I’ve just moved my iMac into the same room as my music system which includes a PS Audio Directstream DAC.
All musical components are on a dedicated electrical circuit. The music server and computer containing ROCK is in another room.
The iMac in the music room is not involved in anyway in the music system and is on a separate electrical circuit than the music system. The iMac is 8.5 feet away from my DAC.
Is there a downside to having the iMac turned on when I’m playing music? Is there a possibility of some kind of interference between the iMac and DAC? If so, what can I do about it.
Bill_Janssen
(Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)
5
Possibility? Sure. As the reluctant witness grudgingly admits on all those courtroom TV shows, “Anything’s possible, I suppose.” But it’s so wildly unlikely that I wouldn’t give it another thought. Consumer appliances are shielded and tested for interference.
That’s what I would have said before reading too many online audio posts. Here’s a quote from one such post:
“Noise from a PC could get into other electronics via radiated EMI/RFI which can go thru the air like radio signals”
I probably need to dial my paranoia back a bit.
Bill_Janssen
(Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)
7
Yep. Mainline audiophilia seems to be full of half-smart dudes repeating these myths and shibboleths that go back to the early days of radio, I’d bet. It’s almost like tribal identity mantras. Some graduate student in anthropology should really write a thesis. The snake-oil salesmen that infest the audio industry do what they can to keep those chants going, in order to sell pointless hardware at ridiculous prices.
And, you know, that statement you quote is technically true. But the key word there is “could”. As it turns out, it doesn’t. Because these devices are engineered to prevent that from happening.
And if you want to get overly paranoid (for no reason by the way), just start thinking about all those electrical wires running in the walls of your house, and all those radio waves traveling through your house from your neighbors WIFI, broadcast radio and TV stations, etc. etc. It becomes never ending if you want it to. But as noted, it’s not a problem.
My listening room is so quiet I can hear fans in laptops across the room. That’s the only reason I’d remove it is because the fan would be distracting to me. But, if its just sitting there idle in low power mode convection cooling itself I’d leave it alone.
Bill_Janssen
(Wigwam wool socks now on asymmetrical isolation feet!)
12
I also worry about rock formations underground with anomalous magnetic signatures, and every once in a while about whether the iron ore excavated to build the steel cables of the Brooklyn Bridge might have come from a site which was quantum entangled with the giant iron crystal thought to be at the center of the earth. I mean, that bridge is a lot of aligned steel; there most be some effect on the earth’s magnetic lines of force.
2 Likes
AceRimmer
(Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!)
13
My nuc running Rock sits in my audio rack right above my amp and below my Lumin T2.
Buggered if I can tell any difference from when I had a Roon core running on a PC upstairs.
And it is in a fanless case so never going to be worried by fan noise.
I would do that too, but there is no LAN in the room. I’d need to get a long cable to reach the switch in the next room. I will try that someday. But since WiFi sounds that good, I don’t feel the need to change anything. I do experience short dropouts sometimes, so I guess, Ethernet is the better way to go. To be honest, I’m rather sceptic about WiFi influencing sound quality. Could you ask someone in your house to switch it on and off every now and then without you knowing whether it’s on or not? That way you could verify your assumption.
