Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming LAN isolator anyone?

Hello Ian,

yes my post was more basic not to much in detail.
What you telling is correct,simply look on the plug can tell you if the screening is there or not,BUT it doesnt mean(as you posted) that it is connected inside the equipment.
On the other side , to have a non-metall connector on a equipment, doesnt mean that the cable to that equipment is not shielded.The cable can get the shield from another equipment in the chain(the shield runs till the end of the cable).
The Giso have shielded connectors but different coupled to the earth refer their specs(arrow pointing to earth on one connector only).It is not galvanic connected,but would/could be a AC coupled/shielded.
The other story is grounding.
A equipment can have a shield,but no ground/earth.
Here in austria and also in germany the mains coming from the power station to the house and have 3 or one phase(hot) and one neutral(the second pole or cold).
INSIDE the house at the entry from the mains, the (protective)earth get connected with the ground.
Also the neutral at the power station is grounded,means its connected with the earth.
So the best thing(in theory) is to "suck" all noise away to the ground when the equipment has the proper design for that.
The shielding "receives" the electrical noise and protect inside the shield the other wires.The shield itself get grounded on the correct place where the resistance/impedance to earth is at minimum and the noise can flow down to the earth.
Doing that,the shield is a receiver/antenna for all the noise(have a greater potential as the earth/ground) and so the shield get "cleaned" and can not( in theory) transmit the noise.
A ungrounded shield protect the inner wires from outside, but can carry also a noisy shield to an "silent" equipment.
So the best way is to have a daisy chained shield that is very well grounded at on point.In the real world you have maybe different main phases and potentials as all other(non audio/PC) equipment is connected at the mains.
In my personal case i have a switch in my listening room and one cable go down to the router/modem.
The router/modem or the switch have only a two wire main plug(phase and neutral)and no metall surroundings/connections.
So to use shielded cables here without a possibility to ground the shield(no metall-plugs) have only a limited sense.
So in my case with a grounded 861 and ID40 card, the only place to ground the shielding is at the ID40 card where the network connector is connected with the earth(measured that).
So my newtwork cable is grounded then till the switch or GISO(when its in the chain.)
So the shield acts here to (very low)dampening the signal+noise inside along the cable and works outside as a faraday cage so nothing can go inside or outside.
All that in theory of coarse.
Turn the isolator and hear what sound best....