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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
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mains OP
170 posts
 
hi,
Please check the Max Townshend video spikes v Podiums on you tube, the Podiums are somewhat of a new product maybe a couple years old now, here in the UK they have received great reviews, the 3 top sounding rooms at the Bristol in the UK all had there speakers on Podiums,
If you try them under your speakers and your system sounds so much better then they have done the same to your system as they did to mine, its difficult to comment on something unless you have tried it, i believe there are other ways to break the acoustic connection between your speakers from the floor/room,but I found the Townshend Seismic Podiums achieved this for me, the newest edition to the Townshend Seismic Isolation technology is the Piano bars, used by owners of Grand pianos, they are also receiving great reviews and magnificent customer feedback, please check out the Townshend Audio website in the UK many vary famous musicians have had them installed.

hifiman5's avatar
hifiman5
1,832 posts
 
@kosst_amojan
Religion plays no role in my preference for decoupling. It works in my environment and experience. I adhere to no dogma about it, I just think it is something people should experiment with and let their ears be the judge. My guess is that the creator cares little for my audiophile preferences.

Might "science" be your religion?
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
If decoupling, and I mean competent decoupling, didn't work and and didn't keep most seismic type vibrations from getting up into the electronics then LIGO - long distance interferometer gravity wave observation - would not have been successful last year in detecting and observing gravity waves. LIGO would have done so a long time ago if it could but the sensitivity of the experiment required development of exceptionally robust isolation systems.

As has been pointed out already, resonant frequencies of cartridge, tonearm, platter of turntables as well as the resonant frequency of the laser assembly (spring mounted!) of CD players and the Fr of all the various electronic elements in components require relatively robust isolation devices, too. That's precisely why audiophiles discover that more expensive iso systems are superior to the usual DIY inner tubes and tennis balls. It's because their resonant frequencies are much lower and therefore more effective at 10-12Hz or wherever.
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