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Cable elevators - conventional wisdom wrong?

Reluctant to put any considerable money in them, the reasons for using cable elevators seemed intuitively correct to me: decouple cables mechanically from vibration and insulate them from the carpet's static. I have therefore built cheap elevators myself using Lego building blocks. (Plastic with a more or less complex internal structure; moreover, there is enormous shaping flexibility, for instance you can also build gates with suspended strings on which to rest the cables)
In their advertisement/report on the Dark Field elevators, Shunyata now claim that conventional elevators are actually (very?) detrimental in that they enable a strong static field to build up between cable and floor causing signal degradation.
Can anyone with more technical knowledge than I have assess how serious the described effect is likely to be? Would there, theoretically, be less distortion with cables lying on the floor? Has anyone actually experienced this?
karelfd
dave_b's avatar
dave_b
3,159 posts
 
Update...after further listening I have decided against using the elevators. For whatever good they appear to do for my system, there seems to be a shift in tone, defintion and dynamic contrast that becomes apparent upon lengthy listening sessions. Things seem less exciting and less colorful somehow:O( Oh well!
tbg
5,263 posts
 
Dave_b, yep, try ceramics, but use one and only one per all cables.
rdoc
92 posts
 
Because of this thread, I decided to try my system without the Shunyata Dark Field Elevators which are only under my speaker cables. If my findings are the same as Dave b and some others, I could sell them and recover some money. I had a dealer here doing a "Master Set" on my speakers. He had never seen the DFE's before and is not a Shunyata dealer. When we put the DFE's in the system, the music took on more bloom and the soundstage widened and deepened. There was an increase in detail. My system (which is quite high in resolution IMHO)was clearly more musically satisfying and involving. There was absolutely no dulling or loss of detail. Both of us thought it was very easy to hear the improvement with the DFE's under the SC's. In my system it is one of the very best returns on investments. It seems that this is the very opposite of what Dave b and some others have heard. I have only one other Shunyata piece, that being a Python VX on my CD player. I am certainly not disposed toward Shunyata products. So, this only means as most other high end products go, be sure to try it in your system before you decide. Regards,

Bob V
tbg
5,263 posts
 
Rdoc, what do you make of these differences of opinion? Is it possible that you are both right? This happens so often, that I think everyone should have reservations about others' opinions on components.
rdoc
92 posts
 
Tbg,
I live in a very dry environment with very high levels of static electricity. Perhaps getting the SC's off the carpet makes the difference. I do not know if those who thought the DFE's hurt the sound had them under more than the SC's. Any of the aforementioned reasons could account for the difference of opinion. I do know that I was biased against them, and the dealer had not even seen them before. I also mentioned to him that some of the posters on this thread thought the DFE's harmed the sound, so he may also have been biased against them. It was just so plainly evident that the DFE's made a very positive difference on my system. So, it could be system differences. I having been an audiophile for over 40 years have seen many things which were unexplainable. Just trust your own ears.
Bob
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