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Let's cut to the chase, eh? I regularly rent thrashed, scratched up, damaged DVD's. As long as these DVD's play without skipping or freezing, the picture looks just as pristine to me as anything from my own collection in perfect mint condition.

That's all the proof I need... you believe whatever you like.

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All right, just because you said it

What about this little wood laminated "puck".

http://www.hifi.nl/recensies.php?id=2118

I am too lazy to translate the text but it boils down to that the reviewer could not explain why, only that these "diffusers" had an positive effect on the resolution. His wife apparently also agreed (that's it: it must clearly have an effect then )

Would be interesting to get the reasoning behind that tweek.

EDIT: I'm sorry, I'm not trying to hi-jack this thread. I just thought these iitems fell into the same catagory.

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My understanding of Dutch is very limited, so I don't get what the «diffusor» should make, but I don't give it much credit -- there's no obvious benefit from such a wooden puck, although it certainly has a minor (rather harmful than beneficial) effect on sound radiation.

The trouble is...if I cannot understand the science behind something...I cannot accept it. moving a wire around in 1 foot circles in the earths magnetic field is not going to cause any induced EMF worthy of mention...if it does create any such EMF at all.

if this was true then all current carrying conductors would have to be set in concrete because you have current...and you have the earths magnetic field...things would be flailing around like in a storm.

Your headphone cables should be whipping around like a skipping rope...your CD player should be turning in circles...speakers bouncing around like ping pong balls...

Yeah...

Microphonics and vibration in audio gear is a real thing though I am not silly enough to fall into the hype that is required to sell the most ridiculous items to the unsuspecting and gullable audiophile who it seems will buy just about anything no matter how dumb.

I go out of my way to isolate all circuit boards from having airborne vibrations from loudspeakers couple in from the chassis.Metal chassis to same metal standoffs to a circuit board attached so it can be considered a single unit mean anything chassis borne rides right in to the standoffs and on to the board then any board mounted parts.

Cables are not microphonic ? Tell that to all the folks using teflex covered interconnects with their portable rig when they move the cord.This is no imaginary noise but a real world problem caused by tring to overdo the cables.sometimes (IMHO always) simple is best and simple solutions cheap if thought out.

I damp eveything metal with wood at some point.

I use dissimiliar materials everywhere two materials meet just so the continuity of the vibration will break up and eventually dissapate into a 'natural" material

I add mass to lightweight gear (those goofy rocks they sell are such an attempt)

I damp everything that does not pass the "flick" test.That is where I "flick" it with my index finger and listen to the tone it makes,add some wood blocks or a brass weight or a penny box or whatever then flick it again and listen.When the sound is more of a low thud that does not annoy me and not a thwak or tick or or any high pitched metallic sound I consider myself done.

The absolute worst offender of my "flick test" is any low to mid priced CD or DVD player.anyone ever look inside these puppies ?
ALL OPEN SPACE !
That and the large undamped surface area of the tin cover which in combination acts like a friggin resonant chamber (think caves ) !
Rap the cover and listen to the tone if you need to know if your transport needs help-most do unless really a high end piece.
Folks worry about electrical jitter of the digital signal,get all crazy about spending long green for the fix ($$$$$$) and never even consider how much vibration is flying around inside the player !
The after-market add-on manufacturers are more than happy to sell you a band-aid solution.Taking your loot is what they do.

Power transformer isolation,crystals in digital circuits isolated,circuit boards using ceramic standoffs and mounted to pine boards,wood panels added to cabinets both inside and out,solid block of brass inside a chassis for both vibration absorption and mass,blue tak,rope caulk,etc.

My tweaks are more the Home Depot variety and not the high end audio salon variety.
Those guys are shameless and should many times be arrested for fraud of the unsuspecting and anal audiophile who has to have everything even if it is so goofy he would be laghed out of town if his freinds and neighbors knew what this knucklhead actually spent for some "river gravel"

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thanks for the correction! sorry about that.

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I find it interesting that his company is selling quite decent looking acoustic treatment stuff and typical outrageous snake oil (the resonators... GMAB!).


Regards,

L.

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Finally somebody who speaks about what I have discovered too, in all modesty. Thank you!

The dampening of a chassis, can pay off. It might sound like hokus-pokus but my ears tell me differently.

I am new at this forum and I have often found it very strange how people, especially at meets, stack the equipment. There we have a $4000 CDP underneath the $2000 headphone amp and on top of it all a switch-box or a portable source. And next lays an external PSU and the power-cords run criss-cross everywhere. OK, the rooms are always full of people chatting. I guess it won’t matter then: The background noise just overwhelms any nuances.

I’m sorry, I might have been overly negative there.

However, a simple application of halved soft squash-balls under a Marantz CD6000OSE rendered an increase in the soundstage width and “air” of the general presentation, I remember. On the other hand, the same treatment did not have the same audioble effects on my current source. Better dampened? Perhaps.

Perhaps the high-end stuff at the meet's pictures also were very well dampened and shielded

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Could be.But many times the fix is componant specific and not a general fix.
Squishy balls/inner tubes/sorbothane/gel packs/hockey pucks-all work for one set of problems,roller balls another and spikes for another.It is by experimenting and a little bit of out of the box thinking that will get that individual piece up to speed.

I just about always add wood to inexpensive CD/DVD players because of the before mentioned large hollow space inside coupled with the large surface area of the undamped cover.Simply bolting on hardwood end caps to the cover and then adding a piece of pine cut to the size of the top and then glued inside with construction adhesive in combination with a top weight and bottom spikes to a cutting board on a tube works for me in most cases.
Total cost about ten to fifteeen bucks american

http://www.soundstage.com/audiohell/audiohell200306.htm

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I think brlliant pebbles just met its match

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Yep!
Getting the cables off the carpet worked so well even the wife heard it. You don't have to use the nice ceramic elevators, I got by for years with X shaped wooden pieces to hold cables up. The ceramic ones look a lot better and are more stable.

Wiping the cables down with anti static spray helps too, especially in the winter. Radio Shack sells some pretty cheap. Spray it on a cloth first then wipe the cables.

Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater...

The real problem with some of these companies is charging ridiculous amount of $$ regardless of something working or not. It is very possible those brass cable damper will change sound (not necessarily for the better), especially if the IC involved has very little mechanical damping, minimal jacketing, etc. For example, those popular cables with thin wire in "air dielectric" floating inside hollow teflon tubes. The problem is that one can DIY similar dampers for dirt cheap.

Remember those "Silver spirit" cables on A-gon that has the wooden damper separating teflon tubes? A lot of people love this cable's sound. I have made similar DIY IC's, and using some wooden sticks to dampen the teflon tubing does make the sound better to my ears. With other DIY cables, even power cords, adding more jacketing material such as rubber on top of the wire/dielectric/shield definitely changes the sound (again, not necessarily for the better).

As far as Machina Dynamica, the site has become the butt of jokes since the Brilliant Pebbles and Smart Chip, but before all that, they actually had some great products. The Nimbus isolating shelf is a well-respected device that IS based on science. I have one of their Promethean bases, which is a REAL product as well.

Remember, before everyone and their uncle jumped on the roller bearing bandwagon, something like Symposium Rollerblocks were laughed at also.

Even before that, remember how Electraglide COMPLETELY changed the way people think about power cords...

As usual, it's up to US as individuals to sort through the mess and find the real thing. To denounce everything b/c you don't understand it 100% without even trying would not be in the spirit of empirical science. Just my 2 cents.

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Microphonics are only important with headphones. If you think microphonics makes a bit of difference between your source and your amp, you're mistaken. The only reason why it makes a difference with headphones is that they're in physical contact with your head and ears, which transmit sound to your ear drum. Don't worry about microphonics for cables that aren't attached to your head.

And vibration damping is only a concern with speakers and components with moving parts (ie turntables and CD/DVD players). Ideally, all sound should be transmitted through the air to your ears, and not resonated through the floor and furniture in the room. That's why the have damping for speakers. The best are the magnet based systems actually levitate the speakers off the floor. But that is excessive. And besides, you'd have to have the same thing for your chair too because the sound waves will be absorbed by the floor and transmitted through the floor and furniture anyway. So the ideal setup isn't exactly practical. It is worthwhile to use damping on your speakers, and your subwoofer especially, but it shouldn't be taken to extremes (more than $50 and you've spent too much). Components like CD players and turntables should also be dampened to prevent vibrations from other audio equipment, especially low frequency stuff to reduce tracking problems. Potentially you could have read issues with a CD player due to vibrations from your speakers. Really though, this is more an issue with turntables. And if you're listening to headphones, there's nothing to worry about at all. Unless you're listening to Sony EX71's. They have a stupid amount of bass.

And techflex is to prevent snagging one of the wires. I can live with microphonics if it means not damaging my cable. I'm not 'overdoing' my cable by protecting it.

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Electraglide sounds like a personal lubricant. And if I were ever stupid enough to drop over a grand on a power cable, I'd expect a better product name. Something like 'Powertron Ultimatum Mk V Superconductor". If I ever sell cables, that's what I'll call them. Regardless of whether there were four previous iterations or not.