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To extend Ethernet to remote location, are Powerline extenders or Mesh systems better?

I am trying to get Ethernet into a listening room that is not prewired, and it is not practical to run the hard cable through the old house into that room. I am planning to use a new music streamer that requires Ethernet connection (no wifi).

For hifi purposes, for passing the music signal, not just for computer equipment, are ethernet over powerline units better, or are wifi mesh router systems (which bring an ethernet port into a room using wireless transfer between the mesh devices) better?

For Ethernet over powerlines, I am worried about contaminating the power lines feeding the stereo preamplifier/amplifier, I don’t know if hifi power conditioners will filter out that super high frequency noise well enough.

For wifi mesh, it seems that the wireless handling of the music signal to feed the remote Ethernet port might somehow degrade the sound and introduce other problems that a connected wireline would avoid.

I am not a person that understands these technologies deeply, so I would value perspectives from others here who are users and who may be technically more qualified to understand this stuff.

troidelover1499
laps
88 posts
 

+2 on TP-Link (Deco).

jbs
90 posts
 

Another vote on a quality mesh wifi network. One key is to be sure the mesh device in the listening room has Ethernet out. Some do and some don’t. For example older google wifi pucks do but the new Nest ones do not. Avoid extenders (they just generally stink) and certainly any power line method. 

gdnrbob
4,408 posts
 

I used a Netgear (WNCE3001) to convert a wireless signal to ethernet for my Bluesound Node.

Worked like a charm.

Bob

fuzztone's avatar
fuzztone
5,496 posts
 

The Decos have integrated power warts. They don’t work without ’em.

 

troidelover1499 OP
253 posts
 

I suppose that to get a suitable music stream fed into my new Ethernet only network bridge device, a simple extender will do the trick. I think that device just sucks in the existing wifi signal broadcast by the main wifi router, and feeds it into an Ethernet plug. So basically, this is fundamentally using wifi to transfer the signal.

The mesh systems seem to set up an alternate, more powerful broadcast-and-receive setup using wifi also. Not sure if that’s on different frequencies than the basic repeater gadget above which simply sucks in the existing wifi signal. Yes I see that some of these mesh units give you an Ethernet jack at location B and some don’t.

As I understand it, the Ethernet over Powerline arrangement is totally different. It is a wired connection only (never goes through the air) but these EOP devices specially encode and then decode the signal so it rides on top of the 110 AC lines in the walls. So fuse boxes and other barriers can present obstacles for this ride-on-top signal to get from the transmitter to the receiver unit. I wonder whether this encoding/decoding process degrades the music being sent, AND whether running those signals on top of the AC power also dirties that power feeding the hifi gear which may be sensitive to it. So this introduces that new problem.

Seems like all CAN work but not sure which would deliver the best sound quality and least errors and most bandwidth.  And if the EOP dirties up the power to make the rest of the system sound bad.

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