It is incredibly unlikely that Clock jitter will be audible, for example on a 1Gbit Ethernet link we would be looking for an RMS jitter figure for the clock of around sub-1ps, so 1ps spread/smear in the clock edge. Bad clock jitter would create bit errors, but you'd be looking at a jitter figure which is a large a % of the clock period. Clock jitter at the ADC or DAC can look like a decrease in the the effective signal to noise. So if jitter/phase-noise is an issue the equipment is junk.
However, if on a high speed serial link like HDMI/USB 3 etc. there is a termination impedance mismatch which will cause reflections, this will most often be the cause of bit errors. The severity of the error is down to how bad the mismatch is, length of cable, data rate etc. Again if this occurs then the equipment has been badly designed and should go in the garbage bin.
Bit errors will occur no matter what, they are inevitable, but 99.99% of the time you won't notice them, partly due to error correction techniques, but usually because they are insignificant. If they become audible then the equipment is failing or something like disc rot is occurring. I have had it occur when the laser module on an old CD player started to fail, and more annoyingly due to CD/BDA disc problems, neither of which the player could correct as there were too many errors.
However, if on a high speed serial link like HDMI/USB 3 etc. there is a termination impedance mismatch which will cause reflections, this will most often be the cause of bit errors. The severity of the error is down to how bad the mismatch is, length of cable, data rate etc. Again if this occurs then the equipment has been badly designed and should go in the garbage bin.
Bit errors will occur no matter what, they are inevitable, but 99.99% of the time you won't notice them, partly due to error correction techniques, but usually because they are insignificant. If they become audible then the equipment is failing or something like disc rot is occurring. I have had it occur when the laser module on an old CD player started to fail, and more annoyingly due to CD/BDA disc problems, neither of which the player could correct as there were too many errors.