Ten Misconceptions about Loudspeaker Spikes

[Richard Vandersteen]

On 4/16/2023 at 10:02 AM, audioNeil said:

Well, the IsoAcoustics Gaia are now off my Kento's for now.  I am going to listen to just the spikes for now.

I liked some of what I heard with the Gaia.  I felt it cleaned up a bit of grunge from the soundstage.  Unfortunately, I think it also softened the sound too much.  I notice the Kentos are very narrow and are only on 3 spikes (you can't really use the other holes to make it 4 feet, as the other holes aren't countersunk).  This makes the speaker too unstable on the Gaia footers.

If the Kento's had outriggers on the base, with 4 feet, I feel the Gaia might have been more stable, and perhaps been a net positive.

I think you are right - Richard has voiced the speaker for a hard base.  But, why is that a good thing, necessarily?  It means there is a lot of energy reflecting around in the speaker.

audioNeil, your experiences with the Gaia feet and the M5 amplifiers are so counter most people's experiences it makes me wonder.  I never question what people hear or like because it is personal, they being the BOSS but I often ask why because I learn from it.  First the feet which are three because three defines a plane, so each foot has the same weight.  This is very difficult to do without instrumentation with four feet.  In the back two corners there are two 1/4 X 20 threaded holes one on each side for outriggers.  These are designed to be just short of touching the floor to prevent toppling.  Nothing put under the speaker will have any noticeable effect on the energy within a speaker cabinet but with proper constrained layer damping it can be contained so it can do the work it is designed to do, be silent.  I have written to ad nauseum about this everywhere, but I design the feet, so they hold the speaker cabinet still in space so that none of the diaphragms of the drivers are modulated by their surroundings on a solid floor (all bets are off on tympanic floors).  In my experience softer indicates lost information and dynamics.  Better imaging width indicates less transparency, more confusion and less focus, best example would be speakers with drivers pointing all over the place which lower the magic when the ears are exactly equally distant but because there is less magic the homogenated information is less focused.  I am OK with that, but it makes it hard to justify expensive wires, phono cartridges, better turntables and all things Hi-End only to have the improved definition and dynamics thrown away in the speaker.  We are ultimately building a system and I find one that is balanced and accurate more enjoyable than one that has just enough smear to make all things average, YMMV.  RV

[Holmz]

3 hours ago, Richard Vandersteen said:

best example would be speakers with drivers pointing all over the place which lower the magic when the ears are exactly equally distant but because there is less magic the homogenated information is less focused

Does this also translate into the room treatment and brightness? As the wide dispersion/radiation-pattern will be involving more of the room?

Which makes me winder about people using very wide radiation pattern speakers and then treating the room more aggressively…

[audioNeil]

9 hours ago, Richard Vandersteen said:

audioNeil, your experiences with the Gaia feet and the M5 amplifiers are so counter most people's experiences it makes me wonder.  I never question what people hear or like because it is personal, they being the BOSS but I often ask why because I learn from it.  First the feet which are three because three defines a plane, so each foot has the same weight.  This is very difficult to do without instrumentation with four feet.  In the back two corners there are two 1/4 X 20 threaded holes one on each side for outriggers.  These are designed to be just short of touching the floor to prevent toppling.  Nothing put under the speaker will have any noticeable effect on the energy within a speaker cabinet but with proper constrained layer damping it can be contained so it can do the work it is designed to do, be silent.  I have written to ad nauseum about this everywhere, but I design the feet, so they hold the speaker cabinet still in space so that none of the diaphragms of the drivers are modulated by their surroundings on a solid floor (all bets are off on tympanic floors).  In my experience softer indicates lost information and dynamics.  Better imaging width indicates less transparency, more confusion and less focus, best example would be speakers with drivers pointing all over the place which lower the magic when the ears are exactly equally distant but because there is less magic the homogenated information is less focused.  I am OK with that, but it makes it hard to justify expensive wires, phono cartridges, better turntables and all things Hi-End only to have the improved definition and dynamics thrown away in the speaker.  We are ultimately building a system and I find one that is balanced and accurate more enjoyable than one that has just enough smear to make all things average, YMMV.  RV

Thanks for your input, Richard.

I am learning that my room acoustics aren't good.   I am fighting bass peaks, and the high frequencies are damped a bit too much (plus my high-frequency hearing is getting worse).  I have a TV in the middle, which if covered makes the sound too dull, and if uncovered adds distortion and imaging problems.

That makes my previous audition of the M5s a bit suspect, and my new Pass X260.8 sound more similar to it that they do to my old reference.  If I can fix the room setup, I may revisit the M5s.  You have to admit that the distortion numbers are high compared to most other amps, but I guess it is the type of distortion that matters.

As for the Gaia, I think they do good and bad, and may be speaker dependent.  I've decided they are a net negative for the Kento for my ears, but I've heard speakers that sound good with them.  It may depend on how one listens to music, and what other problems there are in the system.  When I listen, I like an enveloping soundstage, smooth detailed highs, and an accurate punchy percussion (on bells as well as drums).   The accurate transients on the Kento are one of its best qualities.