Shockproof stand for Squeezebox

[RockerDIY]

The Squeezebox is a great way to access music stored on a computer. I found that the following DIY support stand slightly improved the sound. I am not making any wild claims about this but as it costs almost nothing [except your time), it is a worthwhile exercise.



The 'supports' are standard rubber bands retained with screws or nails, the 'feet' are two golf tees and a homemade spike [tees on the front and the spike on the rear] as follows:



And the stand in use:



The remaining 'bits' of the golf tees can be pointed using a standard pencil parer!

Enjoy.

[RockerDIY]

Having the Squeezebox shock mounted, it follows that the internet router [which is now in the audio chain] might benefit in a similar fashion. So I built the following shock mount stand for the router [about ten minutes work] and found that, like the Squeezebox, the sound improved slightly when the router is isolated from its surroundings:



Detail of the golf tee 'feet':



And with the internet router in place:


In general I found that the sound of my system was smoother when the Squeezebox and internet router were placed on the supports [ensuring of course that the rubber bands were supporting the devices and no part of the devices was in contact with the frame of the supports]. I also found that I was listening at lower volume levels than before [the use of silver speaker cables and interconnects may or almost certainly have contributed to to the smoother less strident sound than when my previous cables, which were Nordost cables, were used].

I believe that other users may get similar gains from the use of such a support otherwise I would not have published the details here.

[RockerDIY]

One thing that I found is that the rubber bands seem to get brittle and break through time. Might be caused by exposure to light... no idea why but a couple have failed since I posted this suggestion. Rather inexpensive to fix though......

[JoeDJ]

Please forgive my ignorance but, how it this supposed to benefit?

[RockerDIY]

Originally Posted by JoeDJ

Please forgive my ignorance but, how it this supposed to benefit?

*

I have no idea my friend.* In your own installation, simply put some folded bubblewrap under and supporting both the Squeezebox and the Internet Router.* You might find, as I did, that the sound was sweeter, less compressed and generally

[RockerDIY]

Originally Posted by JoeDJ

Please forgive my ignorance but, how it this supposed to benefit?

My original reply was posted when the system was in the middle of some maintenance and it only accepted a few lines.

As I said I have no idea why this simple suggestion should benefit the sound from your Squeezebox Duet. In your system it may not make any difference but it did in mine. To find out make a pillow from a scrap of bubblewrap and put it under the Squeezebox. Do the same for your Internet Router. Listen for a week or two and check if your system sound has changed when you remove the bubblewraps.

Vibration is known to affect electronics. I was inspired by looking at a studio microphone antivibration mount. [SME use 'O' rings in the construction of their turntables too.] I wondered if such simple methods would improve the performance of my Squeezebox. It did even though I suspect the Squeezebox is mainly chips and surface mounted components. I would love to hear [read] if others benefited as I did. Even if the shockproof mounting did nothing, post your results here.