Tweaks

Jax2 (Marco), I know the reason you're so opposed to the Clever Little Clock and I'm gonna let the whole Audiogon community know the truth.

You bought one last September and after some testing you decided to go for the refund.

Before you could box it up and ship it back, one of your big dogs chewed it up and deposited it in the yard where you were unable to tell Clever Little Clock from puree of Gravy Train.

Driven to deep depression, you immersed yourself in Elton John albums at ear splitting levels, causing one of your Klipsh drivers to blow more than Elton John at a YMCA.

Understandably, you're still depressed but lets be honest here.

On a more productive note to the OP's query. I recently did a test of isolation products a few months back. I can't recall the name of the product I was trying as it was supplied by a friend, but it was a rubber-based isolation product. I compared it on my front-end digital components comparing it to my favored Sistrum stands, which are metallic cone-based systems. I could certainly hear a difference between the two options. The Sistrum sounded more focused and clearly etched. There was a particularly muted vocal passage in one cut that became much more easy to hear and understand. The rubber based isolation product (It was not Vibrapods, which I have also used) sounded a bit softer and less focused, and the particular vocal passage was nearly impossible to make out. Just my .02 Lincoln's but this says to me that isolation products can sound differently and it would be worth trying out various products yourself. I had a similar experience with Vibrapods as one poster already noted; they made marks on a component that were not removable by any means I tried. They also marked up wood. I would not use them myself, simply for that reason. This speaks nothing at all to their effectiveness, and I think the manufacturer is aware of the issue because they did assist me in trying to find a product to remove the marks (not successful).

Damn, Albert. You swore to me you wouldn't tell anyone!!!! That's the last time I buy the drinks!!!!

Semi: What about XLR shorting plug? you solder both "+" and "-" to GND?

That's a good question, and I'm not sure whether it would be more optimal to just short pins 2 and 3 to each other, or to also short them to ground (pin 1). A theoretical argument could probably be conjured up to support either approach. In practice, my guess would be that generally there would not be a perceivable difference between the two alternatives.

Regards,
-- Al

Jax2 , were cool. I know that the Machina Dynamica items seem like wild unbelievable stuff.
Albertporter, perhaps Jax2 could have his dog sit in the center of the room for better imaging.
Enough said about this on my part.

Here are a couple more tweaks that I have found to be worth while.

1.Apply Quicksilver Gold at the ends of the copper wire at the dedicated circuit breaker , also apply it on the ends of the wire at the dedicated outlet.. Funny, I did not like the Quicksilver Gold on my speaker spades, power cords, or interconnects. It might be that the wire used in home wiring is a much lower grade to start with and the Quicksilver Gold improves on that connection.

2.I have also been using the new Alan Maher CBF items, and again, they do something positive to the openness of the soundstage.