The performance of isolation devices is ultimately tied to the Laws of Thermodynamics; generally the First and Second Law. The answer to your question is a qualified, yes; a maple platform and pins could be better than your current configuration.
Here are some things to consider. The First Law of Thermodynamics states that energy in a System cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be converted from one form to another. This is really important.
Basically, this is a complicated way of saying that your listening room is an energy System when you turn your components on and the volume up. Electricity is the primary energy fueling your system.
Your speakers convert electrical energy into mechanical energy. The motion of your speaker diaphragms creates particle disturbances in the air. These airborne disturbances propagate outward from your speakers and you hear beautiful music. These propagating disturbances are molecular and are transferred into everything in your listening room including your components and the isolation device. This is the energy that needs to be eliminated. This is largely defined within the Second Law of Thermodynamics which states that energy generally diffuses outward from a point of focus. There are other implications of the Second Law.
Mechanical energy degrades the performance of the components and the isolation system and this is one of the reasons some isolation devices fail to meet your expectations. There are other reasons, but in general, exposed surfaces in the System become part of the System.
Putting the First and Second Law together, a really good isolation device is an energy conversion system. It converts deleterious mechanical energy into an innocuous form of energy, in this case low grade heat, before it can diffuse into your components and degrade their performance. The rate of conversion needs to be really high; the higher the better. It needs to quickly convert mechanical energy to heat energy across the audible spectrum and its extremes. It needs to be so good that energy striking a component drains downward into the device preventing your components from reaching equilibrium with the energy permeating the air.
A maple platform will be exposed to the same mechanical disturbances degrading your components. It will be in the System, as will the pins. It will come up to equilibrium with the mechanical disturbances permeating the air and it will be excited by vibration coming up from the floor at a host of frequencies. At some frequencies it will resonate; it will amplify mechanical energy.
A block of maple is not a high grade energy conversion system, but thats ok. The optimal choice is a maple platform with the grain oriented in the horizontal plane.
Hope that helps,
J
Critical Mass Systems
