Speaker Spikes - do the shake test

...If Dynaudio only supplies one type of spike for their speakers they have apparently voiced their speaker that way...

No way that's true as big a difference as it makes in the sound based on the coupling to the floor. That, and you won't like what you hear when the speakers are perched-up on carpet verses firmly in place on a solid floor material.

C4 cabinets have next to ZERO resonance even when played hard, so it's the WHOLE unit being moved by the woofers in my case.

I do agree that different methods will diminish either cabinet resonances or the entire speaker moving about. What ever keeps things still is going to be best.

Cabinet resonances are logarithmic with volume. To say they make a difference down low is pointing out the diminishing effect of the cabinet. No one is challenging your superb hearing, but most will hear the difference only when their is enough energy to actually move the cabinet and it doesn't move for free.

The problem with audio, is everyone's challenged to claim they hear everything. So disagree some more as it makes no difference when you do the math. Cabinets are much more inert at low volumes so they contribute little to the sound. Not so at higher SPL's.

But if you're a human phase response / SPL meter...hey, hear away at 30 dB SPL. No one's challenging that.

If you think about what is going on, the effects of a neutral cabinet motion are critical to getting the best from your speakers.

For example, look at a high-end scan speak tweeter, the one's I call the cone-heads. That big spike in the middle of the tweeter is designed to make sure the CENTER of the tweeter move about when the EDGES of the tweeter, where the voice coil is attached, moves. And, to beam the energy more sideways so it's arrival time is more room "reflections than direct, improving resolution. A mechanical device is not infinitely stiff, so the middle of a round object, with the "push" coming from the edges will have a ripple effect towards the tweeter (in this case) center. If the middle of the tweeter is mechanically "soft" it will actually lag behind and dimple inward compared to the edges and add significant Doppler / intermodulation distortion.

Some tweeters use central phase plugs to damp this out, but all of them are aware of the shortcomings of a too soft structure and manage it somehow...apparent or not. The stiffer a structure is however, the harder it is to damp once it gets going.

Look at the distance a tweeter moves...Well, you do it, I can't see that well anymore. Its motion is virtually invisible to the naked eye. Want crisper sharper imaging? Add a bunch of cabinet resonance to the speaker front panel that is orders of magnitude worse than the tweeters full excursion. The tweeter doesn't stand a change to be at it's best.

Bass is more controlled by the cabinet itself as the wavelength / excursions of the driver are at the opposite end of the spectrum, much longer than the cabinet resonance. Lets hope so anyway. Still important, but not the pinnacle of perfection the mids and tweeter demand.

Look at speakers as they get larger, and harder to damp. A HUGE part of the price is stopping the darn cabinet from moving. Big speakers carry a lot of extra "loose" baggage that has to be managed, at a big cost. Internal braces and exotic shapes all to simply get the drivers to stand still. When the braces are added, it steal cabinet volume from the drivers and the cycle feeds on itself as the cabinet is made bigger to account for the lost internal volume the braces removed. OK, use carbon fiber and it feeds on your bank account. You pay all that money, and then let the speaker wobble all over the floor? Want to know why so many fantastic smaller speakers exist? Well, now you know...the cabinet is order of magnitude stiffer as they get smaller all things being the same in the design. A panel half as long is four times stiffer.

But, once you select a speaker what ever it takes to keep that front panel from moving back and fourth (the speaker cabinet itself is a done deal) is as important as any component in your system, probably in the top three (and it's actually pretty cheap to optimize).

It is certainly possible that a very responsive cabinet could move LESS with dampening feet. And, this would explain the better resolution you hear. The less your speakers move front to back, the better they should sound.

A super solid cabinet that doesn't move unto itself (vibrate) more than likely will like spikes. Those that vibrate some may do better with something to quell the shakes in the cabinet MORE than the front to back motion of the speaker itself using spikes.

The end goal is the same, get the driver to sit motionless around the voice coils and let the diaphragms do all the moving. No one will care how you get that done after they listen to the difference.

Wolf_garcia, if you're not on concrete an isolater my indeed be better than spikes. Why grab onto / into a surface that is vibrating worse than you? So yes, you have to use common sense, this isn't magic or expensive. My sub spikes cost $32.00 delivered. Isolaters are more complex and would be more, but not crazy.

...Then explain why the spikes make a difference at any volume level...

Don't need to. It's the same answer as when they are louder. Different people will hear the degradation of sound depending on their ears pleasure center based on driver movement. There is no "magic" to reducing cabinet movement (spikes do not address vibration so much).

OK,

I think we have TWO evolutionary paths, speakers placed on "soft" floors, and those placed on "hard" floors. A soft floor being a typical floor is a house supported with joists. A hard floor being (in my case) ten inches of concrete.

I would certainly agree that as different as these surfaces are, the method to tune the sound would be, too. The agruments probably have to be very specific as to what general floor type is being addressed.

I do hear this, big tall wobbly C4's like sharp steel SPIKES on concrete to tighten-up the sound.

My point of the post is to EXPERIMENT and not accept what's thrown your way. There is no harm in going back to your original set-up if you don't like what you hear.

OK, Spiked my DD10+ subs. I used Dayton Audio spikes into the concrete floor beneath the carpet. Here, like the speakers, the spikes force the speaker / subs to become "one" with the floor so the speaker can't shake near as much. The hand on the cabinet test say so big time, too.

The AUTO EQ shows less boost at all frequencies suggesting that more energy is going into the room than before.

The soft feet are more than likely best for keeping vibration FROM a unit where the sharp steel spikes adhere the object INTO the substrate below them, and that in turn determines how hard the spiked object is to move relative to the surface it is spiked into. When they are spike into a conctere floor, they have too "push" the whole house around to move, which is kind of hard to do. Sitting on the carpet? They shook away on that springy surface.

Anyone with Velodyne subs, the Dayton Audio DSS3-BK spike kit fit perfectly. Screw out the old insert with the wrong threads / inch, screw in the same type inserts with the right threads / inch that come with the kit, and screw in the spikes. Done.

http://www.daytonaudio.com/index.php/loudspeaker-components/speaker-cabinet-accessories/speaker-spikes.html