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Cable elevators

My Saturday hifi tweaking involved digging out the family’s box of wooden building blocks and using them to elevate my speaker cables off the floor. Previously under an area carpet on a wood floor. Mc 601s to SF Amati with Wireworld speaker cables (to be replaced with Cardas). 
 

The result—mind you the system is playing really well right now thanks to my new Cardas interconnects—is greater clarity (I think), sound stage, and texture. This is definitely about wringing out the last ounce of the system and maybe I’m imagining the improvement. I don’t think I’d spend any money on buying risers, but what the hell why not use the old building block. Looks dopey and the family laughs at me, but dang does the system sound amazing.

Anyone else play with risers/elevators?

w123ale
w123ale OP
118 posts
 

Okay, I’ve been enjoying the discussion, and listening. For the last week I have been listening to the system with the “building block risers” in my system with my Wireworld Equinox 8 speaker cables. 
 

Today, I removed the risers—takes 30 seconds. My go to album for the week has been Cash and Nelson live VH1 Storytellers. Listed to a couple of tracks, put the risers back in, out, and then in again.

Without question there is an audible difference. With the risers in, the music has greater intensity and realism—I can actually hear the reverb in the recording room. Pretty cool. The vocals are more forward and the timbre in the guitar is clearer. If I want a mellower sound, I can drop the risers out. 
 

Aside from the aesthetics, this is a definitely in the why the heck not department—no cost. If you don’t hear a difference, no loss when using scrap wood. 
 

(I don’t understand snake oil pot shots for an easy to try and free tweak. If it’s not your thing, how about scroll on)

Now, I’m going to see if I can use my building blocks to build even higher risers.

bimmerman2's avatar
bimmerman2
93 posts
 

Here's mine. 

They do absolutely nothing, but they sure look neat.  Less than 20 bucks into them. 

tksteingraber's avatar
tksteingraber
785 posts
 

@w123ale  agreed!  Seems very system, cable and flooring dependent.  Seems pretty clear and simple.  If it improves the sound in your system great use them, if not, don’t use them and scroll on!  I have wood floors and ribbon cables so no improvement but I still use a few since i made them.  Why not. 

ghdprentice's avatar
ghdprentice
9,473 posts
 

OP,

Thanks for the feedback on your test. This is why lifters have been around for at least thirty or forty years. I got mine around then… ceramic electrical… were relatively inexpensive back then and are a permanent part of my system. All this little stuff adds up. 

digsmithd
913 posts
 

Ha.. my wife bemoaned me trying them...Mind you the first shot at it i used dollar store tumblrs that i had enough to cover cables.All the while she was making dinner peeing and moaning "blah blah"....Grabbed a beer and played first disk.She couldnt believe it made that much difference.She was quiet the rest of night 😉

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