Isolation Feet for Laptop


It seems fairly common knowledge that vibration is a form of distortion in many electric components, not just for turntables and speakers. Isolation feet seem to work well in most applications.

I searched around and I didn't find any information to suggest that folks are using isolation feet on laptops or desktops, despite increased streaming usage. In a great many cases, there are indeed heavy vibrations coming from within the computer.  Whether it is the fan for the CPU or even GPU to the all the various chips/transformers, etc or even power supplies and batteries. If adding isolation feet to a streamer, DAC or power supply makes sense, then wouldn't it also make sense to apply isolation feet to your laptop; if you use it for music?

Well, I am going to find out. :)

I ordered some IsoAcoustics Orea Series Audio Equipment Isolators with a max weight of 16 pounds. The laptop weighs about 6.7 pounds, so it shouldn't be that much strain, even with all the cables creating some measure of down force as they dangle over the edge.

My expectation is that the DAC will be able to perform slightly better due to reduced vibration across the USB port and power filter. The DAC is a USB stick (Dragonfly Cobalt) so it has a very rigid hard connection to the laptop; so vibration is very easily transferred.

Has anyone else tried this?

128x128guakus

Showing 2 responses by lanx0003

The OP raised a legitimate concern, i.e., the annoying fan noise.  I use Dell XPS as a music source. A while ago the fan came up constantly and, without 2nd thought, I put the isolation feet underneath hoping the fan will quiet down epecially when music is playing. It turned out the CPU was occupied by some resided app. in the background and caused the fan to operate endlessly. So my advise is, as the first thing, to check on the CPU and eliminate unnecessary bagages. Whether adding isolation feet as a damper helps vibration attenuation is debatable. To completely cure the root of the problem, I will suggest the use of fanless Mac instead.

I tried semisphere rubber feet by 3m beneath my laptop and found no difference before and after in terms of sound, at least to my ears. I have placed those under each speaker I own and the sound improvement are substantial in particular on low end. These feet were even recommended by the Wharfedale manufacturer and shipped along with the speakers for the convenience of owners. I therefore subsequently used them under my DAC, ifi zen blue, CD / SACD player and the power amp (large diameter/weight capacity). But, under laptop, no improvement can be discerned unfortunately in my case. This only think that really bothers me still is, like I mentioned earlier, the fan noise.

I really wish you, OP, luck in this journey and please report back your experience with Townshend Air Platform ($800?). I sincerely hope you will get your money worth. It is possible that $800 gear will do much better justice than the $10 proven tiny device.