Hi-Fi racks - still a thing

[ryder]

I like the look of glass shelves as, aesthetically, they let the equipment speak for itself (the Solid Tech rack @ryder shows above does this too; though the legs are not to my own taste I can certainly see the appeal). I don't personally like wooden shelves or wooden cross members as they're just too blocky. There is a lot of nonsense out there about glass "ringing" but we are rarely talking wine glass thin here; my go-to shelves are 10mm toughened glass which can support massive weight and doesn't seem to have any ring to it at all. Technically, I believe laminated glass should be even better, but i'm not sure how real world the sonic difference might be...

Agreed, different designs and looks that will appeal to different people. Whatever it is, for the first time in 20 years I can now convincingly say that the rack does matter. It's not all about aesthetics as the rack will change the sound of the components placed on it, to the better or worse. That's all I can say.

So folks, if sound quality is the predominant factor, please get a good rack and not one that only looks good. Of course if it looks and sounds good, then you have struck gold.