Under my tower speakers -- Isoacoustics Gaia, other options?

@rmdmoore 

Pleased to hear you didn't despair over your suspended wooden floor and put the speakers on stone blocks.  Assuming there may be a weight issue, try using a thinner but larger stone block, like a large paving stone.  Spike the speaker to the stone.  If your floor is flat and even, there will be little or no movement in the stone if you shake the speaker.   If there is movement, try putting a thin layer of fabric under the stone, or two layers if the movement remains.

But note: with a concrete floor, nothing stabilises the speakers more than spikes.  Everything else allows movement.  From the listening seat, movement of the speaker chassis means distortion.

As far as I can tell, most of this advice is correct: if you have concrete floors with carpet, as you do, use spikes. Ideally, the cabinet should be completely rigid; all the movement should be in the speaker cones and domes, not reactive movement in the cabinet. Sort of like suspension in a car coupled to a very rigid chassis: the engineers can calculate the dynamics of the suspension, but flex of the chassis is too complex to accurately model and compensate for. If the cabinet can move in reaction to the speaker movement, it will "smear" the sound somewhat.

The exception would be if your speakers stand on a suspended wood floor. In that case, rigid coupling will create a secondary—and uncontrolled—passive radiator in the floor! So, with suspended wood floors, de-coupling is best.

That's what I've done with my 49" tall and 52 lb. Scientific Fidelity Teslas. I tried Gaia, borrowed from a friend, but settled on sorbothane feet attached to a screw threaded to mate with the female threads set into the base of the speaker—where the spikes would go. Eight bucks each on eBay. Significant improvement in imaging, clarity of bass, etc. But the speakers do wobble. Of course, they would on Townshend podiums, too.

+1 kingbr  I have pair of Verity speakers on carpeted concrete.  In theory coupled to floor with spikes seems best, but I went with Herbies Giant Threaded Sliders and haven't looked back.  Makes moving them a breeze, and they sound wonderful.

Yes, spikes! 

Hi Hilde,

I have a pair of Focal Sopra 2 driven by a Hegel H390.  I had the GAIA feet under them for a couple of years, for a while driven by an H360.  Before that I used spikes.  Hardwood floor.  Something about the system always seemed lacking to me.  The highs were there but not "clear" or "precise" which made no sense to me as those beryllium tweeters are super fast .  Mids were a bit smeared, bass sounded deep and fine, to the depth they go anyway.

On a whim, almost impulse buy, I bought the Townshend Bars, as the regular stands are too big for the location of the speakers.  The impact has been shockingly transformative.  The weirdest thing is how much better the beryllium tweeters sound.  Mids have lost the smear, vocals are richer and more defined and while I thought the bass was fine, turns out I was wrong.  But it's much better now. 

I think what the Townshends do is prevent the floor from becoming energized by the speaker.  When the floor becomes energized it becomes another speaker in the room, and a rather poor one at that.  So while my speakers were actually doing a great job on their own, by the time the sound got to my ears, 10-20 feet away, it had been stepped all over by the crappy sound being generated by my floor "speakers ".  At least that's my hypothesis. 

I know the Townshends are a bit pricey, but they are easily one of the best tweaks I've ever made.