for those interested in granite platforms, you should check out scientific or high-tech industrial suppliers. 2-4" thick very flat granite platforms are frequntly used in air-suspension systems for various applications (e.g., precision measurement). a few years ago, i was able to find some of these slabs, aporox. 24"x30"x2" for about $30.00 each. they are very heavy and not polished to the degree you would expect in a kitchen counter. i have sold these since in favor of zoethecus stands. the sandwich materials in the z-slab shelves sound best with my equipment placed on black diamond racing cones. my equipment all is on the "heavy" side. the cd transport, for example, weighs about 50#. i've yet to find any pod-type products that work with such weighy stuff. at ces earlier this week, i saw some really neat-looking and sonically dead shelving material at the billy baggs booth. it is constructed of 3 layers of safety glass, each about 3/8" thick. the "middle" layer is shattered and then bonded to an unbroken plate on either side. the shattering is what gives the material its acuostically neutral property. they are rated to hold up to 500# when used on the metal stands for which they are designed. cool, but i would guess a virtually impossible diy project.
Footers/Shelf Material
I am still on the shelf quest, trying Corian, Neuance and Maple Butchers Block (the latter is still to arrive, but is coming). The Neuance is still the best - the Corian less dynamic, slower and a little warmer. But I have also been trying lots of footers with these shelves, hoping for a magical combination. And I found one.. With hard shelves like Corian, glass, perspex, marble etc (including the Neuance) - (but definitely not for MDF), the best I have found is the E-A-R Large Isolation Feet, $3.25 each at the Parts Connection. With hard shelves all of the cones I have tried are way too peaky. Plain old hard rubber feet are muddy and smeered. Vynil feet in general are "zingy" and tend to hardness from the middle of the mid-range on up, and a bit smeered on down - and this includes Vibrapods. The Vibrapods are a bit too lively in the upper mids and not great with string tone, but are also not coherent from top to bottom (but are otherwise second-best to the E-A-R feet. But the E-A-R feet give you all the detail of the best of the other footers (cones, squishy feet etc) with NO peakiness, and fantastic solidity to images. They are an unfortunate shade of blue and look like a hard synthetic rubber, but do not have any of the fuzz and smeer that you get with hard rubber footers. More neutral overall than anything else, all the detail as you get with cones but with none of the peakiness, none of the smeer you get with rubber, vynil, or sorbothane. I like them. There are also small feet at $1 each, but my components are too heavy for them and they sound muddy and grey - but they might work with light components - they are used by Sonic Frontiers on all their better gear. Please note I do NOT recommend them if you use MDF shelves.