaps like the work of SPDIF, where cables also matter. I have not gone into the wilds of “golden” patchcords yet, your explanations reassure me)))
But I also don’t believe in the massive madness of network audiophiles. I will leave this question open for myself for now.
Information integrity and audio quality are not necessarily the same thing, we all know that.
There are multiple other factors like ground noise that come into play too.
With S/PDIF there’s jitter.
In short, it’s clear you consider subjectivists the great misled, and that’s fine with me, we can agree to disagree.
We’ve already covered that many times in prior posts on why/how audio over Ethernet/TCP is very different from audio over S/PDIF - the former has multiple layers of abstraction/error-correction, is packetised, buffered, and asynchronous in nature. While the latter is a purely physical layer interface operating synchronously with no error correction whatsoever, etc. etc.
We’ve already covered this before Bill. Simple optical isolation fixes any such claims of ground noise (to which you claimed optical has other problems without getting into details).
Looks like we’re going round in circles here
No actually, I don’t think you’re being misled necessarily. I just think many folks are not critical enough to their own psychoacoustic response, and resort to “trust my ears” beyond reason.
“Nice discussion” here.
Everyone listens in a different environment with a different network. And then we are not talking about the speakers, amplifiers and mains filters used, so the outcome will always be different. Completely useless. Just listen for yourself if you think something is an improvement. Everyone here is looking for confirmation that their choice is the right one.
It’s all the same physical connection, with an analog signal. Probably some problems, sound artifacts can be associated with this. This is not about data loss.
But I will only be glad that I managed to save money by buying Belden instead of Audioquest))
Ruud, interesting observation. Personally, I don’t really care if anyone here thinks I bought the right stuff (being a dCS forum, the odds do go up 
), but I do learn a lot from a lot of smart, convivial people here. Still, you’ve highlighted a very common human trait. The reality is that our human failings will get in our way every time. By coincidence, Paul McGowan has a post about confirmation bias over at PS Audio today. It’s not likely to be anything really new to folks here, but like your observation, it’s apt. There is a literal catalog of human cognitive biases that make it very difficult for us to assess the world rationally, though they don’t necessarily prevent us from being effective. Sometimes, they enhance our effectiveness. But they are still irrational.
Any of us may consistently hear differences that no one else, even with similar hearing acuity, might perceive. It would be unusual, but hardly impossible. But it’s also probably not the norm. It is likely that, if one of us can hear “it,” others can as well in like circumstances. And if that’s the case, then there is probably a reason for it that is explicable, or at least explorable. But making suggestions to try things without some sort of shared objective framework is a prescription for confusion. Imagine if a doctor, who had never met you or read your chart, recommended a pill with the words “try these; you might like them and they worked for me.” That may work for food, wine, and movies where it’s a pretty simple matter for the recommender and the receiver to share some objective framework. E.g., “if you like Nolan’s Memento, check out his Following; I think you’ll like it.” And it works over at WBF, fueled by dollars, oneupmanship, and audiophile paranoia. But it’s not proof or predictive of anything, and it’s not a basis for predicted or known outcomes with high confidence.
For purposes of this hobby, it may not even matter. If people believe that Ethernet cables can make a difference in their system, and their hearing confirms it for them, then it’s their wallet. And if they don’t care why or how, it’s their choice. And in that respect, it is a lot like movies and wine. Not quite sure how anyone took that as an aspersion. I’ve written many times here that I believe people in this forum when they say they hear, for example, a difference between Roon and Mosaic coming out of the same server. I believe them. But their hearing it doesn’t mean it’s not a cognitive bias at work. In the absence of engineering explanations for the difference (as with Roon vs. Mosaic or Ethernet cables), cognitive bias is a legitimate factor to consider. So the refusal to seek explanations is IMHO an odd point of view (and a bit of an indicator of cognitive bias at work), and to me—who believes in subjective impressions informed by science—it’s an insufficient framework for guidance to others who may share neither the identical cognitive biases nor even a similar audio system.
Just so Anup. This oft-repeated statement that “but, it’s not been studied for audio” is one of the sillier and more deceptive memes out there.
Being new for audiophiles means the audio quality is really only being examined of late.
Sonus users don’t care if the soundstage is shortened, many don’t even have multiple speakers for stereo.
Many others are using Ethernet to play songs from a NAS to their $89 Sony Blu-ray player so also don’t care about the things audiophiles do.
It’s like dismissing concerns about the audio quality of LP reissues today because they haven’t bothered the buyers at Urban Outfitters and Hot Topic over the past decade.
I don’t think anyone ever said they don’t want to know why Ethernet cables make an audible difference int the systems they do, it’s just we don’t need to know to hear the difference.
If you want theories, I’m sure AudioQuest or Synergistic Research can tell you their thinking.
The typical Audiophiles that thinks Ethernet cables makes a difference only knows about subjective “quality”. Really quality is measured. IEEE, AES, ITU-T, IETF; the folks who do real research about Audio over Ethernet/IP. Not subjective amateur stuff 
