WIRE MANAGEMENT FOR GOOD SOUND

The first instinct of any audiophile who wants a nice-looking system is to neatly bundle that mess of wires behind their equipment. DON'T DO IT! Bundling hurts the good sound of those cables you paid all that money for.

Don't despair: correct wire management can help rather than hinder good sound. The following four simple rules tell you how:

• Don't run wires-speaker cables, ICs or power cords-close and parallel to each other for more than a few inches; they'll "talk" to each other, causing muddy, smeared, edgy sound. To avoid sonic degradation, keep parallel wires separated by at least 6" wherever possible.

• Try not to run any wires near plastic (or ungrounded metal) surfaces, e.g. artificial fiber rugs or curtains, plastic tiles, linoleum, laminate wood floors, plastic moldings/wallpaper, urethane varnished floors, etc. If possible, keep wires at least 8" from plastic (or ungrounded metal) of any significant mass. These plastics are invariably terrible-sounding dielectrics.

• Avoid using plastic cable ties, plastic sheathing, plastic braid, or plastic conduit to hold, support or protect wires. Instead, use good sounding dielectrics like string (cotton or silk), thin polypropylene tape, or thin wood (preferably maple) to hang/support wires.

• Non-parallel wires--that is, those crossing at angles of 45 degrees or more-don't need to be separated: they can even touch at the crossing point without sonic harm.

The accessories shown below provide neat, good-looking solutions to help you implement these four rules, whether using garden hose cables or Mapleshade thin wires.