Asked simply to send us something under the general heading of 'equipment support', Russ Andrews elected to supply this simple platform, and we're glad it did.

Custom Design's range has expanded recently to include several inventive approaches to the problem of balancing performance with good looks. This one is completely new on us, but we immediately took to it.

In many ways, this is a classic British dedicated hi-fi rack. It's more attractive than many models of yesteryear, yet it shares many of their features, including the metal-and-glass construction, that's available in both black and gunmetal grey.

Like many modern racks, this is a modular system and variations are many. The key element, though, is the patented Base. It may look like just any MDF shelf, but employs some clever thinking to make a stable, damped support surface.

Many spend thousands of pounds on AV gear and software to play on it, but completely ignore one crucial factor – the mains supply that powers it.

In some home cinemas, the separate processing paths taken by audio and video mean that they can arrive at your speakers and display at fractionally different times. This lack of sync between the two can seriously detract from the AV experience

If you've ever been plagued with lip-sync errors then you may well have latency problems, wherein a display's signal processing introduces a perceptible delay. TVs will usually compensate for this with an internal audio delay.

Van den Hul offers one of the most diverse and intriguing ranges of cable on the planet, featuring among other things conductors of linear structured carbon (LSC) instead of metal.

Sensaphonics moulds earpieces for Shure, which makes incredible earphones, so the pedigree was good going into this review. Unfortunately the workmanship here is budget quality and we found this product more bother than it was worth. It's hard to know where to begin.

The Wireworld Orbit differs from rival cables in that it's intended principally for installation use. Still, apart from having a slightly more slippery jacket that's suitable for being pulled into conduits, mechanically it is very similar to the Atlas Hyper 1.5

Supra Sword-ISL is designed as the natural partner for the Sword speaker cable. Described as a 'global limited edition', the first 3,000 pairs of the cable will be supplied in a 30th anniversary presentation case

The price per metre is nominal as this cable is not available off-the-reel, which is just as well - would you want to cut and strip 16 individual strands at each end of each cable? Between them, those multiple conductors add up to a lot of copper

Atlas' Hyper 1.5 sits within a larger family of cables, with the 1.5 denoting the cross-sectional area in square millimetres. That's not actually a vast amount of copper by speaker cable standards, but over normal-length runs, resistance doesn't add up to anything too alarming

After the success of Profigold's PGC82546 speaker cable, we thought we'd try one of the brand's interconnects. At a fairly modest price, it appears to offer some more than decent materials and construction

Calling the SQ 402 a 'stand' is a little inaccurate - it's actually a whole range of stands, under the one SQ 402 name tag. You can opt for steel or glass base plates, metal or solid hardwood vertical supports and steel or Acoustic Steel top plates

This cable embodies a number of Black Rhodium design features, notably the use of silicone-rubber insulation and an unscreened construction with two identical conductors twisted together.

We've seen plenty of chunky mains cables over the years, but few rival this one for sheer bulk. Encased within an attractive three-colour nylon-braid sleeve, it measures a whopping 13mm in diameter

The iVinyl is a simple solution for those looking to record and save their LP (or cassette) collection onto a digital format. It features a phono stage with a line-level option, the output of which then transfers along USB 2.0

A digital cable seems like the simplest thing in the world - the requirements are just the same as a TV aerial cable (priced about 15p per metre last time we looked) and digits are digits

You might need a long memory to recall Audioquest: the company's cables have been seen before on these shores, but over the last couple of years there has been no UK distributor for the US-based brand

Atacama has been in the equipment supports game for a very long time, and the experience has clearly come in useful here. This model neatly marries virtues of rigidity and tubular-welded construction with modern curves and 'designer' looks

Historically, Bandridge hasn't really been a name to conjure with in audiophile circles, bringing with it connotations of ultra-cheap accessories. However, under its Profigold brand, the company has been making some interesting stuff of late

Goldring points out with justifiable pride that its background in home audio goes back a full century, to the days before electronic amplification. To some, it might seem that the company's phono-cartridge designs date back very nearly as far

It's hardly surprising that Cambridge Audio would bring out an interconnect cable to partner the successful Azur range of separates. Nor is it much of a surprise that the material value for money looks very good

Manufacturers are now seeing sense and equipping their TVs with morethan one HDMI input. Just as well, given that there's an ever-increasing quantity of source gear with this 'digital Scart'connector