Couple then decouple. Couple you speakers to a large mass, mine are 450 x 330 x 180 mm laminated pine blocks ( large butcher boards), these are then decoupled from the floor with audio springs (Nobsound type). This essentially isolates any vibration to the speaker / mass alone, lowers any vibration to below anything audible and does not transfer to or through the floor. You can measure this by placing a measuring instrument (programs for your iPad are OK) on each speaker with only one playing at a time. You can see the difference clearly. The sonic effect is quite marked especially separation and sound stage.
To couple, or not to couple, that is the question
There seems to be a fundamental difference of opinion between those who would couple their speakers to the floor (e.g., with spikes), and those who would decouple them (e.g., with springs). I’ve gone both ways, but have found that I prefer the latter; I’ve currently got Sorbothane feet attached to my tower speakers, so that they wobble or "float"—much like the Townshend Platforms videos show for that similar, but more expensive, approach. My ears are the final arbiters of my listening experience, so they rule my choices. But my mind likes to have a theoretical explanation to account for my subjective preferences.
That’s where the question comes in. A very knowledgable audiophile friend insists that what I prefer is precisely the opposite of what is best: that ideally, the speaker enclosure should be as rigid and immovable as possible so that the moving cones of the drivers can both most efficiently and most accurately create a sound front free of the inevitable colorations that would come from fighting against a moving cabinet. He says that transients will be muddied by the motion of the cabinet set up by the motion of the speaker cones. And this makes perfect sense to me in terms of my physical intuitions. It’s perhaps analogous to the desirability of having a rigid frame in a high-performance vehicle, which allows the engineers to design the suspension without having to worry too much about the complex interactions with a flexing chassis.
Am I just deluded, then, in preferring a non-rigid interface between speaker and floor? Or does it depend on the kind of floor? (I get that most advice seems to favor decoupling from a suspended wood floor, and coupling to a slab; my floor is hardwood, but not exactly "suspended" as the underflooring structure is very rigid.) Or are there trade offs here, as there usually are in such options: do I gain something (but what, and how?) even as I lose something else (i.e., clean transients, especially in bass tones)?
The ears will win this contest, but I like to have my mind on board if possible. So thanks for any input you may have on this question.
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- 70 posts total
- 70 posts total