I had that dammed flu that is going around so did not get to do any comparative listening for a while. I did do some critical listening this weekend. The unit fully broke in as it was running a few weeks before I say down to listen. During that time, despite my flu, I thought that my system was getting better and better in fundamental ways. Turns out it was clear enough I heard the improvements grow over a week with the flu! And my experience has shown that the SmoothLAN needs some break in time. In fact in my swapping in and out during critical listening told me that it takes some time to cure every time its swapped to sound its best. I found long term swaps to be the most definitive, where I left it in our out for a couple of days, then switched. The difference was more dramatic.
So the meat of it is, it made more of a positive change than most of the individual things I've tried in my network, including adding a fiber bridge, adding linear power supplies to network switches and media converters and improving cabling.
One thing to note, this device only supports 100MB network speeds, so its throughput if you have a 1GB network, is slowed into whatever device it is connected to. It also shouldn't affect the rest of your network, just the device its plugged into. I don't think this is a problem for any music streamer. I initially set it up on my desktop PC and I did notice the slower network speeds when I was downloading or uploading large file sizes. But on my Innuos Pulsar streamer I tested it with every kind of high resolution file and it did not slow down playback of any of them that I could notice. I tried it on some files that were 2GB, and files that were 32bit/768Khz PCM, and DSD512. That should cover it. I wouldn't recommend it for a switch or something that has to move data/video around the home though.
Sonics
Lives up to its name! Overall the SmoothLAN increased resolution and smoothness. This means things that areas that were blurry or jagged disappeared and instruments, voices, recorded venue increased in density, detail, 3d rendering, and depth. While at first this seemed minor, more in depth listening showed that it revealed a lot of new information in recordings, and truly enhanced my enjoyment. I was able to turn up the volume a couple of clicks because of the reduction in distortion, this increased perceived bass, but also the bass had more depth and character, making each bass or drum sound more like itself, less generic.
One of the results of this was Big Tone on well recorded material. Things like violin and cellos, pianos shone through like golden sunlight hitting the forest floor. I felt like my system made a small step closer to master tape.
I have my own rating scale of 1-10 to judge sonics and value in my system. 5 means no change. 1-5 means worse. 5-10 is an improvement. Something that costs up to say $250 is worthwhile if it rates a 6 or above. Something that reaches 7 or higher would be worth $500 to $1500. Something that reaches 8 is $2,000 and above. I've never heard something that rated above 8
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I rated the iFi LAN Silencer around 5.8. At less than $100, that makes it a solid value!
I rate the Stack Audio SmoothLAN 7.6. At $250, its a stone cold deal, and well worth the effort. Seeing how there are tons of audiophile switches etc that cost north of $1,000 that I don't think hit the 7 mark, I think this speaks for itself.
