About The Quadraspire SVTL Bamboo Hi-Fi Rack
Quadraspire, the contemporary furniture manufacturer based in England designs & manufactures a range of Hi-Fi furniture that blends functionality and style with acoustic performance all to enhance your sound system both sonically and visually.
In the same way every musical performance needs a stage so a Hi-Fi needs a stage to bring the music to life in your home. More than twenty five years ago Quadraspire set out to develop a modular rack - the Q4 - that could support a variety of Hi-Fi systems and deliver acoustic performance with style. This was achieved by combining solid aluminium columns with specially engineered shelves to create a light and rigid construction to deliver a clearer, cleaner musical performance.
It is commonly accepted that every component in a Hi-Fi system from Amplifier to Source including Turntables, CD Players & Music Streamers are microphonic and produce resonance that will distort the quality of the music reproduced by a Hi-Fi system. This distortion can be significantly reduced by siting the Hi-Fi system on a purpose built equipment rack designed to deal with these resonances. The design of a Hi-Fi rack and the use of materials in its construction is critical. To develop their Hi-Fi racks Quadraspire use the tried and tested technique of tuning by ear in the same way as the finest musical instruments are developed. From extensive research they found that the use of non-ferrous metals such as Aluminium and Bronze along with natural materials such as Wood and Bamboo reduce resonance. Furthermore the shape of the shelves and columns used within the rack will determine how resonance is treated. In particular Quadraspire found that a light but rigid construction delivers a clearer, cleaner musical performance.
Quadraspire's first Hi-Fi rack - the Q4 - was launched in 1995 and met with unparalleled success around the world. The SVTL performance rack was developed for larger Hi-Fi systems and components and better sound performance. Curved columns eliminate parallel lines to further reduce resonance and vented shelves reduce mass and allow air to flow freely around your system.
Bamboo Shelves: Lauded by many in the manufacturing industry as the "Material of the Future", Bamboo, with its high tensile strength and vibration suppressing qualities, is the ideal material to use in Quadraspire Hi-Fi racks to further improve sound performance. The natural beauty of solid Bamboo lies in its awesome strength and intricate growth patterns and micro pore structure that can be seen in the shelf edge detail. Bamboo is the fastest growing plant on the planet and each year about 30% of the world's forest is harvested without reducing the size of the forest. Bamboo is carbon neutral because its C02 Fixation (absorption) prior to harvesting is greater than the C02 emissions during manufacturing and transportation. Quadraspire only uses 'Panda Friendly' high Moso bamboo, supplied by Bamboo Surfaces, that has no leaf growth on the first 5 metres of the stem and is therefore not a source of food for the Panda.
Columns: SV Columns come in Black or Silver finish and are available in 6 different heights to accommodate different sized components and can easily be interchanged if your system changes.
Quadraspire Accessories: The Flat Foot (for hard/timber floors) & Spike Foot (for carpet) are included with all Quadraspire racks. Alternatively the Spike Foot can be used on hard/timber floors in conjunction with the optional Quadraspire Floor Protectors - the QC (good vibration resistance) or QX7 (amazing vibration resistance). If moving your equipment rack is important then the optional Casters can be specified. All Accessories are sold separately.
Quadraspire SVT Bamboo Review
"Shifting the electronics onto the bamboo shelves produced a far more impressive improvement. Once the source components were correctly supported on the bamboo shelves, the musical impact was not far short of revelatory. Right from the opening bars, the significant improvement in transparency, the blacker background and wider dynamic range were startlingly apparent in the increased musical drama and tension. The broader, deeper soundstage stepped away from the speakers, giving the performance a sense of spatial and expressive independence. Bass instruments gained shape, tonality and texture, with far easier separation of overlapping instruments like bowed bass and tuba. The upper strings extended properly, to occupy their seating, with the contrasting tonality of violin and viola and the way Shostakovich loves to pass melodies and phrases between them and the oboes both easier to appreciate and musically more effective. Woodwind interjections and brass punctuation were much easier to identify, as well as making more musical sense.
But for all the impact and drama that's so immediately impressive, again the real benefits come in the realm of timing and phrasing. The tempo of the performance as a whole becomes more natural and persuasive, the sense of Previn controlling and directing it much more apparent. The notion of being able to "hear" the conductor might seem odd, but it's central to any great large-scale classical performance -- and any system that's trying to reproduce it. The bamboo shelves bring plenty of sonic benefits to the system, but their real strength lies in the way they enhance clarity and separation whilst simultaneously binding the orchestra and the space around it into a single, coherent whole. The evenness and uncluttered organization with which they underpin the proceedings simply makes it much, much easier to concentrate on the message in the music, rather than trying to unravel what's actually happening." The Audio Beat
Our Take
I still remember the first time I ever heard Quadraspire. It was at a Hi-Fi show in Heathrow, London and my colleague & I walked into the Quadraspire room and wondered why it was so empty (most rooms were packed with gear). Eddie Spruit, Quadraspire's founder was standing there presiding over 2 racks, a CD player, an amplifier and a pair of speakers. Huh? He told us his Quadraspire rack made your Hi-Fi system sound better. We smiled quietly, wondering what he was smoking, but politely took our seats as he demonstrated his product. One rack had typical glass shelves with steel columns and next to it was a Quadraspire rack with veneered mdf shelves and solid aluminium columns. All Eddie did was move the CD player from the top of the glass rack to the top of the Quadraspire rack. Our jaws could be heard hitting the floor from fifty paces away. We were astonished at the improvement. In fact we suspected some sort of trick so I got up and did the moving of the CD player myself just to make sure absolutely nothing else was being changed. The improvement was definitely all down to the Quadraspire rack.
Quite a few years later when Eddie visited Australia he brought with him the brand new bamboo version of the entry level Q4 EVO and this sounded so much better than the standard model that it was clearly the next evolutionary step in hi-fi racks. With the price of wood going up the veneered mdf shelves have now been discontinued and the bamboo range has been expanded to include four different finishes – Natural, Black, Cherry & Dark. If you haven't heard what a Quadraspire rack can do for your system please get in touch and be prepared for a nice surprise.
Main Features & Specifications
- Design: High Performance Hi-Fi or AV Equipment Rack
- Please Note: The price above is for a 4 shelf SVTL Bamboo rack. Each Bamboo Shelf plus 4 x Black or Silver SV32mm Columns/Feet costs $1,000 and you can have 1, 2, 3, 4 or more shelves in your rack depending on your requirements.
- To build your Quadraspire rack online, click here
- Weight Capacity: 80kg per shelf
- Shelves: Solid Bamboo Vented Ply Construction
- Available Finishes: Natural Bamboo, Black Bamboo, Cherry Bamboo & Dark Bamboo
- Shelf Dimensions
- Overall Width & Depth: 645 x 560mm (Maximum)
- Width Between Front Columns: 540mm
- Curved SV Columns
- Colour: Black or Silver
- Diameter: 32mm
- Construction: Solid Aluminium
- SV Column Heights: 100, 140, 180, 216, 256 & 326mm height columns available
- Spiked Feet: Included
- Flat Feet for Hard Floors: Included
- Castors: Available to purchase separately
- Made In England
Note: Features & Specifications Subject To Change Without Notice. E&OE.