[jumping jupiters]

curiousity got the cat a month ago and i gave in to the hype...bought 2 sets of myrtle bocks from cardas.

a year ago i had my first experience with isolation...i sought out the cheap soloution formally known as vibrapods...a great starting point to see if the idea of isolating ones components from vibration could hold water or not. the long and the short was the the vibrapods turned on the light of tweaking my system...bringing an understanding to the idea of softening sounds, thickening bass and clarifying highs. after the initial tests i researched 10's of other ideas that fequent the boards on the popular sights. i ended up building a maple rack and then tried brass footers, duron plastic, cork, mdf composites and whatnot. i even machined down a few metal pieces to hear what differences materials can make. in the end, noting quite prepared me for what the myrtle blocks would do.

mind you that i never spent $$$ on isolation footers...

for $30 spent on a set of 6 blocks (i use 3 under various components)...the price is very close to that of the vibrapods...i experienced exponential enjoyment of my music. the first things i noticed was vocals became more human...quivers, throatier, more cohesive...wood instruments obtained a unique signiture...a drum head now had texture. all of this was noticed on the cd source alone. afterwords i placed my second set of 3 blocks underneith the singlepower ppx3 amp...the background became blacker causing the enhancements to the cd player to become more pronounced. i felt like the music now had musical teeth...something more palpable happened?!? but nothing quite prepared me for the PRAT obtained by placing 3 little blocks under the monster power conditioner...i have no idea why but isolating my power center caused the bigest difference! I actually had to adjust down (retard...in the politically correct sense of the word) my tt. i have no idea why all of these things happened, but unlike most of the other isolation attempts the improvements changed my listening for the better over an extended period of time.

i am not a good reviewer per se, but i thought i might share a really system changing event in my experience...more than power cord changes. i think it might be worth a shot if you are in to this sort of thing.

just to balance out my opinion i will say that i had little to no difference found when placed under my ss phono amp...marginal difference under my pre amp.

 

[Jon L]

Resonance control is just as maddening as cables. You just can't know what something will do with certain components until you actually try it.

You are right that power conditioners react very well to good resonance control. Many people forget to do this, but a synergistic isolation/resonance footers under power conditioner can bring relatively large improvements, mostly b/c it's feeding multiple components.

Also, you are going to hear a lot more difference when using speakers vs. headphones, and what you put under your speakers REALLY can make profound differences.

This week, I've been playing with changing one (out of 3) footers under each speaker, and changing one metal cone to BDR cone makes the speaker almost unrecognizable as the same speaker sound-wise..

 

[Welly Wu]

I might get the Ayre / Cardas Jenga blocks.

 

[chesebert]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jon L This week, I've been playing with changing one (out of 3) footers under each speaker, and changing one metal cone to BDR cone makes the speaker almost unrecognizable as the same speaker sound-wise..

I guess you are right you gotta try it...all this sounds like voodoo magic/snake oil to me.

I got some Insignias..anything I should try to make this a $500 speaker?

 

[Patrick82]

OMG! Solid-tech Feet Of Silence make the music sound very heavy. It's like changing to other headphones! Great tweak for K1000 if you want more body.

Edit: It sounds 2-3 dB louder after I put them under my amp. It's fatiguing to listen because of too much body. However, it's a great match for the thin sounding Nordost Vishnu! I don't need another Valhalla power cord for DAC-1 anymore.

$2750 saved from these $400 feet!

I'm afraid to put Feet Of Silence under my Power Plants soon.

Everything already sounds black and HUGE. I don't like it, but I need the detail.

 

[jumping jupiters]

i think playing with isolation is one of the most satisfying saturday/sunday activities...its cheap (in this hobby) and it always brings new things out of ones system. one thing i have learned is that isolation really comes to fruition as one climes up the component scale...the less capable the component the smaller the difference.

 

[ken36]

Why not, try this. I thought.

 

[Patrick82]

I experimented some more and got surprised again. I didn't expect to hear such a dramatic difference between 2 step and 3 step isolation!

Disc Of Silence > Shelf suspension > Feet Of Silence > Cary 303/300 > DAC1


Remove Feet Of Silence under Cary and DAC1

Muddy, thin, open, relaxing, less detail, incomplete bass transients that are in the background. Mids are focused more but they don't sound as transparent as my amp without the feet. The source needs the best isolation!!
Cary 303/300 sounded better than Benchmark DAC1.
It sounded 2-3 dB quieter without the feet.


Put Feet Of Silence under amp's and DAC1's Power Plant

DAC1: Smoother, more transparent, warmer. Bass isn't faded away in background anymore, there is great layering. Bass is faster.
Sounds 1 dB louder than above.

Cary 303/300: Bass doesn't sound as heavy as DAC1. Cary's Power Plant has tennis balls under it.


Feet Of Silence back at sources, tennis balls under Power Plants

Louder, heavier, blacker, smoother, more detailed. Bass is focused and faster.

This explains why Cary and DAC1 sound the same now! DAC1 is very sensitive to vibration, amazing little source.

 

[jaybar]

All thgat is being discussed is not isolation. By and large, compliant materials or things that allow some type of movement, are more likely to isolate. Cones and wood blocks tend to couple a component to ist environment. Wood blocks and some type of cones are also tuningh the resonance frequecies, but not significantly eliminating them.

I really like the Ayre/Cardas wood blocks, but then I have a fair bit of Ayre gear. I would not say for a minute that I am isolating the components.

There is also the issue of constrained layer damping and multiple materials, which can BOTH alter and dissipate resonance frequencies.

There are also racks such as Grand Prix Audio, which offer a complete ande complex solution for dealing with resonances. GPA racks are designed so that equipment sounds betst w/o added footers and other devices.

I find many of this stuff to be exceedingly rach specific. I switched from Zoethecus racks to the Solidsteel 6.4 racks and I am getting completely different sound, with the smae equipment and the same Ayre wood blocks.

If I had the $$$$$ and the space, I would get 2 GPA Racks and not have to worry about tweaking with footers.

Jay

 

[mysticaldodo]

I just set my sub woofer on the floor near my power amp (due to cable length). The woofer of the sub is actually facing half of the amp blocked by inch of wood (have not been able to detect any audible effect on the amp) I used to decouple the woofer but now I leave it on the floor since it sounds better that way. Should I use some kind of isolation for my power amp since I too leave it on the floor. My sub has rubber feet while my amp feet...I'm not really sure what it is but it doesn't feel like plastic or rubber though. My floor is also the reflective tile type.

The manufacturer of my amp told me not to buy any rack or isolation for my amp since the feet are good enough. I forgotten to ask him what the feet were made of though

But now I have the sub closeby, I would like to try some isolation to see whether it works or not.

My power amp is 25kg by the way

Any footers able to support that or maybe I should just get a low stand with spikes underneath?

 

[jaybar]

I would recommend as good an amp stand as you can afford. One that isolates and does not couple. I would imagibe that the sub transmits a lot of vincations through the floor which cannot be good for the amp's performance, given the proximity of the amp to the sub.

Great amp stands that truely isolate are not cheap.

Jay

 

[skyline889]

Mmm, curly Koa vibration isolation for my breakout box

. I'll post a picture of it when I finish sanding and staining it, it's actually more for heat dissipation then isolation.

 

[Bosk]

I must admit I've never experienced such a dramatic improvement in my systems after using various Herbie's Audio Lab footers, but they seem to improve the sound in a subtle way so I'll keep persisting with them.

 

[Jahn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bosk I must admit I've never experienced such a dramatic improvement in my systems after using various Herbie's Audio Lab footers, but they seem to improve the sound in a subtle way so I'll keep persisting with them.

Speaking of Herbie, I use his Hal-O tube dampeners for the tubes in my Melos, and there's a big diff. My old telefunks without the rings would actually howl when the volume was jacked above Noon. With the dampeners, no problems - for any of my tubes. I laugh at tube microphonics now!

 

[eyeteeth]

I just put those Cardas blocks under everything and they do seem to change the sound. I say "seem" but it's pretty obvious. It could be psychological but I doubt it. Once I get adjusted to the change over a week or two I'll take them out and listen. I should remove them one at a time and listen. I can't say it's an improvement really. There does seem to be greater clarity/separation/dimensionality but at the cost of some warmth. Things seem brighter, that's not really what I want.
Don't fool with my tonal balance!!!!

It could be that I'm getting a truer listen to something else in the chain.