Vibration isolation or absorption?

But, when the most expensive platform with the highest degree of damping was put under the CD player, the sound became too dry and analytical.  This was not just my conclusion, but everyone else thought the same, including the Symposium representative.  The idea that the "ideal" is the least amount of vibrational energy is not always the case and this goes with all components as well as room treatments. 

What this suggests is that the damping system had a flaw; perhaps something like the system was ineffective at a certain frequency.

ISOLATION IS THE NUMBER ONE MISCONCEPTION IN AUDIO

Springs, discs, pucks, squish balls, pads, cones, spheres, and all the materials have retailed in audio since the late 1980s.

All these devices are coupling products according to the empirical laws.

Isolation does not exist on Earth in the presence of gravity. Audiophiles are a small group of believers who insist it does.

How many believe a wood shelf isolates resonance? How many believe their equipment should float in space, free from all earthly vibrations? How many believe isolation is the goal leading to the holy grail of sound quality? 

Do you know electricity is the root cause of vibration?

DECOUPLING – AUDIO’S SECOND ULTIMATE MISCONCEPTION 

Coupling and decoupling are the most popular marketing strategies used today. Two names have taken the modern-day helm leaving many methods and theorems of vibration management behind. 

The only significant difference between the two is that coupling science is based on the laws of vibration, motion, and gravity and is accepted science.

Anyone can argue that absolute mechanical isolation and decoupling cannot exist in the presence of gravity.

Decoupling is a great advertising tool in the marketing gambit for repackaging and selling old stuff. 

The product designs and the packaging looks fancier today but still use coupling as their function regardless of storyboarding. The products sold long before the term ‘de-coupling’ hit the marketplace. The word decoupling has yet to gain scientific proof other than the Sound Industry’s love for marketing.

SOUND IS VIBRATION 

Killing vibration is stupidity. Eliminating it is impossible. Fearing it makes for sales expansion. Using it as a tool to improve sound reproduction makes more sense. 

We should rethink our minimalist understanding of vibration and realize we live in a world where everything vibrates! 

Thank you for your time. 

Robert Maicks

Sound Engineer, Vibration Management Consultant

Thank you, Robert Maicks. 

@audiopoint

I am neither an engineer, nor a "Vibration Management Consultant", but I find some of the assertions in your above post to be dubious.

Springs, discs, pucks, squish balls, pads, cones, spheres, and all the materials have retailed in audio since the late 1980s.

All these devices are coupling products according to the empirical laws.

You are suggesting that springs, used in combination with dampers, are coupling devices?

Would you characterize shock absorbers, used on every car in the world, as coupling devices?

Böllhoff is a German company founded in 1867. They have produced vibration control products for many products over a very long period of time. Their products were used in early VWs, and on the Lunar Module used when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon. Etc.

In reference to some of their current spring/dampening products, they say this (bold emphasis mine):

Vibration and noise decoupling

SITEC® Spring
The decoupling spring system with screw connection

Do you imagine that the engineers at Böllhoff are badly uninformed about "laws of vibration, motion, and gravity", or is the company making false advertising claims?

Here is a link to a patent of a "Vibration decoupling connection device", in which the word "decoupling" is used multiple times:

vibration decoupling device

I have the impression that you are playing semantic games, based on the suggestion that even the best designed springs/dampers are unable to completely decouple components from floors/racks, etc.

It may well be true that like shock absorbers, the best that spring-based isolation devices in audio can do is to greatly mitigate vibration. But there is no doubt whatsoever that, at least in the case of speakers, they can come far closer to decoupling than coupling devices such as spikes.

And as most audiophiles are, in fact, using such tools to "improve sound reproduction", your post strikes me as much ado about nothing.

@jumia 

Is vibration a two-way street?

So you have vibration from a speaker cabinet, but don't you also have vibration due to the sound waves bouncing around the room where the floor will vibrate and that vibration will transfer back into the speaker cabinet and also the component rack?

So maybe isolation is the answer?

Yes, you have all kinds of vibrations.

However I believe that the most serious ones are those usually coming from the loudspeaker cabinet itself.

Accelerometer tests have revealed that the loudspeaker baffle can be vibrating at far greater levels when that loudspeaker is placed on spikes as opposed to when it has been decoupled via springs or rubber.

Perhaps we could imagine the loudspeaker drivers acting like musicians standing on a vibrating floor? The less that 'floor' vibrates throre chance they have of performing with greater accuracy.

Of course there will be other vibrations that might affect the floor also but the ones coming from inside the box must surely be the most serious when it comes to smearing the sound.

It should also be noted that these days an increasing number of loudspeaker manufacturers are using laser inferometry to design their cabinets in order to limit these vibrations from acting on the loudspeaker baffle.

And then there's the thin walled BBC approach as used by the likes Harbeth, Spendor and Graham Audio.

The days of loudspeakers with terrible 'waterfall' graphs revealing poor construction seem to be over.

However, since my Tannoy speakers are over 40 years old, I'm not too surprised to find that decoupling works for me. Back then, the BBC research into cabinet construction had barely been published.