Advice needed first time isolation

[b345t]

Hey guys, I've got a Solid Steel 3 tier rack and looking for some good isolation for my new gear.

Here are the products I am considering:
1. Taiko Audi Daiza
https://taikoaudio.com/product/daiza/
2+3. IsoAcoustics Delos // Orea
https://isoacoustics.com/products/delos-the-floating-island/https://isoacoustics.com/orea-series/
4. Stillpointshttps://www.stillpoints.us/(They have a lot of different models and look like a serious but EXPENSIVE company, I live in Europe and the Ultra 6 costs almost €1000 per footer!)
5. Critical Mass Center Stage 2
http://www.criticalmasssystems.com/productPages/CenterStage.html
(Again, looks serious but expensive too)

So, anyone have any first-hand experience with these products? Is it better to go with a platform or separate footers or both? Any tips greatly appreciated. Cheers

 

[spiritofmusic]

I would chip in re considering Symposium Acoustics Rollerblocks and Arya Audio Revopods. First class experience w both.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

tell us about your floor. concrete? suspended wood?

 

[b345t]

My floor is (starting from the lower layer) suspended wood-->1cm thick carpet padding--->carpet top (the medium-thick/silky/yacht type). Hope that makes sense

 

[Mike Lavigne]

My floor is (starting from the lower layer) suspended wood-->1cm thick carpet padding--->carpet top (the medium-thick/silky/yacht type). Hope that makes sense

yes; makes perfect sense.

a suspended wood floor plus carpet are both flexing layers, which means they are bouncing to some degree with the sound.

your rack and any footers are compromised by that floor and carpet layer. your solid steel rack, if it uses spikes, might get through the carpet to the floor. but not all suspended wood floors are created equal. yours might be really solid, or the rack and speakers might be located at solid points. and your speakers are also sitting on that same floor, pushing resonance into it. which causes a feedback loop that magnify's the resonance. and finally it depends on how loud and dynamically you typically play the music. at low SPL's you are not exciting the floor much, but at higher SPL's it might get very smeared.

so investing in expensive footers might not pay the dividends that other approaches might. you should look at ways to solidify your floor under your speakers and your rack.....if you observe jumping up and down causes your speakers or rack to vibrate.

in my previous room i paid a guy (not very much) to pour concrete slabs in my crawl space and then used beams and shims to remove the bounce from my floor under my rack and speakers. made a huge difference, and would be much cheaper than a system wide application of expensive footers. but that might not work for you. sometimes mass loading can reduce the bounce in a suspended floor. but it's tricky to do and not a perfect solution.

my real message is to understand cause and effect and then to apply common sense before you spend any money. all those tools you list are good ones. but they presume a solid rack to work from. and any effects from those tools will include the suspended floor effect.

lastly; there are lots of great systems on suspended wood floors. it's not a fatal flaw.

 

[b345t]

Excellent advice, thank you. I am currently waiting for a Townshend rack isolation system to sit the spikes of the rack onto there, negating their contact with the floor. I have granite slabs under my Sopras and they are wearing Gaia II feet. But I am sure the problem you mentioned with the bouncing is happening because I am feeling the bass in the floor to a significant degree. If I wasn't renting this place, I would definitely look seriously into what you told me with the concrete. I am also waiting on a pair of Velodyne dd12+ subwoofers that I am slightly hesitant on what will happen when they are introduced. Townshend carried a speaker isolation system which could be good. Maybe I should set them on Granite too..

 

[spiritofmusic]

If it's of any help, I run my system on a pretty challenging 150 yr old for, overall span 48x30, suspended timber, with a certain amount of flex. Stacore pneumatic/mass loading isolation sorted my tt. And chancing on Revopods footers made massive strides under my Zus.

 

[b345t]

If it's of any help, I run my system on a pretty challenging 150 yr old for, overall span 48x30, suspended timber, with a certain amount of flex. Stacore pneumatic/mass loading isolation sorted my tt. And chancing on Revopods footers made massive strides under my Zus.

Thanks for your reply. Could you tell me rough pricepoint of the Stacore unit and please tell me what you mean by 'tt'? Thanks!

 

[spiritofmusic]

Sorry, our friendly leader Ron is always telling me not to use abvns (abbreviations, Lol).
tt= turntable.
Stacore Advanced that I use is just short of €6k, although there are less expensive Basic and Basic Plus, and Intro platforms.
I pretty much went this way to sort a unique challenge I had w my tt, using the Stacore Adv in conjunction with a 55kg inert slate stand to create 150kg of isolation.
But in some ways the big bonus in my system has been the Revopods...more affordable at less than €1k for set of four.
And my Symposium Acoustics Isis rack and Rollerblocks footers have been absolute solid performers too.