Platforms: granite, marble, maple or other?

Maple.....go to Home Depot, you'll find the John Boos cutting boards 18"x 20" x1.75" for $36 and change(the checkout gurl thought i was nutz buying 6)
for the money,use your imagination.... if you choose to use them under amps, oil them well with mineral oil keep them from drying, they are nice platens

Jafox; you're apparently a non-believer when it comes to vibration control/management, and I won't try to convince you here. I've already briefly stated the improvements I got using the maple board under my amp and stand by them. There was no need to go "back and forth", but I easily could.

To use Jeffloistarca's acronym, STFA. Prior to using the maple board, I had this very high performance amp sitting on a Townshend Seismic Sink with very good results-- but lacking the warmth, then the amp on the Sink on the maple board w/cork/rubber isolation footers. This combo added the pleasant warmth and worked very well, but finally I preferred it w/o the Seismic Sink in the stack-- more warmth. If interested, you might check the Mapleshade Music website for more info specifically on maple.

I would note that with the amp just sitting on the MDF of my stereo stand, music quality/character was muddy and sort of incoherent with poor detail and not very musical at all.

Consideration of vibration control/management really is essential in a high performance system (which I have) to get the full potential out of it. Personally, I think there are many potentially excellent stereo systems out there that are not optimally tweaked for best performance. IMO, the same kind of attention to detail needs to be applied to all system components that is typically used in a high performance analog system. Cheers. Craig

For speakers, I like the idea of iso bearings on a granite slab, but the bearings are $300/set ($150 set b-stock); a set for each speaker. That's a lot of money. Worth it?

Or is there a cheaper DIY bearing mechanism?

Thanks for all your advice and experience.

Garfish, what is between the amp and the maple cutting board. Does the amp sit on it's factory-installed feet, or did you change to something different?

Jim D.

Garfish, it was not that I am a believer or disbeliever here. But from all my experiences with "upgrading" my audio and HT systems, a piece at a time, after listening back and forth with and without the new item, it is often not as big a difference as I thought from the beginning.

There are times when the system sounds phenomenol and other times for whatever reason, not good at all......and nothing has changed. I can only assume it is the humidity, clean power or just my mood and interest at that moment.

I have done extensive cable comparisons from the line stage and amp, and yes, there can be big differences, but often they are difficult to hear as well. And this is between NBS, MIT and Cardas cable. So it is hard for me to imagine how simply putting a board or platform under a component can be so noticeable of a change unless you return briefly to how it was before for confirmation.

And of course a high resolution system will show this as well. But if an amplifier, of all pieces in a system, unless it is loaded with tubes, is susceptible to such problems when not on an isolation stand, that does not say much of the design/assembly of the amp.

I have experimented with a few platforms under my Clearaudio Ref Table and also BAT VK P10 / VK31SE and I have to be honest here, nothing has brought on any more detail or a change in the tonal character. This was the point of my question above as I went through all this myself recently.