The EtherREGEN thread for various network, cable, power experiences and experiments

[kennyb123]

29 minutes ago, soares said:

I replaced my Gtek FMC with an optical module  and there was a notable increase of SQ. 
Cheers Jorge

Would you say that the increase justified the cost of the opticalModule?

[soares]

56 minutes ago, kennyb123 said:

Would you say that the increase justified the cost of the opticalModule?

Ohh yes. Definitely:-)

Even with the additional cost of an extra LPS. 

[kennyb123]

An update on my earlier post on adding optical..

 

The highs continue to have a tendency to have too hard an edge.  I've ordered some optical attenuators as it could be that the signal is too strong given the relatively short length of fiber I'm using. A friend is using a much longer length of cable with is Startech products - and he doesn't hear this issue.  He's also not using an ER on the clean side, but I doubt that's the issue.

[PYP]

5 hours ago, soares said:

Currently using:

 

Jensen VRD- iFF > Router (HDPLEX) > Pink Faun isolator > Ethernet copper > Zen MKIII > Ethernet  copper > Optical module (LPS 1.2) > fiber > Etherregen (Sbooster + ultra) > Ethernet copper >  Ultrarendu (Sbooster) > USB > Isoregen (LPS 1.2) > USB > (OPPO 205 modded).

 

Interesting setup.  By any chance did you try using the eR without the Optical module to determine how it improved the eR used alone?

 

I assume that a JS-2 LPS could power both optical module and eR.  That is an interesting prospect as I consider future improvements to the eR alone.   

[zettelsm]

2 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

An update on my earlier post on adding optical..

 

The highs continue to have a tendency to have too hard an edge.  I've ordered some optical attenuators as it could be that the signal is too strong given the relatively short length of fiber I'm using. A friend is using a much longer length of cable with is Startech products - and he doesn't hear this issue.  He's also not using an ER on the clean side, but I doubt that's the issue.

 

I’m the friend Kennyb is referring to, and to test the equipment and the concept before crawling under my house to pull the CAT 6 copper and install the fiber I hooked everything up and put the fiber link in series with the existing 50’ of copper. Today, when Kennyb told me he was hearing some hardness with his fiber installation, I decide to hear what it sounds like with that 50’ of copper ethernet cable removed. I went ahead and laid out the fiber around the edge of the floor from office to the stereo in another room and bypassed the copper completely.

 

I heard a hardness that I hadn’t heard before, as well as a loss of some of the liquidity and relaxed transparency that I value in my system. Luckily, I had four -5 dB optical attenuators and inserted a pair at each end of the fiber. Voila! Hardness gone, transparency and liquidity return.

 

So, given the 80 km range of the specified FMCs, SFPs and fiber and the minuscule length of fiber in use, it seems a reasonable and prudent thing to knock down some of that optical power and avoid over-driving and saturating the optical receivers in the SFPs. It certainly sounds now like there is much less distortion.

 

Steve Z 

[soares]

8 hours ago, PYP said:

 

Interesting setup.  By any chance did you try using the eR without the Optical module to determine how it improved the eR used alone?

 

I assume that a JS-2 LPS could power both optical module and eR.  That is an interesting prospect as I consider future improvements to the eR alone.   

Yes I did. The oM improves the already excellent eR SQ. Cheers Jorge

[esmit]

20 hours ago, soares said:

Currently using:

 

Jensen VRD- iFF > Router (HDPLEX) > Pink Faun isolator > Ethernet copper > Zen MKIII > Ethernet  copper > Optical module (LPS 1.2) > fiber > Etherregen (Sbooster + ultra) > Ethernet copper >  Ultrarendu (Sbooster) > USB > Isoregen (LPS 1.2) > USB > (OPPO 205 modded).

 

Can you test without the isoregen? I have a similar setup, and although the ir improves my microrendu I find that my ultraRendu sounds better than mR+iR, and the ultrarendu on its own sounds better  than uR+iR. All powered by Lps1.2s. I am curious about your findings. I tested for instance with Sinner Man, from Four woman: the Nina Simone Philips Recordings. 

This came especially apparent after adding the etherRegen: before adding that I did not really notice this clearly. 

[soares]

Yes, I will do it whenever possible. 

[uwe062]

I would like to buy a power supply for the EtherRegen. I heard a lot of good things from the Farad Super3, but also from the Teddy Pardo PSU. Has anyone tried the teddy here? Thanks and best regards from Berlin, Uwe

 

[alsterfan]

9 hours ago, uwe062 said:

I would like to buy a power supply for the EtherRegen. I heard a lot of good things from the Farad Super3

Hi Uwe,

The Farad 3 interests me as well, but the price tag so far made me refrain from buying it. Instead I am very pleased using a Zerozone LPS:

https://www.ebay.de/itm/ZEROZONE-Finished-65VA-Ultra-Low-Noise-linear-Power-supply-5V-9V-12V-15V-18V-etc-/322429316074

 

which is a lot cheaper and brings the ER forward too, surely (?) not as much as a Farad 3 would do.

However, one warning I have to make:

Using the Zerozone 12v LPS lead to massive hiccups,

(Hi Crom! #701) -->

https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/57519-uptone-audio-etherregen-listening-impressions/page/29/#comments

 

so pleasant listening became impossible. Via the German "aktiv hoeren" forum I got contact to a helpful audiophyle who uses the identical type of LPS now knowing that at least for 2 years (that is the age of my LPS, his is nearly new) it is produced with a bug (at least the 12v version). He kindly soldered a capacitor to the board thus achieving a constant flow of 12v. After this LPS-modification the ER works as it should have done from the beginning,

which is brilliantly.

Best,

Uwe

 

[kennyb123]

On 1/13/2020 at 5:59 PM, kennyb123 said:

An update on my earlier post on adding optical..

 

The highs continue to have a tendency to have too hard an edge.  I've ordered some optical attenuators as it could be that the signal is too strong given the relatively short length of fiber I'm using. 

 

An update on my update...

 

Attenuators are a must with these StarTech FMCs it would seem.  From the manual:

 

SFP modules are designed to transmit signals over large distances. If the physical wiring distance is too short, the transmitting optical signal (laser) may be too strong and damage the receiving SFP module. An in-line optical attenuator may be required to protect them from damage.
 

And

The SFP transceiver module supports a maximum distance of up to 80 km (49.7 mi) 
 

I just installed a pair of 10 db attenuators on the server side and a pair of 5 db attenuators on the other side. Treble is much improved though still a little hot on recordings that have that tendency anyway.  These are the attenuators:  https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B07R5D72JL/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_MM5hEbVX60JNC

What I didn't expect was an improvement to bass with the attenuators. It's better balanced now where it seemed a little bloated at times when first trying this fiber solution. 

I just ordered four 20 db attenuators just to satisfy my curiosity. I'm really liking what I'm hearing but I just want to hear if more attenuation impacts sound quality.  Clarity is much improved with this optical solution in place.

[charlesphoto]

@kennyb123

 

Thanks for this info. Ordered a pair and will see what they might bring (or take away) from my pair of opticalModules. 

[auricgoldfinger]

17 hours ago, kennyb123 said:

I just installed a pair of 10 db attenuators on the server side and a pair of 5 db attenuators on the other side. Treble is much improved though still a little hot on recordings that have that tendency anyway.  These are the attenuators:  https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B07R5D72JL/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_MM5hEbVX60JNC

 

What is the difference between the LC/UPC attenuators you bought and the LC/APC attenuators below?

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07B1KH6DX/?coliid=I4B8CAK6ZS4FP&colid=1O2O3N2HH23ZK&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

[charlesphoto]

Good question:

 

https://www.belden.com/blog/data-centers/upc-or-apc

 

The biggest takeaway is don't mix APC and UPC connectors. If you have standard OM1/UPC (orange) cable, then use the UPC attenuators. 

[lwr]

I’ve got a 35 foot cat8 run from my Cisco switch to my EtherREGEN that I’d like to replace with a StarTech optical modules, optical cables, and the appropriate attenuators.  I would greatly appreciate it if you would please provide the parts numbers I need to replicate your build.

 

Thanks

Wayne

[jcn3]

6 minutes ago, lwr said:

I’ve got a 35 foot cat8 run from my Cisco switch to my EtherREGEN that I’d like to replace with a StarTech optical modules, optical cables, and the appropriate attenuators.  I would greatly appreciate it if you would please provide the parts numbers I need to replicate your build.

 

Thanks

Wayne

 

Look at post 298 in this thread.

[lwr]

11 minutes ago, jcn3 said:

 

Look at post 298 in this thread.

Thanks!

[kennyb123]

2 hours ago, auricgoldfinger said:

 

What is the difference between the LC/UPC attenuators you bought and the LC/APC attenuators below?

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07B1KH6DX/?coliid=I4B8CAK6ZS4FP&colid=1O2O3N2HH23ZK&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

 

I just had to Google APC vs UPC.  Interesting:  https://www.belden.com/blog/data-centers/upc-or-apc

 

This helps:  "UPC connectors are blue while APC connectors are green."

 

The fiber optic cable that I purchased has blue connectors.  I would think that UPC would be the correct choice of attenuator for these.

 

Begs the question though if APC would be the better choice with the Startech SFPs because they have a 1550nm wavelength.  Per the article above APC is often the choice above 1500.

[auricgoldfinger]

19 minutes ago, kennyb123 said:

 

I just had to Google APC vs UPC.  Interesting:  https://www.belden.com/blog/data-centers/upc-or-apc

 

This helps:  "UPC connectors are blue while APC connectors are green."

 

The fiber optic cable that I purchased has blue connectors.  I would think that UPC would be the correct choice of attenuator for these.

 

Interesting.  Thanks!

[kennyb123]

Just now, auricgoldfinger said:

 

Interesting.  Thanks!

 

I'll continue to do some more digging into this and report back what I find.

[kennyb123]

3 hours ago, charlesphoto said:

@kennyb123

 

Thanks for this info. Ordered a pair and will see what they might bring (or take away) from my pair of opticalModules. 

 

I very much look forward to hearing your thoughts.  

[emailists]

 I have a metal connector Ethernet cables in and out of the ER.  I’m not sure if this is cat 6a - it was over a year ago since I bought them.  I replaced the short B side with a standard cat 5 and it diminished the sound quite a bit.

 

Also I have been playing with various footers and weights on the ER.  I found too much weight (about a 3 lb copper weight) made the sound a bit too controlled.  I placed various Starsound copper washers on the case and found an amount I felt was the best combo of control and bloom. I find the whole process quite like a black art where little makes Technical sense.

 

I also floated my tube preamp on active insolation platform that took the system to the next level (but not the same magnitude as the ER added)

 

I played some tracks last night i hadn’t heard since getting the ER (and preamp isolation) and was shocked by all the new things I heard and the level of realism and naturalness.  Just wow.  

 

[charlesphoto]

On 1/16/2020 at 11:16 AM, kennyb123 said:

 

I very much look forward to hearing your thoughts.  

 

Installed the -10db attenuators on the receiving opticalModule. Thoughts so far - this is yet another rabbit hole to go down! Might actually be worth starting a separate thread. Sound was a bit disconcerting at first - there's so much more detail, and the instruments have so much separation, I think it's taking my brain/ears awhile to adjust (burn-in so to speak). Bass doesn't seem as prominent, but on careful listening one can really hear the full tone of the bass, and really discern the instrument in space, and pick it out even when it's pushed back in the mix. In fact the same can be said for every instrument/sound. Closing my eyes and listen to "Cluster &Eno" and Harrison/Shankar's "Chants of India" last night was near psychedelic sounding, for lack of abetter descriptor. 

 

With all of that extra clarity, it did seem to lose some mids weight and musicality (toe tapping) but I'm thinking that's mostly a case, like I said, of getting used to all of the new detail. The big question is: how do different db attenuators sound, and would a better quality attenuator (say a Belkin) sound any better? Also, both ends vs just the receiving one? 

[stevebythebay]

1 hour ago, charlesphoto said:

 

Installed the -10db attenuators on the receiving opticalModule. Thoughts so far - this is yet another rabbit hole to go down! Might actually be worth starting a separate thread. Sound was a bit disconcerting at first - there's so much more detail, and the instruments have so much separation, I think it's taking my brain/ears awhile to adjust (burn-in so to speak). Bass doesn't seem as prominent, but on careful listening one can really hear the full tone of the bass, and really discern the instrument in space, and pick it out even when it's pushed back in the mix. In fact the same can be said for every instrument/sound. Closing my eyes and listen to "Cluster &Eno" and Harrison/Shankar's "Chants of India" last night was near psychedelic sounding, for lack of abetter descriptor. 

 

With all of that extra clarity, it did seem to lose some mids weight and musicality (toe tapping) but I'm thinking that's mostly a case, like I said, of getting used to all of the new detail. The big question is: how do different db attenuators sound, and would a better quality attenuator (say a Belkin) sound any better? Also, both ends vs just the receiving one? 

Yep!  Like diff in looking at Grand Canyon form a distance using binoculars versus with eyes wide open at the rim. 

[auricgoldfinger]

2 hours ago, charlesphoto said:

The big question is: how do different db attenuators sound, and would a better quality attenuator (say a Belkin) sound any better? Also, both ends vs just the receiving one? 

 

What about trying less attenuation?