Cheap cable raisers, do they make a difference ?

[terryforsythe]

Have some of you if we have to be critical thought about if the hight of cable raiser matter ?

They raise speaker,lift cables but does it matter by how much ?

It doesn't matter. In my test, post #125 above, having a 2m speaker cable hanging completely in the air only reduced the capacitance, at best, by 10 pF in comparison to the speaker cable laying on the floor. The impedance of 10 pF at 20 kHz is close to 796 kohms, which is nearly 100,000 times higher than 8 ohms, and nearly 200,000 times higher than 4 ohms. It will have no impact that is even remotely close to being audible.

EDIT: Referencing the in air measurement, the capacitance is 123 pF, which is 64.7 kohms at 20 kHz. The worst on floor measurement was 133 pF, which is 59.8 kohms at 20 kHz. Both impedances are much too high to have any audible impact on the speakers.

 

[Gringoaudio1]

This is incorrect.

It was humour in response to a dumb question.

 

[im_gumby]

No: cable risers make no difference, no matter what. Save your money.

Uhm not true...
First they help when it comes time to herd and clean up the dust bunnies or in my case, Husky Fluff bunnies.

Second... it depends on your home and what's in the floor. Now this may seem weird but depending on the age of your home and where you live... you could have some electrical interference from wiring. Of course the shielding on your cables also play a part in it. My brother in law is an EE who was extremely anal when it came to running Cat-5 in the wall making sure it was away from the electrical wiring. (In Chicago... the wiring is in conduit so the amount of potential interference is less and while I forget the math the interference would quickly the farther it was from the source.) So there could be truth to the issue.

The third thing... wire placement and routing on the floor.
Depending on what you have in terms of risers and cables... it could make things look a lot nicer in terms of layout.

That said... how much you spend is going to be up to you.
I mean creating something out of Lucite or multi-color 3D printing that has high wife approval? Could be cool.
Printing something up or doing it out of a hobbyist project? Could also be cool.

Paying snake oil prices? Fuggit about it.

It seems that there's a bit of truth behind some of the myths and snake-oil claims.

 

[Talisman]

Sorry, but if I listen to music on the first floor, it's like I have a huge lift that raises the cables ten feet above the floor below, right?

 

[DonR]

My brother in law is an EE who was extremely anal when it came to running Cat-5 in the wall making sure it was away from the electrical wiring.

Look at data center wiring. They seem to have no issues. Power dissipates at the square of the distance.

 

[Gringoaudio1]

I disagree. On ASR the person ought to be provided with the correct advice and treated with respect.

There is no such thing as a stupid/funny question if asked in good faith. That some answers have been mocking, this is a reason that ASR may be viewed as unprofessional.

Don’t agree. You watch and read and understand a community before you make a post. Not doing so is just lazy and or disrespectful. Pay your dues. You understand where you are before participating. Any regular ASR reader would understand that this is clearly in the category of something the Community here would not take seriously. That the OP has been a member here for some time means that they haven’t really been reading much of what gets posted or haven’t understood the tenor here. Unacceptable. And just dumb.

 

[Noske]

Don’t agree. You watch and read and understand a community before you make a post. Not doing so is just lazy and or disrespectful. Pay your dues. You understand where you are before participating. Any regular ASR reader would understand that this is clearly in the category of something the Community here would not take seriously. That the OP has been a member here for some time means that they haven’t really been reading much of what gets posted or haven’t understood the tenor here. Unacceptable. And just dumb.

I disagree with your opinion. ASR is a community - a common noun. It is not a proper noun.

What is with this "And just dumb" comment? In psychology there is a concept known as projectionism. I may kindly suggest that you google the meaning of that word.

 

[Grotti]

Uhm not true...
First they help when it comes time to herd and clean up the dust bunnies or in my case, Husky Fluff bunnies.

Second... it depends on your home and what's in the floor. Now this may seem weird but depending on the age of your home and where you live... you could have some electrical interference from wiring. Of course the shielding on your cables also play a part in it. My brother in law is an EE who was extremely anal when it came to running Cat-5 in the wall making sure it was away from the electrical wiring. (In Chicago... the wiring is in conduit so the amount of potential interference is less and while I forget the math the interference would quickly the farther it was from the source.) So there could be truth to the issue.

The third thing... wire placement and routing on the floor.
Depending on what you have in terms of risers and cables... it could make things look a lot nicer in terms of layout.

That said... how much you spend is going to be up to you.
I mean creating something out of Lucite or multi-color 3D printing that has high wife approval? Could be cool.
Printing something up or doing it out of a hobbyist project? Could also be cool.

Paying snake oil prices? Fuggit about it.

It seems that there's a bit of truth behind some of the myths and snake-oil claims.

My statement was related to impact of cable risers on sound quality only obviously. Do they make cleaning the floor more comfortable? I don't know and I don't care. And I am pretty sure, that the OP did not have this in mind when starting this thread. I wired my gear without cable risers and i have no problem with cleaning up our living room ;o).

I live in Germany (2nd floor btw), and in my country you will rarely find any current wire in the concrete (or wooden) floor of an Apartment building. Same goes for small houses: I know a lot and no one (!!!) has current wiring in his floor. In fact most of them have a floor heating installed (even I have one).

So, from my point of view, cable risers make no difference at all. At least sonically.

 

[Noske]

It was humour in response to a dumb question.

It may have been a question which was naive in the circumstances, but to make a mockery of the question which was made in good faith is not humour.

I notice that you have a favourite word. Know that when you point your finger, there are three pointing back at you.

 

[solderdude]

It doesn't matter. In my test, post #125 above, having a 2m speaker cable hanging completely in the air only reduced the capacitance, at best, by 10 pF in comparison to the speaker cable laying on the floor. The impedance of 10 pF at 20 kHz is close to 796 kohms, which is nearly 100,000 times higher than 8 ohms, and nearly 200,000 times higher than 4 ohms. It will have no impact that is even remotely close to being audible.

EDIT: Referencing the in air measurement, the capacitance is 123 pF, which is 64.7 kohms at 20 kHz. The worst on floor measurement was 133 pF, which is 59.8 kohms at 20 kHz. Both impedances are much too high to have any audible impact on the speakers.

While we can measure R L C and characteristic impedance of a cable we still have not measured the 'unknown' signal. The one we cannot measure yet and is the cause for the discrepancy between electrical measurements and perception.

Now... if people could only suggest where to look .. oh right ... there are various cable companies that already know how to make 'perfect sounding' cables + cable risers but all of them are keeping it to themselves and none have ever 'leaked' the secrets. Given that all cable manufacturers have different ways of making cables (and goes for risers too) there must be a gazillion ways to make those products... one thing ... they have to cost a fortune.

 

[voodooless]

there are various cable companies that already know how to make 'perfect sounding' cables + cable risers ... they have to cost a fortune.

There, shortened it for ya

 

[solderdude]

even shorter description for cable risers:
humbug

 

[im_gumby]

Look at data center wiring. They seem to have no issues. Power dissipates at the square of the distance.

Uhm... did you read what I wrote?

First in a DC, your power is going to be inside conduit.
Second you're not going to see long parallel runs.

Third you're right about the dissipation. Which is why you'll see wiring separated.

To give you an example... In my condo's garage, we have a bunch of CAT 5 for video feeds and what not.
In parallel, there is conduit (pipes) that are separated by approximately 1 foot (rough estimate).

Not the same when running CAT 5 in the same cut out w romex wiring.
Sound is analog, not digital.

Hence the caveat on that point. You could live in a condo where your electrical conduit is put in your floor and then there's poured concrete.
Much different that if you're in a wood timber house where you're running Romex in the ceiling between floors.

So YMMV depending on building code.

Now the kicker. Does this mean that there's an audible difference? Who the F knows? Some people can swear that they hear a difference. I know I can't.
I live in a condo where my floors are concrete then a layer of cork type material (sub flooring) then a floating wood floor. Any electrical interference is going to be a moot point.

Do I have cable risers? No. My book shelf speakers are actually on a book shelf.
Any data wire I had pulled was a CAT 7 in the ceiling along w a pair of fiber. In wall AV wiring is rated for in wall and is a short run separate from electrical which is also in conduit (City of Chicago code)

Were I to have stand mount or tower speakers, I'd print up something. Not for sound issues, but to help w routing the cables (making them look nice and not sloppy. And to make it easier to corral fluff bunnies.

OK?

 

[Purité Audio]

even shorter description for cable risers:
humbug

While I am not dead set against using confectionery in an audio reproduction chain, humbugs just don’t seem that suitable.

Keith

 

[im_gumby]

My statement was related to impact of cable risers on sound quality only obviously. Do they make cleaning the floor more comfortable? I don't know and I don't care. And I am pretty sure, that the OP did not have this in mind when starting this thread. I wired my gear without cable risers and i have no problem with cleaning up our living room ;o).

I live in Germany (2nd floor btw), and in my country you will rarely find any current wire in the concrete (or wooden) floor of an Apartment building. Same goes for small houses: I know a lot and no one (!!!) has current wiring in his floor. In fact most of them have a floor heating installed (even I have one).

So, from my point of view, cable risers make no difference at all. At least sonically.

If you read what I wrote... I said it would depend on where you lived and the type/age of house.
I agree that for most people here, in terms of sonic performance, you'd never know/hear the difference.


If you don't own a Husky or similar breed, you are probably not a fluff bunny rancher. Even though Huskies blow their coats, they still shed a lot. (A running joke is that Husky fluff adds flavor to your morning coffee.)

Since this is a global community, I don't know what the building codes or ages of the buildings people live in. Hence the expression YMMV.

In my father-in-law's house... it was built in the early 1920s and 25yrs ago I went into the attic to check on his HVAC. They still had tube wiring in place. (Not active thank god)
So you never know what you'll find in the walls.

And the irony... my wife just gave away her collection of glass insulators that were used by the electrical companies on old telephone poles. She found them so they were free. Now they could have been used and there would have been a huge coolness factor. (And they were free. )

 

[Basic Channel]

I misread cables risers as cable rinsers. Surely rinsing the cable would improve sound quality? Imagine the cables could be dirty or maybe not air tight? It could be like that thing you do for making sure you fixed the puncture correctly on your bike.

Does anyone know if cable rinsers are already a thing and the approximate amount I could make selling them to fools?

You could even combine cable risers and cable rinsers and create an audiophile water feature.

 

[im_gumby]

I misread cables risers as cable rinsers. Surely rinsing the cable would improve sound quality? Imagine the cables could be dirty or maybe not air tight? It could be like that thing you do for making sure you fixed the puncture correctly on your bike.

Does anyone know if cable rinsers are already a thing and the approximate amount I could make selling them to fools?

You could even combine cable risers and cable rinsers and create an audiophile water feature.

You may be on to something.
I heard that dust bunnies are attracted to the build up of static charges along the cable surface due to dirty shielding.
So you need to not only wash the cables, but coat them in a special liquid that makes them slippery and shinny. (Its when it dulls that you know you need to rinse and repeat. )

Personally I think that you could use jet dry, that dish washer additive but I could be wrong.

</sarcasm> </joke> For those without humor.

 

[mhardy6647]

I've gone on record about this before, but for the sake of completeness -- I am a proponent of lowering floors as opposed to raising cables.

Same net effect.
This is an example of what Prof. Einstein referred to as relativity.

 

[mhardy6647]

PS I've just come to the awful realization that, if all of my posts were filtered to remove snark, I'd have ca. 16 posts at ASR.

 

[Noske]

PS I've just come to the awful realization that, if all of my posts were filtered to remove snark, I'd have ca. 16 posts at ASR.

Are you proud of that awful factoid? There is quite some discontent in the wider audio community about contributors to ASR.

I find it unfortunate that Amir has found it necessary to have been recently very busy defending ASR on Agon (I am not a member there).