Have you ever wanted to trade up your speakers to somethingthat will give you tighter, better defined bass, improved upperbass and midrange clarity, more focused soundstaging, but youknow you'd have to lay down another one to two kilobucks, ormore, to get that notch up in performance. Well, that'sthe type of improvement I got with $120 worth of cones under mystands! Furthermore, these little fellas improved my DAC! The DACimprovement wasn't nearly as great as with my speakers, butstill, compared to what upgrading your DAC (or other electroniccomponents) cost, I think you owe it to yourself to read on.

My first experience with the effects of component vibrationdamping came purely by accident a number of years ago. Sure I hadread about various platforms, cones, and the such in the audiomags, but I didn't really take it seriously. I was moreinterested in acquiring equipment and felt that little, if anyimprovement could be made to the original design and thatisolation gear wasn't money well spent at all.

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At the time I didn't have a proper equipment rack and didn'treally want one. My system was comprised of an all-in-the-boxsingle piece cd-player, directly into my power amp, and straightinto the speakers. Minimalist for sure and I didn't want anythingelse. Besides, the stuff looked great sitting down low on thehardwood floors. My only goal was to raise them off the ground acouple inches, more to avoid damage than anything. So down I wentto Ikea where I had previously spied up these marble cuttingboards for only $15 a piece (about 15x18 inches, 1/2 inch thick).I bought two and brought 'em home. I used three small woodsblocks to raise them off the ground, laid the shelf on top, thenplaced each piece of equipment on it. It looked great and thatwas all I was expecting. But lo and behold, that cd player now soundedbetter just by placing it on that marble slab. I thought Iwas imagining the improvement (tighter, more defined bass,cleaner midrange, etc.) so I took the cd-player off, then put itback on, then off, then on, then off, then on......well you getthe picture. I wasn't imagining things and yes, putting mycd-player on a stable, less vibration prone surface really seemedto help!

So over the years I've played around with a variety ofisolation equipment and learned quite a big more, although I'm byno means an expert. And I now know that I can do better than asimple marble slab (although it still works well in someinstances). I still look with skeptical eyes, but I judge withwhat I hear. This isn't to say all the products work, or workwell, or work well in all circumstances, or are worth the pricesthey charge. But in high-end audio, some of them are VERY wellworth their cost, which can be quite modest in comparison to whatyou pay for some equipment upgrades.

Now obviously vibration affecting your equipment comes from alot of sources such as airborne vibrations, vibrations from thecompoents themselves, vibrations from the floor and stands, etc.I'd be lying if I told you what type of isolation is best foreach of these circumstances and what to use when. I don't havesuch a background and few people do. Still, I've found fromexperience, and for obvious reasons because of the nature oftheir designs and functions, certain pieces of your system aremore susceptible to changes in performance due to vibration. Forexample, turntables are highly influenced, cd-transportsdepending on their design, as well as tube electronics more sothan solid state. And then to varying degree I've foundcomponents such as solid state amps, D/As, and preamps, etc. canalso be affected, but not always. Last, but certainly not least,speakers themselves benefit highly from being coupled rigidly toyour floors. Which brings us to the point at hand..... BlackDiamond Racing's Pyramid Cones.

It was at Hi-Fi '96 where I met the BDR Prez, DJ Casser. Hesent me home with a box of his Mk.3 and Mk.4 cones. These flashylittle slick black cones are relatively new in the high-end audioarena. When viewed from the top down the cones are circular ( sodon't quite imagine a pyramid which would be square). Their baseis about 1.5 inches in diameter which rises steadily to a roundedtop, making them about 1.5 inches in total height. They'refinished beautifully in high-gloss black. On the flat bottomthere are threaded holes for either Stainless Steel or BrassStuds (Black Diamond sells 'em at a nominal cost) if you'refortunate to be able to screw them into the bottom of your gear(for example, to replace the stock 'spikes' supplied on mostspeakers). The cones come in the Mk.3 and Mk.4 versions whichdiffer in material structure and manufacturing technique.Subsequent sonic differences also result. Neither is supposedlybetter of worse, they simply work better in different situations.

Two sore spots have consistently nagged me in my system as aconstant reminder of the proper placement and isolation ofequipment. One has been, believe it or not, my DAC, and theother, not surprisingly, my speakers.

First off, let's talk about my DAC. Ever since my Theta PrimeI went into surgery and came back a Prime II, a buzzingtransformer has been a persistent problem. It is a mechanicalbuzz and before it was shipped back to go under the knife againit was audible at 30 feet! Just a gentle, annoying hum, that notonly added to the room noise, but vibrated that little bugger tothe detriment of midrange clarity, bass extension, andsoundstaging. Since then Theta has damped it down, not quiteperfectly, but it's now only audible from a couple feet away.Still, if I rest my hand on top of the chassis while it's playingI can feel it sing along to the beat. Beethoven would have lovedhaving this piece in his final years so he could feel themusic as he went deaf. I don't quite feel the same.

Until now Audioprism's Isopods have been helping tame thevibrations, and quite effectively at that. So in their place fora good test went the Pyramid Mk. 3 Cones. With three Isopods, theDAC is basically floating on spongy feet; with three PyramidCones (two in the front, one in the back - three makes yourcomponents self levelling and seems to makes a stiffercontact than four) it sits rigidly coupled to the stand. I placedthe cones with the tips up in this case. DJ informed me that ingeneral you are to point the tips toward the vibratingsurface. Futhermore, under transformers seems to be the mostbeneficial. Tapping on the top of the chassis now makes a'bnnk-bnnk' type of sound. It feels solid and vibrates less onits own.

And the sound coming out of the speakers? Like the Isopods,the midrange and bass was cleaner and the window into thesoundstage came a little clearer. We're not talking hugedifferences at this point, but we're talking a definite andvaluable improvement in my opinion. How much did you pay for yourDAC and is another $60 too much to ask if they help you make itthat much better? You decide.

Oh yeah, which were better, the Isopods or the Pyramid Cones?Well, the improvements were similar, athough each were employingdifferent technologies. I'd have to say that the Cones renderedthings a little tighter and clearer, and the Isopods a littlewarmer. But we're talking very, very subtle here, so I don't wantto get carried away. Myself, I'm going to leave the Conesunderneath and find another use for the Isopods. But if you wantto hear about some REALLY BIG DIFFERENCES - please read on.

Whereas the Pyramid Cones under the DAC make a subtle, butmeaningful difference, under my speakers they are simplyfantastic. My B&W 803's are attached to Sound Anchor Stands.The stands are excellent and come equipped with drillin' foroil size spikes. Trouble is, take a look at your hardwoodfloors (if you have 'em) after the spikes go on. It's as ifBonnie and Clyde were in the room. So until now I've been stuckwith makeshift remedies to couple my speakers as tightly with thefloor without knocking craters into them and forfeiting my damagedeposit.

Under each of the Sound Anchor stands went three Mk. 4 Cones -one in the front, two in the back. Now although I found puttingthem tips down still does render a very small dent with veryheavy speakers (you may not mind, I do), I currently have themtips up with the same great results. The speaker now feels verysolid on the three points, with little room for sway or motion(important when woofer drivers start pumping). Although I waspreviously getting good sound from my system, the cones took itthat one step further and gave me the type of improvement I wouldhave had to pay thousands more for had I simply gone out andbought new speakers and said screw the tweaks.

The general character of the system has remained thesame; it's the increased clarity that is astounding. Bass linesare much more solid and well defined. The upper bass hump thathas plagued me for so long (and that I attributed solely to roomproblems) is now mostly gone (except for the room problem). Themidrange has turned beautifully clear. I hadn't realized what Iwas missing and I didn't realize that my B&Ws were capable ofthis level of performance. I guess it was in them all this timejust waiting to get out. I thought the imaging was good already,I hadn't expected even more depth, more palpability, and evenmore definition. To cite an example right this moment, as I typethis my favorite Sarah McClachlan disk is playing (The FreedomSessions). Certain tracks on this nearly live-to-disk releasewere previously bass-heavy and somewhat wooly. I just chalkedthat up to the recording. These same tracks still possess deepbass, but now it's wonderfully tight bass with strong definition.And there is a wealth of low level detail that had beenpreviously masked. I'm simply stunned over the improvement.

I can stress enough that speaker placement and how youplace your speakers can make some of the largest improvements inyour system. How often do audiophiles spend hundreds or thousandson minuscule improvements and neglect some real basics? Gettingyour speakers placed properly in the room, then firmly in placeshould be number one on your list. For me, The Black DiamondRacing Cones help do that part of that job wonderfully. 152ee80cbc

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