So, I have just gotten off the phone with a stone merchant. I am thinking that I am not happy with the speakers. They stand on a fairly springy wooden floor that is covered by fibre board that is covered by carpet..... the speakers are on spikes, but still I think that although the speakers are okay (Mission M64i's - bought because they were a steal at the price and they are the better - well supposedly, certainly bigger which as we know does not always mean anything - version of the M33i which was a 5 star winner) they are not being allowed to perform.......
However isolation plinths are jolly expensive (cheapest I have found is £150 off of Ebay)... so, I thought how expensive can two pieces of granite be? So I rang a stone merchant. He was nearly half the price of the Ebay Isolation Plinths.... it go me wondering about DIY Hi Fi. I am someone who believes that high quality materials gets you material returns on the sound... but is there an alternative source of cheap high quality materials that, although not designed specifically for hi fi, get the end user the same result.....
For example......
How would these perform (maybe these ones are a little to thick) against speaker wire? The cables above are 'industrial' flexible round stranded cable.... maybe even braided copper cable.
We all know that times is tough for manufacturers.... and, from some recent posts, it is obvious to see that we on the forum are sensitive to that, but times are also tough for consumer and I would love to know if DIY Hi Fi performs well.
I would love for WHF to blind test some DIY things against some known products (say the award winners). Why? Because I expect there to be no difference? No. I expect the award winners to win hands down..... but it would be nice to know how the DIY stuff performs against them. I do not expect that WHF will be able to do that..... not in a nasty cynical way, but the magazine probably raises a lot of cash from advertising and any article that promotes cheap non-industry solutions could be a massive shoot-yourself-in-the-foot exercise. But it would be a fantastic read..... big guns versus more creative, though not necessarily designed for purpose, solutions.
The stone merchant is now, at my recommendation, looking into pre-cutting some plinths (whether that means that they are, or they just wanted rid of me and were smiling nicely????)..... but it is just something that made me think.
However isolation plinths are jolly expensive (cheapest I have found is £150 off of Ebay)... so, I thought how expensive can two pieces of granite be? So I rang a stone merchant. He was nearly half the price of the Ebay Isolation Plinths.... it go me wondering about DIY Hi Fi. I am someone who believes that high quality materials gets you material returns on the sound... but is there an alternative source of cheap high quality materials that, although not designed specifically for hi fi, get the end user the same result.....
For example......
How would these perform (maybe these ones are a little to thick) against speaker wire? The cables above are 'industrial' flexible round stranded cable.... maybe even braided copper cable.
We all know that times is tough for manufacturers.... and, from some recent posts, it is obvious to see that we on the forum are sensitive to that, but times are also tough for consumer and I would love to know if DIY Hi Fi performs well.
I would love for WHF to blind test some DIY things against some known products (say the award winners). Why? Because I expect there to be no difference? No. I expect the award winners to win hands down..... but it would be nice to know how the DIY stuff performs against them. I do not expect that WHF will be able to do that..... not in a nasty cynical way, but the magazine probably raises a lot of cash from advertising and any article that promotes cheap non-industry solutions could be a massive shoot-yourself-in-the-foot exercise. But it would be a fantastic read..... big guns versus more creative, though not necessarily designed for purpose, solutions.
The stone merchant is now, at my recommendation, looking into pre-cutting some plinths (whether that means that they are, or they just wanted rid of me and were smiling nicely????)..... but it is just something that made me think.