My upgrade today. I closed all open inputs on the switch, modem and power station with the Audioquest RJ 45 caps.
I have the feeling that it causes less noise in the ethernet and the sound is more spacious.
Small thing with a big impact. Where dirt does not get in, nothing has to be filtered out and an Ethernet filter is no longer necessary. Has anyone else had experience with closing their entire unused inputs and outputs?
My wife has been nagging me, we will probably be going there later this year or in the spring. Thereās a lovely spa hotel called Forestis and great walking.
www.forestis.it
I wonderā¦looking forward to your future listening experience.
Have fun.
I have tried the RCA caps before, and found them actually made the SQ less vivid. Let us know how do these AQ RJ45 caps work in your system.
I have caps or epluggs on all open connections. The RJ45 were the last ones I missed. I feel the tone has quieter, more blackness and more hidden details. The layout and presentation of the stage improves slightly. Alive or calm? What you hear at the beginning, perhaps less vividly, is the lack of annoying overtones that soften the highs. I donāt hear a lack of liveliness. Ethernet is said to be the most prone to noise. Thatās why I would like to lay fiber optics up to the switch in front of the streamer. Iām going to keep listening to this and once without caps in a few days.
See what you hear without the cap in a few days. I do think the internet may be the best place to use the noise stopper. If it works I may give it a go too.
I mean ethernet, not internet above.
I had them on all unused RCA connections and one day, with nothing better to do, I removed all of them and came to the same conclusion as you. Havenāt used them since.
Tried them a year ago. RCA, RJ45, XLR out and in, HDMI and USB. All!
In my system they didnāt work, no improvements, no differences in sound, nothing. So I decided to keep them plugged just to protect components from dust.
A few months later Donald (if memory serves me well) suggested to me to remove them all and listen. He was right, I preferred a lot the sound without caps. Since then, they are collecting dust in a drawer.
If anyone interested here on the Forum I sell the entire set for only 100K euros, shipment included!
Sorry Stier2704, hope that you are more lucky in your system.
I will continue to listen to this with my caps on. If it doesnāt make a difference, they serve as dust covers. For RCA analog I have Epplugs reference and high end termination plugs. And on the CD transport an Epluggs XLR Digital. Are epluggs conspicuous? The caps will not produce such a noticeable effect. Luca and Donald, when you say with or without caps, there is a difference. Then they have to do something in one direction or another.
Yes I got that difference only after removing them all. Send me a PM, I would be happy to send them to you for free if you arrange the shipment, we live not so distant, you are based in Germany if Iām not wrong. If they work in your system Iām glad you can have all of my caps without spending money, my friend.
Hello Luca, Does that mean you had worse sound with the caps in your set? You have now replaced most of the components. Your CAD boxes will arguably have a bigger impact than caps. Today I borrowed 8 RJ45 caps for my switch and router to test. Iāll have to listen over the weekend to see if what I heard today is true. The bass seems a bit stronger, is the dynamic lost, or is the sound quieter? Today it seems to me that voices in duets are better separated. But it could also be my mood or receptiveness. Greetings Andrew
I had RCA and XLR caps on in the past, and after I removed them the SQ had better dynamic. I never had ethernet cap before so I do not know if they are more effective.
I told Luca to try without them since he had them on before. He agreed the system was sounding better without them too.
I could not perceive a loss of dynamics with the cinch and XLR caps in my system. In other words, do they even make a difference or do they just look good? There are differences in my epluggs terminators. Minerals, precious stones and, in the high-end variant, diamonds are also connected to the signal ground there. Similar to a mini floor box. I wonder what a 3M film is doing on the inputs. The Vortex does the same with its connector plugs. Or cheaper an EMI sticker for mobile phones? Maybe sticking some 3M on the plugs will helpā¦ When I put the RJ45 caps in the switch, I cap the connectors on my components and the RJ45 connector on my regenerator. At first I had the impression that the highs were muted. After two or three songs, there was no longer any noticeable dampening of the highs. The bass seemed a bit fuller. More separation and calm in the sound. In duets, the voices seem to have more space and air in relation to each other. I still have to check whether this impression is repeated or whether there is a placebo effect. Greetings Andrew
It has been a while since I took these caps out, and my system has gone through many changes. I might try them on again to see if I still feel the same.
By the way, I need to ship the Zenwave PSR demo cords to someone in TX, and I still need to wait another three weeks for my order. Dave has been slow in making them.
Oh thatās a Vmax experience, three weeks of bad sound. 
Dave does a cable burn-in though.
I can still be wrong, but I have the feeling that it sounds more spatial with the RJ45 caps. At least the caps havenāt gotten any worse.
Alight, Iāll order a set of AQ RJ45 cap to try. If they donāt hurt the sound theyāll keep the dust out at least.
For some units, use of caps is specifically not recommended, e.g., Jeff Rowland.
Unfortunately you were right. 
Without PSR-11 the SQ becomes sub-par. It is still enjoyable, but I need a bigger pour of whiskey to convince myself. My system just does not sound the same!
Probably arriving soon to do justice to my Vivaldi Apex dac;
Aurender W20SE with Wordclock input & dual AES output 
congrats. They look like a killer duo, not cheap thoughā¦
