Bridging network interfaces

Yes: “sudo echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward” and you have yourself a router.

Any Linux distribution will support this (with the right drivers and a few additional packages installed), but it’s more complicated. Start here: https://wiki.debian.org/BridgeNetworkConnections.

Respectfully though, configuring your network interfaces in such a manner would be a monumental waste of effort.

ROCK does indeed do this.

If you want to attached a Roon Ready player to a second Ethernet interface you need bridging so both interfaces can use the same IP range, not routing where different ranges are required.

@agillis, why do you say that? Routing will work fine if there is no need to access the endpoint from outside Roon.

In fact bridging would expose packets from the outside to the bridged side, somewhat defeating the point of the isolation.

If your endpoint supports other protocols or has a web interface you would want access from the rest of the network.

A bridge uses mac address level routing so no packets come from the other side unless they are destined for the players mac address…

true, but at this point you really must ask why you are using 2 interfaces at all.

switches prevent that too… which is why this whole idea is a bit silly, but if you buy into it, you are being weary of all the other broadcast traffic on the network… smb, bonjour, etc…

Some people are seeing improved sound by using a bridged configuration. Silly or not in those cases it works.

It would be interesting to put the traffic through a sniffer to see exactly what is there.

on my network, its a bunch of SSDP and Bonjour discovery stuff from routers, cameras, control systems, etc… SMB/NETBIOS stuff, Plex stuff, Roon discovery packets, UPnP stuff from devices I have around the house that speak UPnP. Dropbox is pretty noisy too for their LAN sync stuff.

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Resurrection…

I’ve done this so know it works:

(Routing) Installed a second Ethernet port on my ROCK / NUC, using a USB>Ethernet dongle. After a restart (or was it a reboot, I don’t recall), you do see the 2nd Ethernet adapter on the ROCK configuration page. I configured that adapter to a different network (“main” net is a 172., I set this adapter up on a 10. network), then set my player (a DirectStream with Ethernet bridge) to a 2nd address on the 10. net.

Worked just fine, except, I was no longer able to see the DirectStream, which in my case was because I mis-configured the gateway address of the DirectStream. I wasn’t sure if this should’ve been the IP of the NUC but I’m guessing yes it was.

I haven’t tried, but may tonight, setting up the “internal” network (between NUC and DirectStream) for Bridging, using static addresses on my “main” 172. network.

@jon_michaels…Did you end up Bridging ethernet ports on your music server direct into your DirectStream DAC?

I have a DSJnr & looking to do the same but only if I it is stable, easy to set up with static IP, ROON “sees” my DSJnr as end point (zone) & there is a SQ improvement…otherwise, I’m not sure it’s worth it as I do use TP Link Media converters in front of the DAC to reduce RFI etc…

Cheers
Matt

BTW…there is a short video on you tube from the peeps at Small Green Computers discussing the SonicTransporter i7 with bridged ethernet.