Active isolation, another report

[Ron Resnick]

Ron
My transformer is 85kg of vibrating toroidal coil
It hums away like a living thing
Active isoln seems to calm it down meaning maybe less noise or spikes in the supply to amps and hence spkrs
W my room being so quiet and forensic compared to London, these changes are well beyond cosmetic, truly radical
Drop yr resistance to three Herzans for yr three-box Io
It's just a matter of time...

If I could afford five Herzans I happily would put three under the Io boxes and one under each amplifier.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Mike, I think you know that I rarely start there. This is a rare exception.

Ron, I apologize for not taking a lighter touch with my comments. totally agree that that approach by you is rare, which was why I reacted that way, since it was 'not like you....had to be someone just 'playing you''. but.....I should have added a smiley face on my first post, and my second one too to show you it was not that big a deal. then later.....too late I realized I had been a bit harsh.

here they are in any case.

Here we are discussing not vibrations of a source or of a pre-amp or of an amplifier or even of a speaker, but vibrations of a transformer -- which simply outputs electricity. So my hyperbole antenna received a signal.

and I respect healthy cynicism, only that I respect listening feedback even more.

honestly I'd say active isolation would help any piece of gear that is involved in the signal path. pretty amazing stuff. i'll be stepping deeper into it shortly.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Please don't be silly! Nothing to apologise for!

 

[Mike Lavigne]

If I could afford five Herzans I happily would put three under the Io boxes and one under each amplifier.

hummmm.....or maybe.......... four sounds about right.

since a big enough Herzan can actually fit a pair of mono blocks.

 

[PeterA]

Ron
My transformer is 85kg of vibrating toroidal coil
It hums away like a living thing
Active isoln seems to calm it down meaning maybe less noise or spikes in the supply to amps and hence spkrs
W my room being so quiet and forensic compared to London, these changes are well beyond cosmetic, truly radical
Drop yr resistance to three Herzans for yr three-box Io
It's just a matter of time...

Marc, are you suggesting that Mike unbolt his EquiTech from the wall and place it on a massive Herzan isolation platform?

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Marc, are you suggesting that Mike unbolt his EquiTech from the wall and place it on a massive Herzan isolation platform?

wall mounted gear on ground floors do have advantages from a resonance standpoint......and my Equi=tech 10WQ is not only mounted 'on' the wall, but mounted 'inside' the wall with the wall built around it. and it's on an outside wall on the other side of a hallway from my listening room at the opposite end of the speaker end of the room. so at least it's unlikely to be affected by music feedback at all.

there would be a bit of proper local electrical code one might have to navigate to get 3 phase 220v panel system sitting on a shelf.

but no doubt if you could engineer a proper active isolation installation for it, that would make some degree of a positive difference. all one has to do is observe what the Furutech duplex outlets and duplex cover systems do to improve audible performance with mechanical resonance control of the power grid cables and plugs.

 

[Steve Williams]

since a big enough Herzan can actually fit a pair of mono blocks.

Mike


I am curious in this thought as for my mind the very opposite as I personally would have each channel on it's own active device, much the same as I have my dual mono dual power supply Lamm ML3 (4 boxes) each on its own Black Diamond filter.

For me that is the curse of mono electronics as I equate it it to double everything

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Mike


I am curious in this thought as for my mind the very opposite as I personally would have each channel on it's own active device, much the same as I have my dual mono dual power supply Lamm ML3 (4 boxes) each on its own Black Diamond filter.

an amplifier has no self resonance where one amp would contribute resonance that would negatively affect the other......it's only a matter of delivering the proper isolation performance. the larger, more robust TS-300 has a 600 pound capacity which allows for a huge amount of headroom in weight handling capacity. obviously one would try to distribute the weight evenly.

with passive shelves there are size realities to building the shelf that make it better to make it smaller. easier to ship and looks better. with active it's just a matter of it meeting performance targets or not.

the most challenging issue for active isolation and amplifiers is dealing with heavy stiff speaker cables and power cables. cables have the potential to compromise free movement and reaction times of the piezo electric actuators. my plan is to use a 'pasta hanger' bridge to make sure that the speaker cables stay level from amp to speaker, just a bit higher than the level of the amp speaker terminals so the down pressure from the cables pulling down and damping out the active reactions is neutralized.....with a little bit of springy absorption included to unweight the cable as best as possible. it will require some experimentation but i'll figure it out.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Jeepers, the combinations are endless
Wondering how my bespoke Furutech duplex sockets distribution strip might benefit plonked on an isolation platform
Luckily my Sablon Reservas PCs are moderately light and flexible compared to some competing leviathans so I'm sure I'll find a neutral position where they don't "bias" isolation platform operation
**************************************
Some additional news
Stacore Advanced passive isolation platform soon arrive here to do a potentially fascinating a/b
It sports: 94kg weight of mass loaded slate/discontinuous seperate top slate platform using Rollerblocks to provide additional lateral isolation/up to date bulletproof Vibraplane-style pneumatic isolators/5-layer constrained layer composite material tech
Let's see how an "OTT tricked out/throw the kitchen sink at it" updated version of Vibraplane designed and built from the ground up purely as an audiophile device compares to a non audiophile but uber high tech lab grade active isolation platform
I'll know within 30s of doing the a/b on my cdp when both in my room
The active Kuraka is so dramatically advantageous, if the passive Stacore Adv can compete I'll be ecstatic

 

[adyc]

hummmm.....or maybe.......... four sounds about right.

since a big enough Herzan can actually fit a pair of mono blocks.

It is ideal to put equipment rack on this platform.

 

[adyc]

Mike


I am curious in this thought as for my mind the very opposite as I personally would have each channel on it's own active device, much the same as I have my dual mono dual power supply Lamm ML3 (4 boxes) each on its own Black Diamond filter.

For me that is the curse of mono electronics as I equate it it to double everything

According to my understanding, active vibration platform prevents structural vibration transmit to anything placed on the platform. It does not really care many devices on the platform provided the weight are evenly distributed.

 

[bonzo75]

Amir? is that you? what did you do to my friend Ron?

Actually, this is possible. Amir was once the co-owner, and now its Ron. Kind of those movies where a guy stages an accident (and boy, what a car crash that was) and then comes back to life with another identity. And I have only met Ron, never met Amir, further proof there might only be one.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Ok, can we get to the bottom of this?
If an active platform can support an upper tolerance limit of, say, 100kg
And an inert rack plus 3 components comes in under this limit
Is it feasible that a single active platform will isolate those 3 components as efficiently as isolating each component w its own platform?

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Actually, this is possible. Amir was once the co-owner, and now its Ron. Kind of those movies where a guy stages an accident (and boy, what a car crash that was) and then comes back to life with another identity. And I have only met Ron, never met Amir, further proof there might only be one.

Ked, you are such a *hit *tirrer.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

It is ideal to put equipment rack on this platform.

no; it is ideal to put an equipment rack on this rack (the long wood shelf underneath with active units incorporated (hidden by the shelf skirt) and a rack above it). notice additional active Takio Tana devices underneath gear above that shelf. in effect, this is active units stacked.

btw; on the right side is a pair of Audiopax amplifiers on a single Takio Tana active device to good effect.

 

[PeterA]

Ok, can we get to the bottom of this?
If an active platform can support an upper tolerance limit of, say, 100kg
And an inert rack plus 3 components comes in under this limit
Is it feasible that a single active platform will isolate those 3 components as efficiently as isolating each component w its own platform?

Marc, this may seem an efficient approach, however, the individual components are not isolated from the vibrations that each of the others may cause. I agree with Mike, it seems the most effective approach, regardless of cost, is to isolate each component individually. You wrote earlier that your power conditioner's transformer vibrated/hummed like a bird or something? Well, those vibrations would migrate and effect other components in the rack if they were not individually isolated. I suppose some power supplies and amplifiers might also produce such vibrations.

If I had the funds, I would investigate removing all rubber feet from components, replacing them with hard footers designed to encourage internally generated vibrational energy from draining away from the component into a mass sink, and place all of this on an individual active isolation platform. One is then addressing both external and internal vibration and removing it from the component and preventing it from entering the component.

I think this would be the ultimate solution, especially if most of the gear is removed to an adjacent room or beneath the floor. But what fun would all of this audio jewelry be if we could not see it?

 

[adyc]

Marc, this may seem an efficient approach, however, the individual components are not isolated from the vibrations that each of the others may cause. I agree with Mike, it seems the most effective approach, regardless of cost, is to isolate each component individually. You wrote earlier that your power conditioner's transformer vibrated/hummed like a bird or something? Well, those vibrations would migrate and effect other components in the rack if they were not individually isolated. I suppose some power supplies and amplifiers might also produce such vibrations.

If I had the funds, I would investigate removing all rubber feet from components, replacing them with hard footers designed to encourage internally generated vibrational energy from draining away from the component into a mass sink, and place all of this on an individual active isolation platform. One is then addressing both external and internal vibration and removing it from the component and preventing it from entering the component.

I think this would be the ultimate solution, especially if most of the gear is removed to an adjacent room or beneath the floor. But what fun would all of this audio jewelry be if we could not see it?

I don't quite agree. All his equipments are on Symposium platforms. The Symposium platforms have already drained away any internal vibrations from the equipments. Only thing left is structural vibrations from the floor. Putting a rack on top of active vibration platform should do the trick. Putting every equipment on its own active vibration platform IMHO is overkill.

 

[PeterA]

I don't quite agree. All his equipments are on Symposium platforms. The Symposium platforms have already drained away any internal vibrations from the equipments. Only thing left is structural vibrations from the floor. Putting a rack on top of active vibration platform should do the trick. Putting every equipment on its own active vibration platform IMHO is overkill.

Yes, I see your point, adyc. I was thinking more in general terms as with standard components sitting on a standard rigid rack. I suppose the typical rubber footers help to prevent internal vibrations from escaping and migrating toward other gear, but one may want those vibrations to exit the component. I had forgotten that Marc has already addressed energy drainage from his components with his Symposium platforms.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Marc, this may seem an efficient approach, however, the individual components are not isolated from the vibrations that each of the others may cause. I agree with Mike, it seems the most effective approach, regardless of cost, is to isolate each component individually. You wrote earlier that your power conditioner's transformer vibrated/hummed like a bird or something? Well, those vibrations would migrate and effect other components in the rack if they were not individually isolated. I suppose some power supplies and amplifiers might also produce such vibrations.

If I had the funds, I would investigate removing all rubber feet from components, replacing them with hard footers designed to encourage internally generated vibrational energy from draining away from the component into a mass sink, and place all of this on an individual active isolation platform. One is then addressing both external and internal vibration and removing it from the component and preventing it from entering the component.

I think this would be the ultimate solution, especially if most of the gear is removed to an adjacent room or beneath the floor. But what fun would all of this audio jewelry be if we could not see it?

I don't quite agree. All his equipments are on Symposium platforms. The Symposium platforms have already drained away any internal vibrations from the equipments. Only thing left is structural vibrations from the floor. Putting a rack on top of active vibration platform should do the trick. Putting every equipment on its own active vibration platform IMHO is overkill.

it turns out that stacking one active unit a top another active unit (directly or with a structure between them) improves the performance......should you be willing to pay for it. it does call for a well sorted out complete installation to achieve this; you cannot just throw it out there.....it needs to be engineered.

when combining passive approaches above an active device it will always just depend on the total picture. I've tried passive de-coupling footers, regular stock footers, and solid BDR cones. right now the BDR cones have resulted in the best overall performance for my particular system.

as far as resonance coming from the gear; my strong opinion is that unless there is a gross casework issue, that some sort of resonance mitigating device sitting on top of the gear would work best such as this.

 

[microstrip]

Mike


I am curious in this thought as for my mind the very opposite as I personally would have each channel on it's own active device, much the same as I have my dual mono dual power supply Lamm ML3 (4 boxes) each on its own Black Diamond filter.

For me that is the curse of mono electronics as I equate it it to double everything

There is no reason to have separate platforms for left and right channels, except that perhaps the platform is optimized for a certain mass. I can't imagine that crosstalk through the racks can influence performance. However the physical separation will probably increase distance between channels and this can be a good thing.