RexrothPigeon
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Wifi VS Ethernet for streaming quality
- Thread starter Indydan
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Digital_Thor
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Well.... That's one way to look at it... But most devices needs power anyway... So you aren't getting rid of all the cables that easily, so why not make them look good or organize them neatly?
Besides, as already mentioned, depending on your specific needs and likes, chose either or both options respectively. I use both, because it's very easy to hide a cable along my panels for my streamer, but of course my phone - which I control my streamer with - definitely is wireless.... Unless it needs charging
I would try a ethernet cable for a period of time to test if its your building's internet connect or a wifi issue. If you still get issues over ethernet then not much you can do, it's building internet. However, if ethernet fixes it, it would suggest your wifi is your problem, and plenty you can do.
If it's wifi, switching from 2.4 to 5 GHz might help? Or switching wifi channels? Or disabling 5 GHz and only using 2.4 (or vice-versa)... Or even getting a smarter router, something like Ubiquiti has intelligent wifi channel scanning.
RexrothPigeon
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The fewer cables you have, the easier it is to neatly organize them
RexrothPigeon
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Wireless charging is a beautiful thing
Digital_Thor
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Indeed it is. Though, I also believe that you have to consider simplicity, and a cable is just so very simple compared to WiFi.
Quite a few I know, have several annoyances WiFi 'falling' out, disconnecting and being way slower than cable, depending on placement and the materials of the walls surrounding the router and receiver. This often result in the need for an extension cable to move the WiFi receiver 2-5m away from the PC, to have a better signal, and then WiFi suddenly seems like a bad option, unless a cable between the PC and router is very difficult or visibly obstructive.
But I agree, that with most quality products and proper setup, a WiFi connection can work well enough, and with streaming audio, we need much less data than with 4K tv, for example.
Neither at that location, it's in a forest, tree cover pretty much eliminates StarLink (both there and my home in the City [you cannot locate either place using google earth maps, they both just appear as a field of green [at my city home you can see all about 2/3 of my neighbors homes with Google Earth]) but mine is part of the 1/3 that you cannot see from above.
At the city home, I use a WiFi to cell tower phone # cannister antenna. It works fairly well but is no speed demon.
We haven't (at my wife's suggestion) had a TV since we were living in Saipan & Guam in 2007. So we do not stream.
I have a TECHNICS SL-M3, an oppo 205 UDP, a 32" Samsung monitor for the desktop in the City and a DUAL 1229, SONY 500 CDR & a CD/Blu Ray/4K capable laptop with internal drive & HDMI out at the pictured location.
I've got around 600 albums and about the same amount of CD's, DVD's, Blu Ray & 4K disks.
I probably won't get to them all again within my lifetime, so...
My wife & I travel too much. We expect to be out of the country again for 5 months this year.
When I was younger I made 9 trips to Europe.
In 2001, I told my parents that I'd be gone a couple of years: after 14 trips through the Panama canal and getting married (the first and only time: at the age of 48) in Saipan in 2005, I finally came back (with my wife) in 2018.
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RexrothPigeon
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I think our experiences do not align. My experience is that wifi is vastly more simple than cables, which can get in the way, become unplugged, collect dust, etc. My wifi never disconnects, maybe you live in a developing place with poor internet or perhaps you just have an obsolete router or internet supplier? This stuff about wifi receiver's proximity to a PC is completely alien to me, never heard of such a thing much less experienced it.
Don't mix up poor internet with wifi issues, very difference problems.
AnalogSteph
Master Contributor
You're clearly not living in the equivalent of a concrete bunker then. I've had to deploy an auxiliary accesspoint to the furthest room in my not very big office which would have had marginal coverage (even on 2.4 GHz) otherwise, due to both signal strength and outside networks (urban area). The signal would have to travel kind of a J- or U-shaped path otherwise, which is not helping.
Side note, the more recent WiFi standards are optimized for progressively smaller cell sizes at 5 GHz. In order to get the most out of them, you almost need one AP per room. The power consumption of those adds up, too. I would make sure that high-priority areas have got one nearby at least (as in 2-3 m tops).
RexrothPigeon
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True, I just live in a normal home in a big city, pretty modern apartment I guess, no bomb-proofing or armor or anything
You can have bad hardware too. I have a Denon DRA-900H that fell flat on its face on WIFI. Roku could stream 4K all night while the Denon would work for a while but then start skipping and even stop. Fortunately putting it on the LAN fixed the issue.
I reco spending the little more, for future proofing.
The added cost will be a small fraction of the job total.
In my case having drywall patched and a proper paint job was 70+% of the job, the labour of pulling the cable was 20%, total materials was under 10%
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My Tri-band WiFi 6 router is located inside a 1200 sqft concrete basement under a larger single story main floor. That one unit easily covers both spaces as well as 20 feet out into the yard with a strong enough signal to support Qobuz streaming. While being closer to the router can offer higher speed benchmarks, for normal audio playback you can only tell there is a problem if range is exceeded. They offer multiple WiFi units using a Mesh network but as one unit provided adequate coverage I never added more.
I previously had a Linksys 8300 WiFi router that offered as little as 20% of the speed in a direct comparison, and it could not reach some areas of the home. The age and quality of the WiFi router makes a HUGE difference in wireless signal strength.
In addition, the WiFi receiver on your computer, TV, and audio gear can limit range and performance. If it's up to date with WiFi 6 capability the user will likely experience few connection issues. My six year old 65" TV works great but the WiFi receiver was showing its age. Adding an Apple TV 4K 128GB upgraded it's WiFi capability to match the Tri-band WiFi 6 router.
While dense building materials can make a difference in WiFi signal, the WiFi router technology improvements available in the last few years are massive. Just as SSD brought ultra fast copy sessions to our computers, WiFi 6/7 removes most traditional connection barriers of the past. Cutting the cord has never been simpler. If you want maximum speed and range WiFi 6/7 routers and receivers will be required.
I previously had a Linksys 8300 WiFi router that offered as little as 20% of the speed in a direct comparison, and it could not reach some areas of the home. The age and quality of the WiFi router makes a HUGE difference in wireless signal strength.
In addition, the WiFi receiver on your computer, TV, and audio gear can limit range and performance. If it's up to date with WiFi 6 capability the user will likely experience few connection issues. My six year old 65" TV works great but the WiFi receiver was showing its age. Adding an Apple TV 4K 128GB upgraded it's WiFi capability to match the Tri-band WiFi 6 router.
While dense building materials can make a difference in WiFi signal, the WiFi router technology improvements available in the last few years are massive. Just as SSD brought ultra fast copy sessions to our computers, WiFi 6/7 removes most traditional connection barriers of the past. Cutting the cord has never been simpler. If you want maximum speed and range WiFi 6/7 routers and receivers will be required.
Digital_Thor
Addicted to Fun and Learning
We have places here in Denmark with armed concrete, metal doors and alu foil isolation, that will also kill even a cell phone signal to the point where communication via speech is impossible.
Also WiFi can degrade to half or 1/3 of the speed over a distance of 5-7m, since not everyone has top notch equipment.
The few that have WiFi 6 mesh are getting better... But it still varies quite a bit. My now old Asus rt66ac router starts to struggle a bit now. Even at 4m in a direct open line, I have way less than optimum speed.
But good for you that you live in great surroundings all the time
By the way... I've never had a cable fail
And don't get me started on wireless printers
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