"Audiophile Grade" Ethernet Switches - The new generation

[octaviars]

If you look at Computer Audiophile where John Swenson writes about the upcoming UpTone "etherREGEN" this is what it is supposed to do more than moving 0,1 around.

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forum...ent=802257

The new switch does two main things:
1: blocks leakage current from upstream so no leakage current travels through the Ethernet cable to the renderer etc.
2: blocks clocking issues from upstream network devices and provides its own very low phase noise clocking on the "clean" port.
 
Because of the no leakage current on the downstream cable you don't have to worry about audio cables picking up noise from the leakage current. BUT the upstream cables still have leakage current running through them. Because of this it is a BAD idea to place the switch right in with your audio equipment. You want to keep it somewhat away from the audio system so noise from the upstream cable doesn't get picked up. Do not set this (or ANY) switch on top of your DAC etc.
 
You can use this as a general purpose switch to plug in routers, NAS etc and feed the clean port to the streamer, OR can use as a "clean up" device near the audio system with just one upstream connection and the clean connection. It's entirely up to you how you want to configure that. The extra ports are there to make it convenient for you to use it in many different configurations.
 
The added expense of the extra ports is quite small, so we decided that if we can fit them on the case somehow to go ahead and include them.
 
Why is the clean output 10/100 not gigabit? Because it is much cleaner to do so. A significant amount of jitter on a Ethernet cable come from noise on the power/ground (PG) networks inside the chip. The more stuff is going on and the faster it is doing it, the more noise gets generated on the PG network. Gigabit has way more stuff going on inside, thus generates a lot more noise, which causes significantly more jitter. By keeping it down to 100 the clean port has much lower jitter.
 
The SFP port is there because it is very easy to do and very cheap to add. Some people already have optical networks in their home, this just makes it a lot easier to use for them. There is no specific purpose for it, other than another "dirty side" port which makes it easier to use for some people.
 
Yes an LPS-1.2 can power it, but you have to be careful there. As with what I have been talking about in other threads, part of the leakage blocking needs a ground connection to the switch. The LPS-1.2 specifically isolates the ground so you will need another way to ground the switch. We will most likely be adding some form of grounding connection on the case for this purpose. The UASMPS provided with the switch already has the DC output grounded so no separate grounding needs to be done. The internal power network in the switch will be extremely good, the result is that there should be no advantage to using an LPS-1.2.
 
John S.