I really was se on going for the IsoAcoustics Gaia feet for my new speakers, there’s been a lot of positive feedback about them and I get the sense they really do what they claim to do.a After some thought though, I think I want to try going the plinth route so I ordered today two to be custom made for me by a local company. I was able to pick the stone and and other build options but I went instead with a square edge and polished on the sides as well as the top.
They’re going to be very heavy as I went with granite which is much denser than quartz or marble. The design is basic with a simple silicone sheet that will line the bottom of the plinth for additional isolation from vibration.
I’ll still have the option to go with the Gaia in the future but I’m trying this first because it will add a lot of stability to the speakers as they’re 12" wide but only 7" deep and only 35 lbs which is why I’m looking to go with the additional mass route.
Anyone with feedback on the Gaia feet?
Random thought: rocks on top of the speakers, bad mmmkay? Rocks on the bottom of the speaker good.
Were you trying to solve a particular issue when you bought them or was it more along the lines of seeing if they actually further improved things?
Like I said, I would have gone for them right away if it wasn’t for me wanting to solve a perceived stability concern which the Gaia won’t be able to anything about…
unless I go the outrigger route. hmmm, that thought just popped into my head.
I got them to just reduce vibration control. I already had filled stable stands and this was just to improve upon that.
It definitely tightened things up and raised my tweeters by 2 inches or so. The height diff is important to note
If the Gaia were to be placed on a polished granite slab do you think they would they have the same suction cup effect on the bottom as other IsoAcoustics pucks have on smooth surfaces?
I spent so much time the last few years with headphones that going back to 2.1 on my desktop was eye and ear opening really. It was so much fun and I forgot how different the experience can be.
I was using that SMSL amp I got with rather cheap bookshelf speakers and the SVS sub and my oh my was it delightful.
I’ll have to rethink some of my next moves considering this as I definitely want to improve that setup a bit now. Such a fun and confusing evening lol
Question about room sizes - people online keep referring to small/medium/large rooms but I don’t seem to find any consensus about what that actually means.
My room is a about 6x4 meters or 24 sq m (almost 20x13 feet, almost 260 sq ft). It’s definitely not a small room by my definition but is it medium? large?
And for that room - what size speakers should be big enough? I had 5 inch bookshelves here that were kind of loud enough but definitely didn’t fill the room (didn’t expect them too).
I’ve also q quite ‘complicated’ listening main room, like high ceiling (6m) and rectangular room…similar your square meters.
In any room you can go as large you want with speakers, as long you treat room accoustics. I’ve none at all and still (of course no furniture right in front, still TV with med-size board in between, still fine) 90% perfect and of course what kind of listening position you prefer. Getting closer to wall of course always effects bass (50-60cm to your front driver is fine to start with) and getting far away, you’ll loose the optimal stereo triangle. I move around my listening position, not speakers
Some people love their active speakers to adjust/eq’ing sonics (e.g. Genelec and their room corection software). I don’t like this for 2.1 setups and prefer room-aliveness. Every time I listen in dead-rooms with fully accoustic treatments, music if for me non-organic. Furniture, carpents do help as well.
So you are fine with any good, efficient 2/3+ way speakers. It’s a different story with open baffle speakers, horn, single driver etc… if you look at sound waves at most audible frequences, you can go much larger, BUT we need reflections
FYSA by definition in the audio world, large rooms are capable of seating more than 50+ people.
For our purposes most of our rooms at home are small and medium sized in reference to speaker abilities.
I had found this information on the internet when researching sound absorption for my living room. In the professional world of Audio large is usually in reference to commercial venues.
Am I wrong to think that’s it’s better to spend less on my first pair of “real” speakers (Lets say 3-5K) and compared to the DAC and integrated amp cost in the system until I better understand the room, the chain, treatment etc?
I obviously don’t want to pair the Wavedream and Z40+ with entry level stuff but I don’t have enough knowledge to evaluate what I’ll be hearing and more so what I’m missing or need to correct to start.
Is that 3-5K price range an insult to my chain? The options are so much more complicated than headphones lol
It also seems much harder to try at home and sell/trade/replace to am a little lost on how I might try that without just picking something based on reviews online.
Harder and more expensive to ship speakers that’s for sure. As far as complicated, don’t make it complicated. Buy speakers the way you’d buy a headphone. Which you’ve kind of already not done since you’ve bought the DAC and the amp. So just look at things that will 1) pair well with the LTA and 2) fit in the space you want to put them into. Don’t know if there’s a WAF involved, but that’s a big consideration for speakers for some.
Since you’re already starting right to left to right instead of right to left, think about what you’d like from a speaker then look at what’s available in the budget you’re setting for yourself.
I will say that there are many speakers that scale extremely well with upgraded gear so don’t judge the match simply by the price point. Look for the kind of sound you’re looking for first and then cross reference that with the specs of the LTA and see if it’s a good match or a known good match. With the Z40+ you have a lot more options.
Lol kind of true, already had the DAC
I really wasnt planning on buying an amp this morning, but after thinking about it last night and two reviews that I read yesterday - one of a speaker ive been eyeing for a while now and then of the z40+ - in which they actually used them together and seems to work well, and then suddenly it shows up today with a good deal, and after selling a bunch of gear this week, I said fuck it lol
Empty room which is my new home office, free to do whatever!
Would you say it’s comparable to the headphones space where people like Joshua Valor, Zeos, Amir and others have agendas and push specific products? Are there more reliable sources to look at for commentary and reviews?
outriggers….
