Sage-in not ageing. If we don't just grow older but also wiser from accumulated experience, we should reach a point where—for our budget, taste and space—our primary hifi hardware is perfect for the job. Everything works in harmony. Whilst we could do 'different', we can't get 'better' shy of moving to a new room to start the entire process over again. It's where I'm at relative to our current residence. In each system, all the hardware sings. With zero zest to change electronics or speakers, any ambitions to milk my merry MO to the max is down to so-called accessories. Hitting 'different' is easy. Anything with an actual not just imaginary effect will do. Voilà, change. Hitting 'better' according to our by now hyper-defined criteria? That's a different matter if we mean to remain in our personal groove, just grinding it deeper and more profound. In my book, companions on this path now become things like noise traps, cable lifts, power purifiers, resonance control, ground optimizers. Some of them have no or only marginal effect whilst our system basics haven't locked in yet. It's once those are ideally matched to our space and budget so that overall resolution shows up far smaller changes than before that accessories can put a meaningful spin on things.

Here we see a quad of Nano mounted to Q Acoustics speaker stands in lieu of the stock rubber-tipped spikes. If you think that extreme, I'd concur if you're still looking from the bottom up while a system hasn't sufficiently matured yet. Don't worry about trimming hedges if your roof leaks. Once your house of sound is in order, you look from the top down. The big picture is steady and keen. Now little things register. Sometimes one little thing may be just that; a puff of smoke on the wind. But little things can add up in unexpected ways. Suddenly they amount to smoke signals with the happy message that listening is deeper, more enjoyable, easier to get into. Here we're all our own jury, judge and executive. Once we get a new problem solver that can be employed any number of ways, it's up to us to try them all and determine where we get the biggest returns. In my experience, isolating speakers and subwoofers from the floor falls into the drawer of rather obvious returns. Microphonic power triodes, disc transports digital and vinyl are other easy targets. But even DACs with zero moving parts can respond. 'Why' is for the engineering types to sort out. I can enjoy benefits without having a clue. That's my cue to talk first sonics.

The speaker stand 'flotation' effect summed up easily as lower whisper completion. The meaning of this is as basic as it is telling. Take music you know and enjoy—you'll want numerical volume display and remote control for this—and note at exactly what number on the dial you cross the threshold between 'complete' and 'too diluted' whilst you keep choking the volume. We all know that as we play louder, things fill out, intensify and scale up. Eventually but invariably, in the other direction they shrink, pale and thin out. The only thing important is to notice at what SPL we perceive this shrinkage as too annoying to keep listening. It's when for our aural pleasure stimulation habit, the whole has become too small to be compelling. Now repeat the exercise with the thing on test. To me, whatever ends up with the lower number on the volume readout books the higher resolution. All it implies is that more audibly relevant things survive as we depressurize the room. The music hangs together longer in ways we find still satisfying. I'll always prefer the thing which remains compelling at a lower volume; and for that very reason call it superior. According to this simplistic arithmetic, the system with Nano in play was superior. It gave me more clarity and tone density into lower SPL as though some subtle detail-obscuring action had been delayed. Clarity meant hearing more nuance, tone density meant greater substance. It's a very simple test to conduct. It requires no taking of notes, no listening for any particular attributes. We focus solely on how long we remain engaged; and at what point during our descent into ever lower SPL we tune out and disconnect. That's it.

This speaks to a personal core belief. Noise is public enemy N°1 of our precious music signal. In whatever form it occurs—electrical, mechanical, structural, acoustical—noise obscures and distorts the recorded signal. As we peel away noise like a croissant's endless layers, ever more signal steps into the breach. We can notice this two ways. 1/ music becomes more intelligible, nuanced, dimensional and rich at our standard playback levels. 2/ we can play down into lower SPL before too much falls away to remain of interest. I needn't understand how exactly mechanical resonances leach into the floor to spread into other equipment to then cause this masking or insight-choking effect. I just notice the effect and how it ties directly to taking the review devices out or putting them back in. Whilst I was surprised that beneath so small a speaker on a deliberately low-mass stand, swapping from rubber-tipped spikes to Nano remained noticeable when the real disturber of the peace is the dual 9½" force-cancelling Dynaudio sub already on super-effective Swiss wire-suspension isolators… checking on the Sonnet Pasithea DAC's volume readout confirmed it. And yes, this is a suspended wooden floor on the 2nd storey. It's inherently more talkative/reactive than the wooden ground floor with its thick concrete foundation beneath. Equally true, all these electronics already isolate on a brilliant multi-stage Hifistay rack from South Korea. Common sense or sensible cynicism could insist that nothing more on this score should be necessary; or make any difference whatsoever. Personal experience said otherwise. That speaks to another personal core belief. Hifi quality is a multi-layered beast. Peeling away ever finer disturbances tied to various types of noise interference once the amp/speaker/room trinity is under control and we have the tonal balance, linearity and resolution we desire seems to be an endless endeavour. Success just relies on purpose-engineered solutions; and being intelligent or lucky enough to research or accidentally come across them. Then we must learn how to best exploit them. Nano is clearly engineered for purpose. It's demonstrably effective, for a fair outlay given clearly tidy build, fine finish and quality materials. Time to try it under electronics.