I have all my hi res music files and qobuz hi res streaming on my mac mini that is used as my core on roon. Can I send those audio files in hi res(24/192) to my oppo 205 or will they be reduced to cd quality since both my mac mini and my oppo 205 are on my local home wifi network?
The short answer is, maybe… You can easily stream a single stereo Hi-res audio stream over a standard Wi-Fi network. I do it to my Kef LS50W endpoints. However… my core (MAC-Mini) is hard wired to my router.
A single stereo 192/24 PCM stream has a data rate of just over 9.2 Megabits/sec.
If your core is connected wirelessly, and you are playing music from Quobuz, you need to have capacity for three stereo streams at once just to play to one end-point, so you’re now talking 27.6 Mbit/sec. (3 streams needed because your core has to receive the Quobuz stream from the internet, then send it back to your router, then the router has to send it on to your Oppo.
Since 2003, wi-fi has been able to deliver up to maximum of 54 megabits/sec, with a more typical throughput being about 25 Mbit/sec.
The most modern routers (Wireless ac) can achieve up to 248 megabits/sec with a typical throughout of 74 megabits/sec.
Environmental factors play a part however and if there are walls in the way, other streaming going on, neighbours with their own routers, even a microwave running nearby, all these things can affect whether you will get away with it.
I know for a fact if I disconnect my core from Ethernet and use wireless for the core as well as the endpoint, I get stuttering with hi-res files. It’s due to 3-way traffic rather than one-way traffic.
So… I just have my end-points wireless.
The stream won’t be reduced to CD quality, it’ll just stutter if there’s a problem.
If you want to, you could manually reduce the stream to CD quality using the sample rate converter in Roon DSP, then you’d probably avoid stutter, but… you’d be in CD quality then.
Thanks Dan. I think to play it safe I will use a wire connection for my mac mini. The thing is my mac is in my office in a room where another computer uses the wire connection for my work at home. Do you think it would be ok to use a powered ethernet splitter for both my mac and the work computer and still achieve a better wired network versus the wifi setup?
Dan, I forgot to mention that I have 1 gig internet download speeds and 50 meg upload for the wired portion and I use eero routers throughout the house that usually max out at 300 meg download speeds and 50 meg upload speeds. Thanks.
Yep… even a cheap powered Ethernet hub will do and be better than Wi-Fi for your core.
Sounds like your internet connection is plenty good enough to get a number of different streams from Quobuz at the same time if that’s what you needed.
Technically speaking, its an Ethernet Switch. I’m not sure they make Ethernet Hubs anymore.
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My bad… it’s called a switch. 
Anyway… any cheap Ethernet switch should be fine.