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Has anyone had experiences good or bad with speaker isolation or isolation in general ?

hi
i have been enjoying buying and listening to hifi for some 35 years now and have seen many items come and go.I have also been interested in the audio cable discussions and i agree that cables do make a difference how much of a difference is a very individual, and a system dependent situation. There has been nothing that has got me so excited and improved the sound of my system that has ever made me want to really share it with fellow audiophiles until i started to try various isolation products.With so much choice from affordable to very expensive i found the hole subject very confusing and i did not know where to start. After trying lots of various products all shapes and sizes with very different results i decided to read reviews which is something i do not usually do to get some advise.I read a review on the Townshend audio seismic podiums they are isolation platforms that go under your speakers .This company is very famous for isolation ideas and have been around some 50 years based here in the UK they also had a factory in the USA back in the 1980s. I contacted Nick at Emporium hifi  and he agreed to install a pair for me so i could have a listen. My speakers are sound-lab dynastats which i use in quite a small room but with the adjustments give a nice sound. After installing the podiums we both sat down with jaws hitting the floor these podium things completely transformed the sound of my system to absolute perfection. After all this time trying various products under my equipment i have now isolated my speakers and the sound quality is exactly what i believe we all are chasing, my sound-labs are now transparent no more bass problems i have just got one big 3D sound stage the dynastats are now very open with deeper much better bass everything is perfect. I now believe isolating your loudspeakers is the first port of call i was so impressed by the Townshend audio seismic products i now sell them as i have never come across anything that has given my system such a great upgrade , the sound is the same as before but now its just so much better its playing deeper bass but tighter much more resolution and no boom , the midrange is so much more human sounding realistic and spacious with the top end so refined and perfect , is anyone using podiums and had the same experiences i would love to hear from you thank you john 
mains

Showing 12 responses by folkfreak

folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@mains before laying out for the seismic platforms you owe it to yourself to investigate a superior solution, an active isolation base such as those from Herzan. Obviously rather expensive but if you are really committed to addressing low frequency vibration these cannot be beat and my TS-150 has had a transformative effect on my turntable

I also found installing Grand Prix Audio Apex footers (a ball based system) on all my stands and upgrading the balls to Si Nitride very beneficial (the turntable is on its own wall shelf, all of the other equipment is on Monaco stands on these Apex footers)
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@toddverrone how unstable? It depends what your speakers weigh. Mine weigh nearly 300lb so it's going to take some force to move them even though they freely wobble a couple of cm from side to side on the spring base. Actually as they're no longer spiked but instead are fully supported across the entire base I suspect it would take more force to knock them over the when they were on spikes. Anyway if your kids cannot knock your spiked speakers over I'd suspect they're unlikely to be able to knock over ones on a seismic podium
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@toddverrone. You ask about what to expect from spring isolating your speakers if on a concrete slab? This is exactly the situation I am in, albeit the ground here in NW Portland is quite soft and transmits seismic vibration all too well.

Isolating your speakers on something like the seismic podiums will radically change the way you perceive bass. You will no longer feel bass transmitted via the floor and at first you may perceive this as a diminution in bass but at least in my setup the bass transmitted directly to you is better defined with greater clarity in subtle details and also greater differentiation between shades of tone and timbre. There’s a fuller description of my experience here
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/speaker-isolation-experience-with-townshend-seismic-isolation...

Seperately i I suspect you may find a different effect from roller balls. I have these under all my stands and the effect is more to tighten things up, much like adding herbies dampers to tubes. Oddly when I put apex footers under my power amps it seemed as if the volume level dropped - this is usually a sign of a reduction in the noise floor so I think that’s what the balls do, they help remove vibration manifest as noise. The podiums are quite different in effect

folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@toddverrone the classic mass on spring approaches (or active variants on same) are totally applicable to audio. Every component in your system down to the cables reacts to vibration and finding ways to reduce these vibrations will reduce the noise level in your system

Stands, footers, cable elevators they are all tools to deal with these problems and the effects are very audible. As @geoffkait points out the entry costs don't have to be large if you start off with some appropriate springs so why not give it a try and see what you find out?

folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@mains -- the paragraphs and punctation really help! The last post is so much easier to read, thanks for doing that -- you'll also get better responses so keep it up
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
It can be more subtle and insidious 


very true. I knew I had s seismic problem as I can feel the house shake with traffic but installing a solution that gets rid of it completely (at least for my turntable now it is on an active platform) was transformative. Everything is rock solid stable now and all sorts of subtle timing cues that were masked before are now evident. I've also seen the same effect installing roller based feet below my amps, oddly it made the amps sound less loud, presumably the effect of removing noise and harshness that is perceived as unacceptable loudness
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
Yes expensive. But buying used you can get them for the price of a minus-k and they come up regularly from instrument sellers on eBay

 I'd argue that anyone with a $10k plus vinyl rig should definitely invest and some would suggest that a $5k turntable on such a platform can outperform a $20k one without it and my experience says that could well be true
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@geoffkait not sure I understand your question? If there's rotational energy being propagated into the platform the turntable sits on isn't that a bad thing? Don't most competent turntable designs isolate the platter from the motor anyway (in my case decoupled via a magnetic drive linkage). Finally since the rotational energy is at .55 to .75 Hz (33-45rpm) then the Herzan will not do anything about it anyway. Having said all of that my turntable does run quieter (i.e. I hear less motor noise) since installing the platform so maybe the Herzan is actually helping by cancelling out motor noise transmitted into the stand (even if it was not going into the platter) -- who knows 😏

Your point on isolating everything is well taken, and very well heeled Asian audiophiles have been known to employ multiple Herzan type platforms just for this
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@geoffkait of course another solution for proper seismic isolation is an active platform. These solutions offer 90% at 3Hz and 99% at 10Hz which is enough to make a meaningful difference in the range of interest. Of course they are a little expensive but dealing with this range (say 2-20Hz) is going to cost.

Illustrative data sheet and performance
http://www.herzan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/TS-Series-Data-Sheet.pdf
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@geoffkait I just added a picture to my virtual system that shows the effect of running the motor. Clearly it is generating noise but most is cancelled by the isolation. Interestingly there is some "digital" residual noise albeit at a low level

interesting stuff
https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/5707#&gid=1&pid=31
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
The system actually works via 8 accelerometers (4 horizontal and 4 vertical). Data from all is accessible if you have an oscilloscope handy. The rotational forces being addressed through the combination of accelerometers I presume 

so if anyone in the Portland area wants to bring their scope round ...

more details here
http://www.herzan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Manual-TS-150_-TS-140_-TS-300LP.pdf

folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak
1,349 posts
 
@geoffkait the detailed explanation of why 8 accelerometers is in this paper http://www.herzan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/White-Paper-A-dynamic-antivibration-system.pdf


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