Every AV professional wants to deliver an incredible listening and viewing experience. Most assume the biggest factors are the displays, speakers, source components and Internet service package. But some dealers and distributors have recently discovered that something as simple as the router can make a surprisingly large impact on streaming performance.
How modern streaming works
For both audio and video content, today’s streaming services, such as Netflix or Apple Music, keep multiple versions of the same video or audio track encoded at different bitrates, reflecting quality levels, and broken up into smaller pieces, which the services swap between based on available bandwidth at the customer’s end (a process known as Adaptive Bitrate Streaming (ABR)).
Why that matters
Streaming video or audio is essentially a constant, heavy stream of data packets flowing to your AV gear via the router. Packets-per-second determines how fast the router can process, inspect, and route that data.
You need both a lot of bandwidth to accommodate the raw size of the video stream, and a router with high packets-per-second performance to process the flow of those packets. If the router can’t keep up, it creates a bottleneck that can lead to dropped packets causing buffering, pixelation or stuttering.
With higher bitrate streaming, the data must also arrive continuously, meaning the router needs to maintain its packets-per-second performance consistently, not just average it out over a few minutes.
High bitrate streaming
When it comes to video, content complexity is a major determining factor to the bitrate, as fast-motion sequences or any massive amount of visual change requires a much higher bitrate for that segment.
Additionally, video HDR content can push requirements even higher than those for standard 4K, as HDR adds more color and brightness data to the already large 4K stream.
In audio, hi-resolution streams are often lossless or minimally compressed, preserving almost all original audio data, making them nearly 10 times larger than CD-quality files.
To support the higher bitrates needed for a wide range of audio details per second and to prevent distortion at high volumes, the stream requires high bandwidth, low latency, fast connection speeds, and stability.
Additional considerations
Any other simultaneous demands on the router such as multiple streams or other high-overhead features like QoS, deep packet inspection, or a VPN affect the router’s capability as well.
Live streaming is even more sensitive to consistency than on-demand streaming. Because streaming services like to maintain customer satisfaction, if there is any small glitch, the streaming service will select lower bitrate packets to adapt to the customer’s environment and avoid buffering, diminishing the user experience in the process.
How router selection impacts streaming performance
Because of the bandwidth demands of modern video and streaming, a very fast router can drastically improve the quality and stability of hi-res AV streaming.
According to Brian Ackerman, founder of Audio Imports in Southern California, he had struggled for years with intermittent streaming drops and jitter despite trying numerous network changes. It wasn’t until a recommendation from a fellow exhibitor at the T.H.E. Show in Las Vegas that he finally uncovered his router had been causing the issues.
“The router selection is super important,” says Ackerman.
Walter Bell, Branch Manager at Mountain West Distributors in Bellevue, Washington had noticed a similar improvement in performance for his system when swapping out a network component for security reasons.
“Sounds were more defined,” he reported following the change. “Small details stood out. There was more space around instruments—more ambiance. Everything sounded cleaner and clearer.”
Even still while watching the new F1 movie streaming from an iOS26-version Apple TV to his Samsung Terrace Outdoor 4K television using a Savant 10G video distribution system, Michael Krueger noticed sharper images and more detailed and cleaner in black tones than it had during previous viewings after replacing his router for a higher-speed model.
Takeaways for integrators
The common thread in all three cases above: each had replaced a different, but channel-popular router with a faster one.
“I continue to see higher resolution and greater detail with all streaming movies and shows in 4K,” Krueger confirmed.
With his new, first-hand HiFi experience, Bell has led Mountain West Bellevue to a surge in router-replacement sales at the distributorship.
And since installing a faster router, Ackerman reports, “Consistency is the most important thing, and I haven’t had a single glitch.”
Kathy Donzis is the Director, Marketing Communications for Island
