Does raising speaker cables off the floor really make a big difference?
My cables are laying on the floor (in a mess), would raising them off the floor really make much of a difference? The problem is they are quite wide and too long
http://mgaudiodesign.com/planus3.htm so any suggested props are appreciated! Cheers
Getting cables up off the floor is a big enough improvement I've made stands for all of them, power cords and interconnects as well. It was first tested with wood, but paper or plastic cups would also work. Basically anything that gets them up off the floor is better than on the floor. Best of all by far however are ceramic insulators.
The improvement with Cable Elevators is big enough everyone notices and I've even had people say they could hear the sound change one by one as they are removed or replaced.
With your flat cables the trick would be to reduce sag by twisting them to vertical. Otherwise it would still work, it would just take more insulators. Search around on eBay, where there's a huge selection as they're sold as collectibles. I've tried various ones. They all work well and its nice to have a variety of sizes and shapes. Look around, you may even find some with slots that would fit your cables very nicely.
Also its hard to tell from the pictures but ceramic insulators are all threaded inside as they are designed to screw down to be fastened typically on telephone poles. This makes it very easy to use a wooden dowel or whatever to hold them at whatever height or angle you want.
It doesn't make a big difference in my system, but it does make a small positive difference, and besides that, you protect your expensive cables from dust bunnies.
Theoretically there should be a difference due to transmission line affect with the floor acting as a dielectric, and if the cables lie on the ground, there is a asymmetric affect - the ground act as a dielectric on the bottom half of the cable, but the top half of the cable only has the air as the dielectric. By lifting the cable up, things are more symmetric as the cable will "see" the bottom and top the same. But of course as with anything that has to do with audiophiles, your ears make the final judgement, theories not withstanding.
If you use cable risers, make sure to try them facing in both directions. The grain in the wood, plastic, Styrofoam coffee cup, and cardboard toilet paper roll interacts with the photons traveling down the cable dielectric, smearing the music. If Pat Boone sounds like he’s had one too many martinis, reverse the risers.
If you don’t use risers and your listening room has carpeted floors, at least groom the carpet fibers to lay in the direction the signal is traveling through the interconnects and speaker cables, to minimize the resistance. For the area under your power cords, install Berber carpet. The looped fibers lead to better grounding.
I think Cardas actually cut their little wooden doohickeys into Golden Ratio-sized blocks. Gotta keep to the program, right? In for a dime, in for a dollar. Even better, for a bunch of 'em!
I am the original "Cable Ground" designer. We starter the industry on raising cables in the early 80’s. Anything that a cable touches and the environment the cable is in affects the sound. There are lots of generations of cable risers to explore from lots of people.
It’s a well worth while journey whether you DIY or trying existing products.
Suspended by a series of monofilaments attached to eye-hooks in the ceiling is the only way to go. Tests show no difference in the gauge of fishing-line used.
Many so-called cable mfgs have no clue regarding the science behind cable design (speaker or interconnect) and execution.
We all know that signal is flowing through the cables and that most carpeting can develop an electrostatic charge that can zap us (discharge) when we shuffle across the floor when the weather is cool and humidity is low
SOME mfgs take this into consideration when selecting jacket materials, MANY have no clue.
WireWorld understands and chooses jacketing that does not require lifts
tweak1 We all know that signal is flowing through the cables and that most carpeting can develop an electrostatic charge that can zap us (discharge) when we shuffle across the floor when the weather is cool and humidity is low.
>>>>Some know, some don’t. What many more don’t know perhaps is that the floor transfers vibration to the cables and power cords. Which is a little weird since a lot of folks are under the impression the signal in wires is vibratory or not influenced by vibration. 😬 Pop Quiz: What does vibration interfere with in cables and cords? Current? Voltage? The audio waveform? The electromagnetic wave? Photons? The vibration problem is why suspending cables is 🔜more effective🔚 than elevating them. You kill two birds with one stone. That’s why Enid Lumley suspended her cables with thread inside her Cable Tunnels.
Here’s an idea. How about using a set of Statue of Liberty 🗽🗽🗽🗽 souvenirs for elevating the cables and suspending the cables with a rubber band from the Miss Liberty’s torch? Set your cables FREE! 🤗
It is us that holds the charge when we get shocked, not the carpet. If your humidity is really low, that could be having a real effect on the sound (more attenuation at high frequencies). Get a humidifier. Cable elevators can't fix humidity.
We all know that signal is flowing through the cables and that most
carpeting can develop an electrostatic charge that can zap us
(discharge) when we shuffle across the floor when the weather is cool
and humidity is low
Raised speaker cables off the floor works for me. Give it a few days or so and then see if you hear a difference when you return the speaker cables back to the floor.
It’s the same for electronics. Raise them off the floor. I-SO-LATE them. Hel-loo! You might try rubbing everything down with Bounce! anti-static towelettes.
audiozenology68 posts12-18-2019 8:23amIt is us that holds the charge when we get shocked, not the carpet. If your humidity is really low, that could be having a real effect on the sound (more attenuation at high frequencies). Get a humidifier. Cable elevators can’t fix humidity.
>>>I wooden be too sure about that. Objects hold static electric charge, some more than others. Human beans 🔜attract🔚 surplus electrons from objects with static charge due to electric potential. Like lightning. That’s kind of the whole point of getting the cables elevated from the carpet. That’s also why it is a good idea to rub CDs and cables and cords down with Bounce anti-static towelettes or use a de-ionizer. A humidifier just makes it harder for static electric charges to build up on objects.
As to the horrifying influence of speaker cables touching things: I moved from a variety of speaker cables when my source components were in the same room as my speakers, to moving my source components to another room. This required a 35 foot run of 10awg speaker cable, run down along ceiling, under floor, snaking through shag rug to speaker. No sonic difference detectable at all. Sounds exactly as detailed, pure...all the nice descriptors....as before. That's just my own anecdotal evidence, though.
If all this "cables can't go touching things (what's that shielding for again?) stuff were true, the home theater realm would be suffering terribly, since even in the highest-end installs you have cables running through walls etc. And yet state of the art sound is often achieved this way. Aside from generally well-known cautions about how to choose and install cables (e.g. you want to avoid many cables running in parallel to power lines etc), this hand-wringing about "I can't let my cables touch things" is mostly reserved for the subjectivist audiophile world, and those selling products to them.
Of course, if you are in the "if I do X to my system and think I hear a difference it's true" camp, many people will "hear" a difference in virtually any suggested tweak. So it's up to you what type of "evidence" is sufficient.
Absolutely not. It is just a way of showing off your over priced cables. The best way to deal with speaker wires is put your balanced mono amp right behind the speaker keeping your speaker wire as short as possible then run long balanced cables to the amps. If you want to put them on cable elevators knock yourself out. Geoffkait go to Wikipedia and read about static electricity. Then look up triboelectric series. But, you are right. Cable elevators can not fix static electricity nor can they fix anything else other than the finances of people selling them. I would never buy anything from a store or web site selling cable elevators or any other patently obvious BS.
I do not believe it makes a difference. Just expectation bias.
But my cousin swears by them.
He has tested quite a few different types. He likes those porcelain ceramic insulators. They can be found for a lot less money than the ones made for audio.
Just google '
porcelain ceramic insulators' and you'll see what I am referring to.
When we at RMAF this year, there was an A/B demo in the Synergistic Research room of having the cable lifters in and then out. There was an immediate collapse in the soundstage when they were removed. So the wild card in this demo was that the lifters also included an HFT as part of the lifter. Was it the lifter or the HFT?
That being said just, prop the cables up for a few days and see if you notice a difference. When I had ribbon cables I made some wooden lifters that were really cheap, looked nice and were easy to make. PM me if you want a picture.
Less time at the keyboard, more time with your eyes and brain .... Read the post I replied to:
geoffkait18,930 posts12-18-2019 10:27am >>>I
wooden be too sure about that. Objects hold static electric charge,
some more than others. Human beans 🔜attract🔚 surplus electrons from
objects with static charge due to electric potential. Like lightning.
That’s kind of the whole point of getting the cables elevated from the
carpet. That’s also why it is a good idea to rub CDs and cables and
cords down with Bounce anti-static towelettes or use a de-ionizer. A
humidifier just makes it harder for static electric charges to build up
on objects.
You have to ask yourself, do you really think the sound stage, which is almost all a factor of recording and speaker/room interaction, would magically collapse due to some exceedingly low level interaction between a cable and the floor?
goose390 posts12-18-2019 11:06amWhen
we at RMAF this year, there was an A/B demo in the Synergistic Research
room of having the cable lifters in and then out. There was an
immediate collapse in the soundstage when they were removed. So the
wild card in this demo was that the lifters also included an HFT as part
of the lifter. Was it the lifter or the HFT?
Bdp24, facing both directions? And I suppose one direction will make a fabulous, incredible improvement in image depth or some such and the other will not? Shit, you learn something every day.
I tried raising cables off the floor for about a year. Tried them back on the floor and heard no difference. Michael Greene seems to believe in risers, but he also told me the type of metal the screws are made of which hold down circuit boards in components would also affect the sound. YMMV.
You have to ask yourself, do you really think the sound stage, which is almost all a factor of recording and speaker/room interaction, would magically collapse due to some exceedingly low level interaction between a cable and the floor?
Exactly. And funny how such a dramatic "change" is something no one (TMK) has ever demonstrated in a blind test.
It might serve to balance things to do a little googling on some of the controversies that have arisen with...*ahem*....certain tweak-selling and cable-producing company’s show demos.
(Somewhat along those lines: One engineer on an audio site talked about how, upon seeing a demo and the associated claims from one of these manufacturers at a show, he started asking simple technical questions and proposing how the claimed phenomenon could be tested. He was greeted not with the type of exchange one might expect between engineers, but with suggestions that lawyers may get involved if he wants to pursue that line of questioning).
But...there are audiophiles who want to believe....so there’s a market that will sell to them.
You have to ask yourself, do you really think the sound stage, which is almost all a factor of recording and speaker/room interaction, would magically collapse due to some exceedingly low level interaction between a cable and the floor?
All the subtle information we look for with our ears, in a recording, is low in level..so yes..I would expect that the subtle and easy to disturb high slew rate impossibly intertwined micro signals involved in our limits of human resolution ..might benefit from some careful handling.
The gross and subtle signals are also paired up in the sense of requiring perfected micro timing and long term accurate micro timing differentials between them for our hearing limits to be fully engaged...so yes..... there would be a difference between the two with the cable suspended vs just laying on the average floor. All things being equal, as in good system, gross mechanical and complex LCR differences between floor and suspended, good hearing in the individual that is part of the experiment, and so on. All things are not quite equal with respect to one person and their system, vs another.
audiozenology, this is a good example of why you should never trust anyone's hearing. I have also seen instances in which these "AB" comparisons were rigged by someone switching EQ curves or phasing. If you can not think of a reasonable reason why something should work it usually does not. Cable elevators are a good example of this. There is no reason and they don't work, not even a little except in the minds of the easily influenced.
I’ve just read through this thread and it would appear there are people in both camps.
I am not surprised some people hear a difference and others do not, because we are all using different cables
The one omission throughout the thread was - NO ONE in either camp has identified the cables they are using.
What difference does it make? you ask... - due to cable geometry, some cables carry so much internal noise that hearing the difference cable risers make is next to impossible
- others geometries reduce the amount of noise, so using cable risers with those would demonstrate the improvements.
- Also the insulation used in cables has an impact on the amount of noise generated internally.
Many years ago I tried cable risers with one of my older speaker cables and they made no difference, but with the cables I now have, lifting them off of the floor did improve the sound.
So - how much benefit is heard depends on the "geometry" of the cables and the insulation used.
- If you use simple geometries i.e. two wires side by side such as Van den Hul CS-122 or the NAIM speaker cables the improvement would be difficult to detect
- with geometries like the Planus III cables used by the OP, I believe they would benefit from the use of cable risers. ---- those big flat cables sitting on carpet or wood would have more internal noise than if suspended on cable risers ---- As one of the other posters mentions it’s all about dielectric influences of the floor on the cable/signal ---- Man Made Fibre Carpet is especially bad - wool would be better
For myself - I use a HELIX geometry in all my cables - the signal wire is suspended in the center of a Helix Neutral coil by spaced wood beads, so a high percentage of the dielectric between the signal and the neutral is actually air - also the coil acts like a faraday cage, so external RFI/EMI in the signal wire is very low - the resulting signal that reaches the speaker is almost noise free - hearing the improvement was quite discernible
I use DIY wood risers with a ceramic base that lift the cable up about 3/4". I did try lifting the cables higher, but there was no improvement.
As to soundstages collapsing due to cables not being treated as if they were unicorns: I have friends and acquaintances who are audio reviewers. I regularly hear whatever gear they have in, from expensive amps, to all sorts of speakers, all of them hooked up to super high end cabling.
Every time I come home from listening at their place I play the same tracks on my own system and...somehow....with my 35 foot long generic cables running under floors and over a rug....I experience glorious soundstaging and imaging (and clarity) of at least the equal if not more to what I’ve heard there. I guess I’m just lucky. (It’s ok, I’ll do this for you: "that’s because you have ears of cloth, not carefully trained golden ears like the rest of us")
Speaker set up/room acoustics/listener position will in all likelihood influence imaging/soundstaging far more than raising the average cable off the floor.
mijostyn audiozenology, this is a good example of why you should never trust anyone’s hearing. I have also seen instances in which these "AB" comparisons were rigged by someone switching EQ curves or phasing.
If you can not think of a reasonable reason why something should work it usually does not. Cable elevators are a good example of this. There is no reason and they don’t work, not even a little except in the minds of the easily influenced.
>>>I nominate that post for the most hilarious post of the week. That’s gold, Jerry, gold!!
@mijostyn, for the answer to your question, reread my post, this time with your tongue firmly planted against your cheek. Which, by the way, also leads to better sound: the tongue’s pressure against the cheek damps the resonances of that skin (the cheek skin’s connected to the.....ear bone; the ear bone’s connected to the....brain stem;.....etc.), and the position of the tongue within the mouth effects the cavity resonance found there. Purse your lips as they are when speaking A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes Y, to hear the change in vowel colorations.
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