Does a 802.11ac Wireless Network eliminates the need for a wired connection for media?

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Millemissen Posted: Thu, Aug 15 2013 3:15 PM

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The new wireless standart seems to solve the problem that many B&O users have when building a network for media.

Is that so in everyday life?

It is well known that Bang & Olufsen for quite a while has recommended a wired connection for the NL network and in general (gigabit/cat7). If a wired connection is not possible a Powerline solution might be usefull. 

In many cases and for different resons users do need the wireless connection - therefore this is also possible with most modern B&O products.

Many Playmaker-users have written about their bad experiences integrating this little brilliant device in their setup and network. And the Playmaker has sometimes been called the 'bad boy', even if the problems could/should be located elsewhere.

This article from Chris Connaker from the highly recommended 'Computeraudiophile' might give some insight and some inspiration to this question:

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/content/537-extending-audio-network-using-802-11ac-wireless/

Here is his conclusion:

"Wrap Up

Wireless networks are never as robust as wired Ethernet. Theoretical performance of wireless is always grossly inflated compared to actual performance in a real world application. In addition certain platforms perform differently when a wireless link is involved, as seen with my JRiver example. Advertised speed means very little. Period. That said a proper 802.11ac extended wireless network can meet the needs of many computer audiophiles. Streaming 24 bit / 192 kHz high resolution audio works well under the right conditions. If readers have the option of wired or wireless I still unequivocally recommend wired Gbit/s Ethernet because it always works and its speed is highly predictable. Those who have wireless as the only option will need to plan their networks carefully to get the most out of their music collections."

So how are your experiences?

Do you use wireless in your setup? With some or more complications - or none at all?

Do you - in case you have a NL network - use wireless connection in that too?

Greetings Millemissen

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Peter replied on Thu, Aug 15 2013 4:10 PM

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I find wireless next to useless as my walls are thick stone and it doesn't get through reliably. Absolute pain as obviously getting wires though is also a pain!

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rxcohen replied on Thu, Aug 15 2013 5:08 PM

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In general It does if you design the right wireless network. I work in networking and wireless networks are deployed in many, what is termed, mission critical applications (hospitals, retail, etc) with huge traffic requirements. I have also seen a trend in pure wifi deployments in large homes. 802.11ac will give you in real life about 700-800Mbps. The issue is that most people buy cheap access points and do not design a network (rather just place the access point anywhere), and second some devices deploy very cheap wifi chipsets. So to answer your question, based on experience 802.11ac can be used to eliminate cat7 (however at the end of the day you will need to connect these access points via ethernet back to a switch/router via ethernet). But you do need to make some investment in designing and deploying the network. And in the end you will need to have a wireless network setup in any case for your tablets, PCs, etc

Having said that I cannot comment on how good the wireless chipset on BO products is. I can say my BV11 is connected wirelessly and it works perfectly for streaming videos and music by itself or via AppleTV or via the DVD player, using either an Apple Time Capsule, and previously a Cisco 1040 Access Point (both 802.11n) on 5GHz channel. I have a challenging setup as my Access Point is just sitting on a desk in one room, and I have a lot of interference from metal all over the apartment, and also from other networks in my building (I pick up at least 20 networks in my building). I get about 70-80MBps with my 802.11n network, and it seems to handle my needs transmitting lossless music ripped from CDs. 

You cannot go wrong with cat7, but 802.11ac would definitely be viable for a media setup in my opinion. 

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Jeff replied on Thu, Aug 15 2013 5:56 PM

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I have a Netgear dual band wireless router that's capable of AC, but since most of my hardware isn't I'm running 802.11n. None of my devices, PC, iPad, iPhone, Panasonic TV, Oppo BluRay, or Playmaker seem to have a problem, I get reliable streaming of media and data to all of them. I stream Netflix and other HD video successfully, Playmaker so far plays nice with the network.

I suspect a lot of issues with wireless have more to do with interference between other networks and devices and such than the actual network standard, though certainly it appears that implementation of the standard among different vendors is anything but a "standard." That also leads to issues, I remember a few years ago a certain Intel wireless chipset in laptops that was hopelessly bad.

In my experience cheap wireless routers seldom work well in difficult, or even benign, environments. My life got a lot easier when I bit the bullet and bought up the food chain of routers rather than assuming all of them are the same and jumping on the cheap ones.

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valve1 replied on Thu, Aug 15 2013 6:21 PM

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I am in the wiring game. As I have exotic meters for dsl I can see exactly what is happening at all the connection points in a building. I would always go for hardwire option but as rxcohen says you must design your set up. I had a client recently how had a 1954 Ericson bakelite telephone on a dsl circuit and was wondering why the wireless was so bad. Nice phone for sure but not a good mix.