[matthewpartrick]

My assumption was no, but you know what they say about assumptions.  I wired my whole house with cat6 cable, and at the modem/router I sent a cat6 to a big powered switch with 16 ports, and then wired the rest of the house from that big switch. 

I recently added an Oppo SACD player, that turns out can do its firmware update via ethernet, and also weirdly with the new firmware update shows up as a Roon endpoint if it's hardwired into the network.  But--I also have this new Cocktail Audio streamer/DAC thingie and it also has a hardwire ethernet input.  So, if I add another Netgear powered switch with one input and two outputs, the input of which has already been split back across the house at the Modem, isn't this a bad thing?

Thanks in advance for the Computer Science 101 advice

[Rusty Jefferson]

Unless  you have an amazingly revealing system and also go through the expense and effort to install linear power supplies on your modem, router, and switches, as well as use Audiophile quality Ethernet cable, I think you'll be fine. I did a similar thing after running 2 Ethernet cables to the stereo from the switch and then a few years later needed 3. I added a small second switch at the stereo. No problems to date.

[zoom25]

What do you mean by a 'powered' ethernet switch? Are there 'non-powered' ethernet switches out there?

Initially I thought you were referring to powerline adapters, but I don't think that's the case.

For my audio network, I have all of the relevant and needed audio, NAS, and computing components connected to a single switch that is powered by a Teradak LPS. I use a 100 Mbps switch during playback (I have multiple gigabit as well that I use during transferring data).

You are free to use whatever switch you want and can easily have a few jumps between switches. Don't worry, your music will play just fine without any hiccups and all of your data will get there just fine. However, with respect to SQ, you may first have to experiment with whether making changes in the network layout makes any difference in your particular system or not. If it doesn't make any difference, use the setup that's most convenient.

[matthewpartrick]

Unless  you have an amazingly revealing system and also go through the expense and effort to install linear power supplies on your modem, router, and switches, as well as use Audiophile quality Ethernet cable, I think you'll be fine. I did a similar thing after running 2 Ethernet cables to the stereo from the switch and then a few years later needed 3. I added a small second switch at the stereo. No problems to date.

Excellent thanks!

[matthewpartrick]

What do you mean by a 'powered' ethernet switch? Are there 'non-powered' ethernet switches out there?

Initially I thought you were referring to powerline adapters, but I don't think that's the case.

For my audio network, I have all of the relevant and needed audio, NAS, and computing components connected to a single switch that is powered by a Teradak LPS. I use a 100 Mbps switch during playback (I have multiple gigabit as well that I use during transferring data).

You are free to use whatever switch you want and can easily have a few jumps between switches. Don't worry, your music will play just fine without any hiccups and all of your data will get there just fine. However, with respect to SQ, you may first have to experiment with whether making changes in the network layout makes any difference in your particular system or not. If it doesn't make any difference, use the setup that's most convenient.

I don't know of a non-powered either!  You are correct that I was not talking about Powerline products, of which I was not a big fan.  I will add the downstream switch and see what happens!

Thanks again folks.