Wifi vs hardwired for streaming

@vicweast 

It is simply that a switch installed in exactly the same position as you suggest an FMC should be installed has a similar effect due to the galvanic isolation inherent in the switch circuitry design.

All switches are not the same. An audiophile switch is simply a better (ie. lower noise) one of these, perhaps adding less of its own noise back into the mix, being better shielded than a regular switch. It's all about noise, some choose fiber and an FMC before the streamer, some choose a switch before the streamer. It's absolutely nothing to do with the data in either case, both work, and some work better than others.

Hope this helps.

There’s no way WiFi can best a good cat8 ethernet cable.  1st and foremost is that there’s no dropout in a cable. 2nd is that there’s limited interference from outside sources if you’re using a well shielded cable, such as a cat8, in which each of the 4 pairs is shielded and then covered by an over-all shield (does required also using cat8 couplers). Because I have over 2 dozen competing close-by WiFi stations (SSIDs) next to my house, I dumped all my Cat6 STP and went cat8 and noticed an immediate improvement, even for my 1G connections. My streamer’s performance also drastically improved.

I should to note that I my house has a 10G backbone, a 5GB fios connection, and for its core there's a SonicWall TZ470 2.5GbE firewall, a Zyxel XS1930-10 multi-gig RJ45/SFP switch, and a Dell 8024F SFP-only switch. I run mm fiber between rooms at 1GB and use HP 1820 Office Connect switches as endpoiints.  And, of course, cat8 and mm fiber. For 1 and 10GbE fiber I’m using Finisar 10GbE SFPs and ipolex multi-gig RJ-45 SFPs. 

@pcolvin I agree that a wired connection is preferable, but this is not an ABSOLUTE statement.  It depends entirely on your gear and your environment.  I get EXACTLY the same low error rate and retransmission rate with both my eero mesh network (6 radio-routers in my mesh, line of sight between the long runs, and sparse channel usage -ie, ration congestion- in my rural location) --as I do with my cat 6 wired direct from the ISPs router in my home.  When I say exact, the numbers vary over time but statistically equivalent.  This is the ONLY factor I care about in the transmission of streaming data or any other internet usage, as the protocols take care of everything else.

The question here in this thread was "is one better".  Again, it will vary according to your network gear and your environment.  

I'll say again, "audio grade" is complete nonsense when it comes to networking.  You are overpaying for a lesser solution THAN an "air gap" or galvanic isolation just before the audio input.  

this subject has been covered ad nauseum here on this forum

just do a search

@vicweast You can’t even compare your Eero network to that average consumer, as most Eero packages are 3 units, and if they’re the dual-band units they can’t operate at full speed on all APs unless you run ethernet backhauls between them. Not sure what model you have, but an Eero Max 7 Tri-band WiFi 7 3-piece system, which includes an internal 6Ghz backhaul, sells for $1700, and are the size of Netgear Orbi’s. A Pro-6E set is $450 for 3, which means about $900 for 6, usually beyond the price point for the average consumer. 

The point I’m trying to make is that your mesh system can’t be used to as a comparison piece against  the results that the average consumer gets who may not have the wiring or the line-of-site availability. I know for a fact that a 3-set Eero can’t work in my house, unless I have 6 of them, because some of my internal walls were built with double-sided insulation (I’m now using TP-Link Wi-Fi 7 Decos).