Lumin U1 Network Error

[Runbob]

Hello,

I’m new to this site and have been happily using a Lumin U1 for 3 weeks. I have had no issues until today.

I just did the 13a Release update and all morning I started getting a network error.  Not sure if these things are connected.

i connect to the internet with a ZyXel PLA6456 power-line Ethernet adapter.  It has worked perfectly until today.

I restarted the router, switched ports and restarted the Lumin with no success.  Any suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

@wklie have you seen this before?

[Runbob]

No.  Do you think I should post my question there?

[The Computer Audiophile]

6 minutes ago, Runbob said:

No.  Do you think I should post my question there?

I asked Peter from Lumin, thus the reason I use the @ and his user name on the site. Please wait for him to respond. 

[One and a half]

Does the Lumin app detect the U1? I thought the app needs to be upgraded for v13x as well, perhaps look at this.

 

Might be inconvenient and ugly, for test only, perhaps wire the U1 direct to a switch or router nearby to bypass the power line adapter, then restart the U1.

 

Network error pops up briefly during Lumin start up and becomes the complete circle on the display for ready operation.

[wklie]

8 hours ago, Runbob said:

i connect to the internet with a ZyXel PLA6456 power-line Ethernet adapter.  It has worked perfectly until today.

I restarted the router, switched ports and restarted the Lumin with no success.  Any suggestions?

 

Is the Lumin connected to the network switch?

 

Power off everything including the network router, switches, powerline adapter, Lumin and iPad.  Please use a different network cable to connect to a different port of the switch (or to the router).  Power on everything.

 

Observe whether the network LEDs on the Lumin unit and the network switch port flash normally.

[wklie]

4 hours ago, One and a half said:

Network error pops up briefly during Lumin start up and becomes the complete circle on the display for ready operation.

 

A momentary Network Error on power cycle means the time required for getting an IP address from DHCP server exceeds a predefined time limit.  This is harmless.

[Runbob]

I got it working!  My son had connected a third ZyXel to a power strip (They say to plug it directly into an outlet.). Once he unplugged it and  I pressed the sync button on my ZyXel it worked.  Hopefully no more issues.  By the way, I love the U1. I use it with a Benchmark 3 HGC DAC.  It sounds amazing.  Thanks for the advice. I was going to try your suggestion next.

[One and a half]

5 hours ago, Runbob said:

I got it working!  My son had connected a third ZyXel to a power strip (They say to plug it directly into an outlet.). Once he unplugged it and  I pressed the sync button on my ZyXel it worked.  Hopefully no more issues.  By the way, I love the U1. I use it with a Benchmark 3 HGC DAC.  It sounds amazing.  Thanks for the advice. I was going to try your suggestion next.

Glad to see the U1 is working again. Two changes at the same time, one suspects the worst.

 

Enjoy the U1, my unit is now 2 1/2 years in service and since March 2020 with the X1 PSU. No faults during this time. Firmware updates are easy and quick, Lumin stay on top of latest developments, with one exception being HQPlayer's NAA, which I suspect is more of commercial decision than a technical one. There are many sources that can work with the Lumin, right now experimenting with Audirvana 3.5x, a few bugs to unravel compared with Roon, the lure is better SQ with the former. All good fun.

 

The network in front of the Lumin is very important, the least amount of traffic, direct connections, cabling, earthing do influence the sound, the resolution on the Lumin is that good, all measures can be heard good and bad, goes without saying, one change at a time recommended!

[Runbob]

Thanks One and a Half.  Do you think the ethernet cable from the powerline adapter in the room to the U1 makes a difference if the cable going through the house to the router is just basic stuff?  If so, what do you recommend?

[One and a half]

3 hours ago, Runbob said:

Thanks One and a Half.  Do you think the ethernet cable from the powerline adapter in the room to the U1 makes a difference if the cable going through the house to the router is just basic stuff?  If so, what do you recommend?

Not a simple chore, am still planning myself. A lot of people have success with powering routers and switches with a linear power supply, the Uptone EtherRegen is effective for blocking out noise from the network, so the expense of the linear power supply for infrastructure may not be needed. Added extras like the JCAT Net Femto also make a great difference. 

 

I prefer STP over UTP Ethernet cabling, but the grounding of the source and the sink when distances are involved is complex issue as it can create more problems. Then there's branded cabling choices. 

 

Still early days yet with changes to the network, sounds good though for the time being!

[Superdad]

16 hours ago, One and a half said:

The network in front of the Lumin is very important, the least amount of traffic, direct connections, cabling, earthing do influence the sound, the resolution on the Lumin is that good, all measures can be heard good and bad, goes without saying, one change at a time recommended!

 

Hi Gary:

I have to agree with you there, and I wish I knew why the Lumin units can be so fussy about their network connection.  We are approaching 1,500 EtherREGENs in the field and of the small handful of people who experience (generally solvable or random) connectivity issues I'd say about 1/3 of them are from Lumin users (all different models).

Many I should connect with @wklie and offer to send him a unit to test.

--Alex C.

[wklie]

Nowadays we test every Lumin unit we ship with a Cisco switch.

 

A Network Error at Lumin boot time can mean one of the two things: an Ethernet link is not established (usually the network port hardware LED does not flash), or timeout from getting an IP address from DHCP server.

 

After Lumin is successfully booted up (i.e. already got an IP address from DHCP), a Network Error merely means a physical link down.  Unplugging the network cable will also cause this.

 

After successfully booting up, Lumin requires multicast traffic to be supported in the network.  The UPnP (MinimServer) server, Roon Core, iPad, etc. must reside in the same subnet.  Managed switches and corporate grade routers tend to cause problems with multicast in their default configurations, in a few cases it is unsolvable until an umanaged switch is inserted.  Some WiFi routers also separate each WiFi device from the network in the name of AP Isolation, or block multicast, these all can cause problems.  Some routers also misbehave after handling a few months of multicast traffic and need to be rebooted periodically.

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, Superdad said:

 

Hi Gary:

I have to agree with you there, and I wish I knew why the Lumin units can be so fussy about their network connection.  We are approaching 1,500 EtherREGENs in the field and of the small handful of people who experience (generally solvable or random) connectivity issues I'd say about 1/3 of them are from Lumin users (all different models).

Many I should connect with @wklie and offer to send him a unit to test.

--Alex C.

Hi Alex, as far as I know, during the bootup process, the Lumin looks for a DHCP host, obtains the credentials/IP address and that's about it. I've set the NIC speed at the Music Server end to 1 Gb/s and just now tried 100 Mb/s, working normally. There's that lease expiry time which could cause drama, but have not experienced this with the Lumin on for many weeks at a time. 

The requirement for the DHCP is easy enough to understand, a Lumin needs to be on the same network as the control unit, whether uPNP server, or Roon, which is understandable. If the control unit is lost however, under Roon, the Lumin keeps playing uninterrupted.

 

If @wklie is OK with trying the EtherRegen, what's to lose?

[Superdad]

11 minutes ago, wklie said:

A Network Error at Lumin boot time can mean one of the two things: an Ethernet link is not established (usually the network port hardware LED does not flash), or timeout from getting an IP address from DHCP server.

After Lumin is successfully booted up (i.e. already got an IP address from DHCP), a Network Error merely means a physical link down.  Unplugging the network cable will also cause this.

 

Hi Peter:

Thank you for your reply.  I just now took another look through our support cases with Lumin users. Wish I could find a pattern and post something typical, but all these people have various complicated systems--with cables, switches, servers, power supplies, and Roon, etc. 

Most all have found stability and are working now. If there is one common thread it seems to be that loss of connection (which I know could be caused at either end--with the EtherREGEN just the poor switch in the middle) occurs after some idle time of the Lumin unit. So I don't know what happens there.

 

The other thing that happens is with Roon--and not just with Lumin users--is that Roon seems to always be polling for the endpoint, and if some other network traffic causes just a little extra delay (of the endpoint responding--through latency of our EtherREGEN) that it is still there, Roon will report that the endpoint is gone. Usually having the user connect the Roon Core server directly to one of the other 'A' side ports of the EtherREGEN takes care of the matter.

 

If we do find some pattern or have some solid questions or something for you to test, then I will get in contact with you directly.

Many thanks again.  We have admired your fine products for years--and we have quite a few mutual customers.

Best wishes,

--Alex C.

[wklie]

Yes, Roon cares about network timing, deeply.  With the EtherRegen, since your 'A' side operates at 1000Mbps but the 'B' side at 100Mbps, I don't know how this affects Roon network timing.

 

A tip I can offer for Roon network diagnosis: I suggest to reboot the Roon Core and all Roon endpoints on every network change.  If that does not work, reboot everything starting from the router / WiFi access points / switches / powerline adapters.

[One and a half]

2 minutes ago, wklie said:

Yes, Roon cares about network timing, deeply.  With the EtherRegen, since your 'A' side operates at 1000Mbps but the 'B' side at 100Mbps, I don't know how this affects Roon network timing.

FWIW, the JCAT Net Femto card in the Music Server has two ports. One faces the network at 1Gb/s, the other to the U1 at 100 Mb/s. No issue, but that's a standard i315 NIC.

[wklie]

1 minute ago, One and a half said:

 the U1 at 100 Mb/s

 

But the U1 has a 1000Mbps network port.

[One and a half]

6 hours ago, wklie said:

 

But the U1 has a 1000Mbps network port.

Only been a few hours, at 100 Mb/s, music is coming through OK at DSD128. Just trying to emulate if an EtherRegen is in circuit as close as I can.

[matthias]

49 minutes ago, One and a half said:

Only been a few hours, at 100 Mb/s, music is coming through OK at DSD128. Just trying to emulate if an EtherRegen is in circuit as close as I can.

 

With top equipment the EtherRegen has best SQ when using the A-side only, so staying with 1Gbps.

 

Matt

[Superdad]

6 hours ago, matthias said:

With top equipment the EtherRegen has best SQ when using the A-side only, so staying with 1Gbps.

 

Hi Matt:

Please do not spread that as a rumor. The only folks who seem to like to stay on the EtherREGEN's 'A' side (not crossing our active differential isolation and rechecking moat to 'B' side) have been a few owners of the $25K-$30K Taiko Audio Extreme--and they are using the SFP port on the 'A' side for optical connection to their Taiko.

 

We have a great many dCS DAC owners (both Rossini and Vivaldi) enjoying their EtherREGEN's A>B (or B>A; other than number of ports and speed our piece is symmetrical performance-wise for data/clocking/power on both sides). If those DACs don't qualify as "top equipment" I don't know what does. Also Lumin users, to be on topic here. 

 

Of course people are free to utilize the EtherREGEN in whatever ways work and sound best for them. A careful examination of the technical highlights of just the 'A' side reveals our design to be quite advanced and focused on performance for audio systems.

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

[matthias]

24 minutes ago, Superdad said:

 

Hi Matt:

Please do not spread that as a rumor. The only folks who seem to like to stay on the EtherREGEN's 'A' side (not crossing our active differential isolation and rechecking moat to 'B' side) have been a few owners of the $25K-$30K Taiko Audio Extreme--and they are using the SFP port on the 'A' side for optical connection to their Taiko.

 

We have a great many dCS DAC owners (both Rossini and Vivaldi) enjoying their EtherREGEN's A>B (or B>A; other than number of ports and speed our piece is symmetrical performance-wise for data/clocking/power on both sides). If those DACs don't qualify as "top equipment" I don't know what does. Also Lumin users, to be on topic here. 

 

Of course people are free to utilize the EtherREGEN in whatever ways work and sound best for them. A careful examination of the technical highlights of just the 'A' side reveals our design to be quite advanced and focused on performance for audio systems.

 

Cheers,

--Alex C.

 

Hi Alex,

 

the EtherREGEN is a great product for sure, some like it more using the A-side only, some like it crossing the moat.

But preferring the A-side only and copper to copper is not limited to Extreme owners:

 

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/taiko-audio-sgm-extreme-the-crème-de-la-crème.27433/page-177#post-644922

 

BTW, I should have said "top servers", not "top equipment".

My impression: The better the server the more liking for the A-side only.

 

So I would be happy to get a version of the ER with the technique of the A-side only, maybe not just me. 🙂

 

ATB

 

Matt

[JMellin]

Hi I saw this thread troubleshooting my LUMIN and etherregen combination.

 

 I have run my LUMIN U1 Mini for 7 months without any glitches.

 I have used a small Cisco switch, but before buying the Etherregen I wanted to try 100mbit connection to LUMIN, so I connected a managed fortinet switch for 100mbit. Ran it for a week or so without problems.

 

With the Etherregen connected with LUMIN at B side it usually works fine (and sounds awesome), but if I leave in alone not playing for an hour I loose app connection.

It seems lite it get stuck in different ways. Sometimes it will wake up by just by remove and insert network cable in LUMIN. Other times that won’t do, I have to reboot Etherregen. Today I had to reboot both at the same time, never needed that before.

 

To be clear I can enjoy hours connected at B side, but being left alone for awhile  it will disconnect somehow.

restarting apps doesn’t help.

 

Now I have had to connect my old Cisco switch to B side 100mbit and LUMIN to Cisco switch at 1000mbit.

This sound better than everything at A side but very suboptimal 😉

 

If I have time I would connect to managed switch and span a port for wireshark analysis but I would of course prefer if there is a known solution. (Full time working Father of three kids under 6 years 😙)

 

kindly 

Johan

[wklie]

On 12/2/2020 at 6:28 PM, JMellin said:

I have had to connect my old Cisco switch to B side 100mbit and LUMIN to Cisco switch at 1000mbit.

This sound better than everything at A side but very suboptimal 😉

 

 

This is NOT suboptimal, you are getting the full benefits of it.  The EtherREGEN is symmetric.

[JMellin]

Agreed 😆

 

I tested to swap sides on the switch so that the 100mbps port now face the internet side, first impression was good. No lockup’s or strange App behavior.

Then I tried replacing the borrowed $800 RJ45 for an all plastic one 1/100 of the price and everything came together, details, scene but most important very engaging presentation.

 

Maybes  I’ll try another switch at some point