Network Isolation

[InfernoSTi]

I never thought much about it being a counterfeit...I guess it could be like so many things. I shopped through Amazon and noticed after few weeks of watching that the pricing is fairly dynamic +/- $20. The vendors seem to be "buy Japan" vendors so if they are shipping from Japan, not China, it seems more realistically authentic. The one I used had very nice packaging, came from Japan (all the customs, etc), and they included some little good luck Japanese nicknacks. It also included full instructions on returning the unit for a full refund through Amazon, so if I could figure out it was counterfeit, I guess I could return it. They also include a contact e-mail and encourage one to send them items they could purchase from Japan in the future. An awful lot of bother to go through if it were counterfeit.

 

Amazon.com: Buying Choices: Acoustic Revive LAN Isolator Rli-1 Eliminate Transmission Noise

 

I used Zipangu Club...

 

John

[ejn1]

I went ahead and purchased it... Hopefully I will get a similar benefit as you guys!

[PeteG]

Mine came out of Japan too through Ebay. One would think the chances are good coming out of Japan to not be counterfeit, but you never know.

[ejn1]

Mine came out of Japan too through Ebay. One would think the chances are good coming out of Japan to not be counterfeit, but you never know.

Did you have similar success with the results?

[PeteG]

Did you have similar success with the results?

 

I haven't received it yet, in a week or so.

[tranz]

Priaptor, how do you purchase these things? I found someone on ebay from Japan but worry as it looks easy to counterfeit... Thanks...

 

This audio shop provides excellent old school service and I highly recommend to get one from this quality shop in Japan.

 

Contact Yohei Kojima at [email protected]

 

 

Cheers.

[tranz]

One more tweak which helped in my setup is to get rid of the squealing wall-wart of the ethernet switch. Just place a cheap AM radio near the switching power supply and you will get an indication of the noise.

 

This was causing ear aches in my setup. I replaced it with a cheap analog linear power supply: TekPower HY1503C from Amazon. A shielded DC cable, with a little ground wire attached to the drain wire of the cable that is attached to the ground of a cheap pro-audio power conditioner. As crazy as it sounds, getting rid of all the noisy wall-warts made a huge improvement. This especially if you have TV signals and home network sitting on the same switch and near audio equipment.

[k-man]

...I'm loving the effects of the isolation (and/or filtering) provided by the RLI-1. I may try an Acousence GISO for comparo, but for now all is good.

 

Not placebo. This is, IMO, the real deal. As I have said before, these are the upgrades I love the most. Best bang for the buck.

 

I received an Acousence GISO (DS model) yesterday. And similar to your experiences, I am finding this product does exactly what it's supposed to. And the benefit is a lot more than subtle! Thanks for mentioning these products, otherwise I would have just simply expected that standard ethernet connections have sufficient isolating properties. I can only conclude that noise from a simple network (router + NAS) is nasty stuff. I'm sure these LAN isolators will get popular as more computer audio systems will be ethernet based.

 

PS My choice was due to my 'slight' concerns of counterfeit (re Acoustic Revive products), and the ease of returning the items 'if' there was no improvement. Ralph (Acousence) was quick and professional with his responses.

 

GISO

[ejn1]

I got my Acoustic Revive RLI-1 in... First impression was why the heck does something like this cost over $200?? maybe it has some NASA technology in it For me, not being able to quickly A-B back in forth its hard to make a profound statement that the difference is discernible. Maybe its because my system is fairly resolving already? or maybe because my Auralic Vega does not receive any power from the USB cable (eg any electrical noise coming in from the Cat5 is not making its way out)? Not sure but I can say that I'm extremely happy with sound of my system and likely the Ethernet isolation contributes to this. I'm happy with the SQ and I still have a $20 laptop brick powering my CAPS... My Paul Hynes PS is close to arrival but I keep thinking that I may be getting into a law of diminishing returns of the incremental improvement.

[tranz]

... I may be getting into a law of diminishing returns of the incremental improvement.

 

Indeed, or your setup is already very clean without much noise coming through the LAN.

 

For me, after tackling some big items like speakers, amps, physical placement, power , etc. I noticed that after one thing is fixed it reveals something that initially was masked by the previous problem. Sometimes I wish I had stuck with my old speakers!

 

Cheers

[Sam Lord]

...I listened to all of the needle-drops with and without the isolator and determined that the low frequencies were being diminished by the device, and overall I liked the sound better without it. So bye-bye RLI-1. YMMV

 

That's an interesting finding, and perhaps a good example of how digital artifacts can create odd subjective results.

 

Of course the RLI-1 is not diminishing the lows, but perhaps is affecting the quality of output with its analog effects on the server's ground and/or the digital signal.

[Listener7]

I received an Acousence GISO (DS model) yesterday. And similar to your experiences, I am finding this product does exactly what it's supposed to. And the benefit is a lot more than subtle! Thanks for mentioning these products, otherwise I would have just simply expected that standard ethernet connections have sufficient isolating properties. I can only conclude that noise from a simple network (router + NAS) is nasty stuff. I'm sure these LAN isolators will get popular as more computer audio systems will be ethernet based.

 

PS My choice was due to my 'slight' concerns of counterfeit (re Acoustic Revive products), and the ease of returning the items 'if' there was no improvement. Ralph (Acousence) was quick and professional with his responses.

 

GISO

 

For whatever it's worth, I found a US distributor of medical Ethernet isolation transformers in multiple form factors. They claim to have the highest performing units on the market. EMO Systems, Inc. · Network Isolation

 

They were willing to sell single quantities to me and the pricing was better ~$175. I'll post back with a review soon.

[The Computer Audiophile]

For whatever it's worth, I found a US distributor of medical Ethernet isolation transformers in multiple form factors. They claim to have the highest performing units on the market. EMO Systems, Inc. · Network Isolation

 

They were willing to sell single quantities to me and the pricing was better ~$175. I'll post back with a review soon.

Just checked the link. Interesting note on the page.

 

"• Audio applications, to reduce the transmission of low frequency alternating currents (AC hum) over the network connection."

[jtwrace]

Just checked the link. Interesting note on the page.

 

"• Audio applications, to reduce the transmission of low frequency alternating currents (AC hum) over the network connection."

I ordered the Emo Systems EN-70HD two weeks ago. It was $176 and the specs are very good. I had quite a long talk with the engineer there too. If nothing else, it could help with power surges on the line and protect thousands of dollars worth of equipment. That was the deciding factor for me.

 

sales (at) emosystems dot com

[The Computer Audiophile]

I ordered the Emo Systems EN-70HD two weeks ago. It was $176 and the specs are very good. I had quite a long talk with the engineer there too. If nothing else, it could help with power surges on the line and protect thousands of dollars worth of equipment. That was the deciding factor for me.

 

sales (at) emosystems dot com

Back in my Enterprise IT days we had a laser on the roof to beam Internet access across the city. This device was connected via cat5e to very expensive equipment. To eliminate the lightning threat we converted the signal to glass fiber then back to cat5e.

 

Isolation can save one's equipment.

[jtwrace]

Back in my Enterprise IT days we had a laser on the roof to beam Internet access across the city. This device was connected via cat5e to very expensive equipment. To eliminate the lightning threat we converted the signal to glass fiber then back to cat5e.

 

Isolation can save one's equipment.

Good to know. The engineer there said to put it between the modem and router to start. If I were to hard wire the ARIES, he said to try one there too.

[ejn1]

For whatever it's worth, I found a US distributor of medical Ethernet isolation transformers in multiple form factors. They claim to have the highest performing units on the market. EMO Systems, Inc. · Network Isolation

 

They were willing to sell single quantities to me and the pricing was better ~$175. I'll post back with a review soon.

 

How would these connect into a typical CAPs server? or do they insert into the path like the Acoustic Revive?

[jtwrace]

How would these connect into a typical CAPs server? or do they insert into the path like the Acoustic Revive?

 

Yes they just go inline. Very simple.

[jtwrace]

Here's a picture...

 

[jtwrace]

[lmitche]

Thanks for sharing. I am curious, how does the system sound with the EMO systems isolator?

[tranz]

An interesting read on the RFI impact of routers and switches. It includes a few model numbers that are big contributors to interference. And yes, this focuses on the radio operators, but I do think it applies to the CA optimization as well.

 

LinkSys Router Interference To Ham Radio Bands - LinkSys RFI/EMI Problems!

 

Cheers

[lmitche]

An interesting read on the RFI impact of routers and switches. It includes a few model numbers that are big contributors to interference. And yes, this focuses on the radio operators, but I do think it applies to the CA optimization as well.

 

LinkSys Router Interference To Ham Radio Bands - LinkSys RFI/EMI Problems!

 

Cheers

 

Thanks for this. An interesting read indeed. I have my digital front end isolated on the power side and replaced the wall warts for the NAS and switches with linear power supplies. This has had a fantastic impact on sound quality. Truly breathtaking. I ordered a network isolation transformer today. I am curious to see if it has any additional impact and where: 1) behind the music renderer; 2) between the NAS and switch; or 3) between the audio dedicated switch and the rest of the house ethernet wiring.

[tranz]

Hi Imitche,

 

Same here with the getting rid of nasty switching supplies. Of course there are some clean ones like Pardo.

 

I have found that anything connected to the audio and power circuit provides a path of noise. The ethernet transformers are not made equal, and I am now looking at creating two networks, so that I can separate the cable modem, tv data, work computers data streams from the network connected to the Audio Mac for remote app functionality. Right now they share the network and I think it is raising the fatigue factor.

 

Should be relatively easy with a wireless bridge/router to the internet as opposed to hardwired for e.g. internet radio, and remote app, a switch for a layer of isolation, a medical isolator for more isolation, bluejeanscable CAT6, Acoustic Revive filter and some bench LPSUs. Overkill? Not sure what else to throw at it, except physically unplug the ethernet cable (which does help), but that defeats the CA convenience.

[Freann]

@tranz - good idea. Since I have two Airport Extremes (one old, one new), I can try to set up a completely separate network for my mac mini.

 

Main network (Airport Extreme 2013) - Internet and non-audio things via ethernet and wifi

 

Audio network (Airport Extreme 2009) - wired to mac mini. Not connection to main network = no Internet. Both AE and mac mini powered by a JS-2 power supply.

 

I use a Macbook Pro and screen sharing to control A+ (with version 2 I’ll switch to iPad). To play music would I switch Wifi from main to audio network. Should work?