What's the best isolation system?

The Sistrum racks are really quite awful... bright and hashy and not mention UGLY. If you take the time to listen you will find the Symposium products to be the only real thing out there.

I'm quite happy with Ken Lyon's NEUANCE lightweight iso/absorb shelves. Much tighter bass than air suspension, and GREAT coherence without spectral shift. And good-looking too.

I second that, Ejlif. deflating my V-Plane has the same effect on my soundstage. Nothing like it.

I have tried all kinds of feet spikes and cones, and nothing can touch the absolute excellence of the Sounds of Silence Vibraplane. Expensive, but you won't want to listen to your CD player or turntable without it if you hear what it does.

Hey Lugnut! The speakers are out from the wall about 6' and there are no drapes, but mini blinds.....First reflection fires into record shelves 8' wide by 7' tall on each side wall.....Go to Audio Asylum and go to rcrump Photo Gallery and you can see how it is set up....I had Marty DeWulf here in March and he took measurements as the room is just sensational, best I have ever had....It was an add-on to the house about ten years back before I lived here....15'7" x 23'7" x 8'6" with an 8' opening at the back that drains bass into two other rooms for another 30' or so....I'm sort of in the cone business (obviously not real serious about it) and have some 1.5" tall x 1.5" diameter cones with a .5" shoulder at the top drilled and tapped for 1.5" long 3/8-16 case hardened steel hex socket set screws...These are black anodized aluminum.....Made some speaker stands out of .5" aluminum and had them grain sanded and black anodized to match the Speaker Arts speakers we used at the CES a few years ago.....These were boxes about 12" x 15" x 24" as I recall and they were completed a day or two before I had to leave for the show.....These weighed about 60-70 as I recall and I filled them with old clothes or whatever to keep them from ringing.....Bottom line is I had about 2K in these and they sounded worse than the steel stands I had for the little speakers...TAS wrote us up as having nice sound at the CES, but think I would stick with steel tubing....Regarding turntables I think the way to go is an active Vibraplane or if under 40 pounds a Machina Dynamica Nimbus....My turntable has a built-in active air suspension BTW and is very heavy, well over 250 pounds as recall shipping weight was 550 pounds, but that included the 90 pound pump....(I have a sport model Rockport, a holdover from when I used to make a real living) Oh, if you can find some wide maple boards and have them put together with biscuits (hard to find maple more than 8" wide) you might give that a try as the 3/4" maple is actually a bit more open sounding than the 3/4" MDF, but don't go with butcher blocks......Geoff Kait has done the research on this when he was building the Nimbus active air bases at Machina Dynamica and you might want to go to his site, www.machinadynamica.com and shoot him an email regarding the maple....Good luck with the new rack!

Rcrump,

I really am interested in your comments about the points since I'm in the process of building a new equipment rack. Would you say that aluminum points for a rack would be the way to go with a mild steel frame? Do you think aluminum would be a better material for the frame itself? Also, my comments about glass were limited to shelving material. In no way was I being critical with whatever works. Also, a world without windows would be an ugly thing, indeed. It doesn't surprise me that windows behind your system have little effect especially if you have floor standers out in the room as is the norm. Is there an aduible difference between the drapes being open and closed? Just to clarify on my turntable recommendations; what I described works extremely well with suspension turntables. I understand that suspension-less tables want lots of mass.

Patrick

Audiopoints and the sistrum racks are great. They have audiopoint spikes with shelves that all have adjustable spikes. The metal support rods are filled with microfil miniscule metal bearings that all serve to transfer vibration into the ground. audiopoints.com. Concrete floor is great but if you don't have that try using a subfloor cork subfoor combo with fiber carpet pad and of course carpet.

Yo Lugnut! I'm pretty much on the same page with you about concrete slab construction, spiked stands and 3/4" MDF, but will add aluminum cones work better than brass or stainless on concrete....I moved into the new old house a couple years ago and figured I would have a lot of trouble with the 3/8" glazed in place windows behind my system and that just has not been the case at all....As far as very sensitive items like transports (the clock) and turntables I really like an active air suspension, but these aren't cheap.....I'm sort of in the cone business as an outgrowth of the preamp business so I have had access to a machinist to make up various cones for me of aluminum, brass, stainless and combinations with Delrin, a machinable hard plastic....On concrete slabs aluminum or stainless/Delrin combination works best and on pier and beam flooring brass seems to be the material of choice....No set rules for any of this other than active air suspension which is the cat's meow....

Symposium is the only way to go.

I have tried several things from Iso-Bearings to Vibropods and have had the best results with AQ Sobethane Feet under my turntable. On my CD players I use the Paulsen Platters which are no longer made bu are in breif a platter riding on apposing magnetic fields. These seemed to enhance the bass on my CD and DVD players

Bravo Lugnut. Another thing, which I actually do, is to move my turntable/phono preamp into a separate room on the ground floor (concrete) and run balanced lines from the phon pre to the preamp in the music room.

Steve,

My ideas on isolation? This will anger a lot of folks but here goes. Best: Concrete floor, rigid stand(s) with spikes, 3/4" MDF shelves. Second best: Wall mounted 3/4" MDF shelves on a load bearing wall. Turntables should be isolated from other equipment by having their own stand or shelf. The only thing one needs to worry about with this concept is airborne vibrations and that can be minimized by strategically placing the speakers in relation to the electronics.

I certainly believe that anti-vibration devices can work and are desirable for tubes and CDP's. I question the use of glass in thicknesses of less than 1/2".

I'll share a little trick I learned 30+ years ago to check vibrations and it's cheap. Buy one of the laser pointers and tape it to a tripod which is placed on the ground outside of an open window. Use double sided tape to attach a very small mirror to the item to be checked for the effects of vibration. The goal is to reflect the light to a surface as far away as possible. Watch the reflected beam of light with and without music and you will observe the vibrations.

As for glass, do this test on an exterior window as far away from the music as possible. You'll see instantly why glass is an audio no-no.