[Moonglum]

I will be honest and state that I have never been fond of iFi's gadgets. I've tried a few over the years where I felt they decreased sound quality in one way or another. But I also know the audio world is extremely complex, and no 2 systems react the same. I am open minded enough to realize that what doesn't work for me may very well be great for others. That said, I ordered a Lan iSilencer just to try.

I do want to say that I run HQPlayer and an UP Board NAA. I recently went through hell trying to improve the sound of my network after finding out every network cable and switch sounds different. I even tried FMC's which was a total disaster even though many think they are great. It was quite the opposite for me, and I tried 3 different boxes, 3 different SFP's, and 2 different optical cables. They were all terrible sounding. So after all my testing, I ended up finding my existing CAT6 cables and network switch easily sounded the best to me. But I was still wondering about the possibility I had some sort of noise on my network. So why not try another iFi gadget?

I've been tweaking my system for many years. I have a sound that I am very satisfied with, but any real audiophile is always seeking "better." I also don't listen to headphones. I am a sound stage guy, and things have to sound realistic to me. I have spent many years tweaking the position of my speakers in my room. I am convinced I cannot do better, and the sound seems to show that.

I received the Lan iSilencer 2 days ago. From the first listen, I was shocked by what I was hearing. I thought my imaging and sense of depth and dimension was fantastic, but this was better. This thing is bringing more precise imaging than I've ever had. Everything is more defined in space and details are just more obvious. The bass has a little less bloat on bass heavy tracks as well. The perception of realism is significantly increased. For me, this thing is amazing.

I will also say that I have spent the last year and a half trying DACs, preamps, power supplies, cables, and network components trying to improve my sound. Everything I tried just made the sound worse. I am running exactly what I started with. The LAN iSilencer is the only thing I tried that actually improved anything in all that time.

For the record, my setup cost me about $19K if that means anything to anyone...

Precisely my experience and enhanced when I added a second one - first one went into back of router with cable going from router to switch; second one went into back of switch with cable into my Innuos server/streamer. Adding the second magnified the impact of the first. I honestly think this is one of the best value tweaks I’ve tried in a long time.

 

[chordguy]

Question for all you owners of the Lan iSilencer.
How do you ensure it is working correctly?
Are there any led's that should be lighting up?

I received mine this morning and I've it plugged into the back of my router and the lan cable going to my switch is plugged into it. I'm using it for streaming Netflix, Prime etc, I'm getting picture and sound ok so at least the data is going through the iSilencer.
The documentation supplied though seems to be for a USB device version as it mentions USB and the appropriate device seems to have two led's that indicate battery charge.
So it's confusing to me whether I just plug it in, (as I have), and expect it to work or should I see led's illuminating?

I've sent a ticket to Ifi support but I'm sure I'll get the answer here much quicker, especially as it's the weekend.

 

[mfdoom808]

Question for all you owners of the Lan iSilencer.
How do you ensure it is working correctly?
Are there any led's that should be lighting up?

I received mine this morning and I've it plugged into the back of my router and the lan cable going to my switch is plugged into it. I'm using it for streaming Netflix, Prime etc, I'm getting picture and sound ok so at least the data is going through the iSilencer.
The documentation supplied though seems to be for a USB device version as it mentions USB and the appropriate device seems to have two led's that indicate battery charge.
So it's confusing to me whether I just plug it in, (as I have), and expect it to work or should I see led's illuminating?

I've sent a ticket to Ifi support but I'm sure I'll get the answer here much quicker, especially as it's the weekend.

If you need an LED to tell if an audio device is working or not, maybe it doesn't make that much of a difference at all?

 

[Moonglum]

Tbh I haven’t looked because the impact on sound was so self evident that it was obvious it was working. Can’t see LEDs lit up on my one in my router - where are they located ?

 

[THUB]

Question for all you owners of the Lan iSilencer.
How do you ensure it is working correctly?
Are there any led's that should be lighting up?

I received mine this morning and I've it plugged into the back of my router and the lan cable going to my switch is plugged into it. I'm using it for streaming Netflix, Prime etc, I'm getting picture and sound ok so at least the data is going through the iSilencer.
The documentation supplied though seems to be for a USB device version as it mentions USB and the appropriate device seems to have two led's that indicate battery charge.
So it's confusing to me whether I just plug it in, (as I have), and expect it to work or should I see led's illuminating?

I've sent a ticket to Ifi support but I'm sure I'll get the answer here much quicker, especially as it's the weekend.

It's hard to see my leds, but I just used a mirror, and I saw an amber led lit up on mine.

 

[Moonglum]

It's hard to see my leds, but I just used a mirror, and I saw an amber led lit up on mine.

What is your unit plugged into

 

[THUB]

What is your unit plugged into

It's plugged into my UP Board NAA. The reason it's hard to see is that the LAN port is inverted, and the UP Board is double stick taped to the bottom of one of my audio rack shelves. It's completely out of sight. I had to use a mirror to see the side of the iSilencer that is up towards the bottom of the shelf. Nothing is streaming at the moment, but the UP Board and the iSilencer both had illuminated amber lights.

 

[chordguy]

From what I see in the manual provided, the led's are tiny and are placed on the top at the back of the device, where the lan cable plugs into the back of the iSilencer?
I see no led lights on, on my unit.

Looking at the start of this thread where Ifi announced the iSilencer the two led's seem to be showing green and yellow led lights and in the set up video, although later on when they show one in operation there are no led's illuminating.
All very confusing.

One other query, does the iSilencer require any 'break in' to reach optimum performance?

 

[Moonglum]

@iFi audio can you comment- I’ve spoken to some other people and there is variation- some say the two tiny LEDs on their units illuminate when in use and some like me and others report that they don’t illuminate yet i clearly hear an impact of the two units I am using- can
you comment and clarify under what circumstances the LEDs are intended to illuminate?

 

[THUB]

I'm listening to music and 1 led is on, and the other is flashing in use. I tried to take a pic, but it's not great with dim leds and a mirror.

 

[chordguy]

I'm currently streaming a movie in Netflix, neither of the two led's are illuminated.
I think Ifi needs to clarify this.

 

[Moonglum]

I'm listening to music and 1 led is on, and the other is flashing in use. I tried to take a pic, but it's not great with dim leds and a mirror.

It’s weird I just corresponded with another Innuos user and he has 3 of these in use and 2 have LEDs lit and one like mine does not

 

[VNandor]

Perhaps if someone could answer the following questions?

What measurement predicts soundstage depth, width and height?

What measurement predicts dynamics?

What measurement predicts timbre?

In this context, none of these things are properties of the sound. These are descriptors of perception of sound.
For example when you ask what measurement predicts dynamics you very likely don't mean what measurement defines the dynamic range of a sound (which can be measured easily), you probably mean what measurement predicts how dynamic a sound sounds to a person.
Timbre could mean the distribution of the harmonics which is a property of sound, but you very likely mean timbre as a reproduced sound having a realistic or plastic timbre.
One of these deal with sound the other ones deal with perception. Sound can be quantified/measured easily compared to perception of sound.

If you can’t actually say how what you’re measuring is representative of outcome, then you don’t actually know what you’re measuring.

Hopefully everyone knows here that a microphone measures pressure changes in air over time at a certain point in space. We know exactly what gets measured, still hard to predict how someone would feel about listening to the sound that got measured.

Dynamics is louds vs softs.

Something you might find interesting is that loudness is not a descriptor of sound, rather, it describes the perception of sound. How loud something sounds can't be calculated just from the sound as it depends on more than just how pressure changes over time. There are ways to quantify loudness but some models were derived from (scientifically rigorous) listening tests because again, loudness is not a quality of sound. Loudness can be measured in phons or LUFS for example but both of them are based on perception. Loudness can't be measured in SPL because SPL is a measurement of sound, and loudness is a measurement of perception. Loudness is one of the cases where perception of sound can be measured with some level of accuracy, but these models used for loudness are developed by smart people working together for years. We first thought of measuring loudness in the '30s and we didn't have a standard measurement of loudness till at least the '90s. And improved standards still came out long after that. Pretty long time for something seemingly so simple, right? It's just how it is when we have to deal with perception instead of dealing with sound.
The rest of the stuff you list, they are so complicated compared to the concept of loudness it's not even funny. I don't think they are going to get measured anywhere near as accurately as loudness can be for a long time.

Timbre is the harmonic content of an instrument/sound.

The way you describe timbre is at least a quality of sound but most people don't mean this when they discuss timbre especially on this forum. They say something have an accurate timbre, or a mellow timbre etc... in this context, timbre means how they perceive a sound, not the sound's harmonic distribution.



People often can't separate sound from perception of sound, sometimes they go as far as confusing sound with music, which constantly lead to misunderstandings. We can measure sound with extreme accuracy. Some microphones can detect changes of fractions of micropascals.
Sound is measured with microphones, not ears. Conversely, microphones don't measure music or our hearing and perception for that matter. Soundstage, loudness, etc do not propagate through air, it's pressure that propagates through air. Qualities like soundstage or dynamics can only be perceived by a person, and then we can maybe try our best to figure out what properties of sound play into our perception and how they do it. But that doesn't mean we can't measure "everything" about sound. Measuring that is hard because we know little about perception compared to what we know about sound.

I see that multiple people are suggesting that the literal dynamic range of a recording is a good way to tell if a recording sounds dynamic. Even the crudest dynamic range meters are more sophisticated than that. The simplest ones take the peak and the average levels of a recording and give you a number of how dynamic something sounds based on that. While that's already better than just taking the actual dynamic range/SNR of the recording, I think everyone who tested their music with these meters found some tracks that either didn't sound as dynamic as the meter would imply or it sounded less dynamic than what the meter told.

 

[AussieMick]

In this context, none of these things are properties of the sound. These are descriptors of perception of sound.
For example when you ask what measurement predicts dynamics you very likely don't mean what measurement defines the dynamic range of a sound (which can be measured easily), you probably mean what measurement predicts how dynamic a sound sounds to a person.
Timbre could mean the distribution of the harmonics which is a property of sound, but you very likely mean timbre as a reproduced sound having a realistic or plastic timbre.
One of these deal with sound the other ones deal with perception. Sound can be quantified/measured easily compared to perception of sound.


Hopefully everyone knows here that a microphone measures pressure changes in air over time at a certain point in space. We know exactly what gets measured, still hard to predict how someone would feel about listening to the sound that got measured.

Something you might find interesting is that loudness is not a descriptor of sound, rather, it describes the perception of sound. How loud something sounds can't be calculated just from the sound as it depends on more than just how pressure changes over time. There are ways to quantify loudness but some models were derived from (scientifically rigorous) listening tests because again, loudness is not a quality of sound. Loudness can be measured in phons or LUFS for example but both of them are based on perception. Loudness can't be measured in SPL because SPL is a quality of sound, not loudness. Loudness is one of the cases where perception of sound can be measured with some level of accuracy, but these models used for loudness are developed by smart people working together for years. We first thought of measuring loudness in the '30s and we didn't have a standard measurement of loudness till at least the '90s. And improved standards still came out long after that. Pretty long time for something seemingly so simple, right? It's just how it is when we have to deal with perception instead of dealing with sound.
The rest of the stuff you list, they are so complicated compared to the concept of loudness it's not even funny. I don't think they are going to get measured with anywhere near as accurately as loudness can be for a long time.

The way you describe timbre is at least a quality of sound but most people don't mean this when they discuss timbre especially on this forum. They say something have an accurate timbre, or a mellow timbre etc... in this context, timbre means how they perceive a sound, not the sound's harmonic distribution.



People often can't separate sound from perception sound, sometimes they go as far as confusing sound with music, which constantly lead to misunderstandings. We can measure sound with extreme accuracy. Some microphones can detect changes of fractions of micropascals.
Sound is measured with microphones, not ears. Conversely, microphones don't measure music or our hearing and perception for that matter. Soundstage, loudness, etc do not propagate through air, it's pressure that propagates through air. Qualities like soundstage or dynamics can only be perceived by a person, and then we can maybe try our best to figure out what properties of sound play into our perception and how they do it. But that doesn't mean we can't measure "everything" about sound. Measuring that is hard because we know little about perception compared to what we know about sound.

I see that multiple people are suggesting that the literal dynamic range of a recording is a good way to tell if a recording sounds dynamic. Even the crudest dynamic range meters are more sophisticated than that. The simplest ones take the peak and the average levels of a recording and give you a number of how dynamic something sounds based on that. While that's already better than just taking the actual dynamic range/SNR of the recording, I think everyone who tested their music with these meters found some tracks that either didn't sound as dynamic as the meter would imply or it sounded less dynamic than what the meter told.

This is an excellent post on many levels, not least of which is to point out the difference between sound measurement and perception. That gap, if I can call it that, is really important to understanding what measurements are being taken and how they ultimately impact what we perceive. It’s why it’s so important to use both - measurements to give us a general idea of how something might perform under certain conditions in combination with other gear (frequency response, THD, sensitivity, etc which is often an excellent way to begin shortlisting gear to audition) - and listening to prospective purchases to experience how we will perceive the rendering.
It’s precisely why my personal feeling is that one should never purchase on specs alone, and also one must acknowledge that there is a gap in understanding between what is measured and what is perceived. Nobody can get around the problem that perception must be taken into account.

 

[FauxReal]

When I say it’s not about bits, I mean that the noise devices such as this try to deal with has nothing at all to do with whether or not the data is transferred accurately. The noise from RF and EM doesn’t corrupt data.
However, this noise can and does affect analogue circuits further down the line, inside DACs, preamplifiers and power amplifiers. By attempting to eliminate such noise before it has the chance to enter the system at all, the thinking is that damage further down the line in the analogue circuitry is reduced.

I’ll say it again, there is no suggestion whatsoever that this type of noise is corrupting data. There’s really no such thing as a “digital only” system in audio. Music playing systems incorporating a digital source are always mixed signal systems. That’s why much of the sound of a DAC is the power supply and output circuits. There is always analogue alongside digital, and it’s the analogue parts that noise can be so detrimental for.
“Measured evidence” is never going to come from checking if the data has been transferred successfully.

Sure, there can be noise in the analog portion of the signal... after it is converted by the DAC. But that's not what this device is claiming to do. And if it is... it's placed in a section of the signal chain that makes no sense for its application. You're not going to get any extra noise out of the digital portion of the signal, so "cleaning up" ethernet makes no sense.