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
hi thastum/bdp24
i went for the cardas golden cubes over the Ebonywood blocks and now regret it as they over damped my system , very interesting reading from bdp24 i read also about barry diament and hes isolation choices for hes big maggies somewhere i read he was trying symposium roller bearings when i went to buy the same ones maybe lots of people read the same because they were constantly out of stock and back ordered , im glad i didnt purchase because the podiums have completely done the job with even better results than i thought possible barry diaments remastered recordings in 1990 of bob marley albums are considered the most musical but now maybe the japan shm cd are slightly better and very nice in the mini lp style ,i have seen barry diaments system pictured on hes website it looks incredible , did you say he is using the podiums now under hes big speakers i know they are quite new to the market , the speaker bars were first , then adjustable speaker bars now we have the seismic podiums, i have thought isolating sensitive equipment was important but placing my speakers on the podiums was a complete game changer for me i hope every ones isolation choices made the same huge improvement as mine did its so great as an audiophile when a really special product arrives that hasn't got the huge 100k plus prices , i have never come across such am upgrade as correct speaker isolation im now waiting on the seismic platforms for my electronics fingers crossed they raise the bar even further.


Question: how unstable are some of these things making your speakers? We have a playroom in our basement and kids have to walk right past my right speaker to get to the playroom. I'd love to experiment with these things, but I can't risk a child bumping into or leaning on the speaker and knocking it over. It would crush my gear rack..
@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
It’s really a center of gravity issue. A very heavy subwoofer with a relatively low center of gravity would be more stable on a springy type stand or feet than tall speakers that weigh the same but with higher center of gravity, all things being equal. Employing a wide arrangement of the springs by placing them under a board the dimensions of which are much greater than the footprint of the speaker goes a long way to bolster lateral support and might be the only way to do it sometimes.
Alas, I can't really get much more width than how wide my speakers already are.. again because of the need to keep space for the playroom entrance. Right now my speakers are spiked through carpet into a concrete slab...

Anyone have any idea if springs and/or roller bearings would be an improvement over spikes on a concrete slab?