Optimal lengths for USB and Ethernet cabling for digital audio


Hello, I have learned over the years that for coax digital cables, like those with RCA or BNC ends should be 1.5-2 meters in length to avoid some digital reflections being transmitted. Does this apply to USB cables and Ethernet cables that carry music in data form when a person uses those types of cables from network to DAC or streamer or from a streamer to DAC?

It seems to me the USB or Ethernet cables have more specific wires in them, and they carry power and computer communications data in those wires along with the digital music signal, but that may be, they still carry the music that will be decoded later.

troidelover1499

With usb I found 1 1/2 M better than shorter.  With ethernet I did not find there was a difference.

I’ll just say I was gonna go with a shorter Ethernet cable to save $$$ but heard it’s better to keep streamer further away from DAC so I went with 1.5m.  So, not so much the cable but the potential noise from the streamer being 5he problem.  Seems like USB less susceptible to noise but look for a cable that physically separates the data and power conductors to avoid transfer of noise.  That’s all I got. 

I have directly compared in my system two pairs of USB cables of two different brands, each pair consisting of a 1m and a 2m cable. In both cases, the shorter cable had richer, more seductive midrange while the longer cable had stronger and more impactful bas, (very) slightly more emphasized highs (or, rather, the cymbals seemed to have better contour and thus were more distinct in the mix) and in general sounded tighter, more organized. I preferred the longer cable in both cases, in one of them even by a long margin. As a side note, this seems to be a typical impact of the cable length, at least in some cases (USB and power cables? shielded cables? I don’t know) because I have discovered more or less the same effect when comparing a couple of otherwise identical power cords of 1m and 2m respectively.

USB 1.5m with seperate output tails, most DACs don't need USB power so tape over pin 1 in the output power tail, or pin 1 if it's an ordinary single cable.

USB cables offer two way communication so length is an issue.

My system uses Ethernet cables between 0.4m and 1.2m, shorter seems better but I haven't done any critical experiments.

I don't recall reading anything about reflection issues with ethernet or usb cables. Makes sense ethernet cables should be shortest possible to minimize rfi, although can still get in through connectors. For usb, seems 1.5m is pretty much standard length used, I've never deviated from this length.

 

As far as ethernet vs cable provider coax, I've found moving cable modem close to system via longer coax/shorter ethernet far preferable to shorter coax/longer ethernet. Another advantage is one can afford much better quality ethernet cable, 1 or 1.5m AQ Vodka vs aprox. 18m price, forget about it.