adding a 5th Taiko Tana/Herzan TS-140 active isolation unit.

[LL21]

I can make an educated guess

There is something very profound happening when lowering vibration induced distortion. Typical audiophile jargon would be increased dynamics, both micro and macro, increased detail, better rendering of texture, more solid and more 3 dimenional imaging, better retrieval of soundstage / ambient cues etc.

However that doesn’t capture something which is hard to put into words. The best I can come up with is a very profound removal of stress and unaturalness allowing your system and room not just to playback a recording but to morph into an actual event happening with you smack down in the middle of it. It’s no longer just listening to music, it’s experiencing music.

If we only apply this sort of care to our vinyl playback systems, digital will never catch up.

Great description. I will say that (completely ignoring the digital/vinyl debate)...the same description in my experience applies to digital and vibration isolation generally. In the case of digital, EMI/RFI also falls into this camp.

My favorite result to illustrate the very, very subtle but incredibly impressive impact of this is the soundstage. I am NOT a soundstaging freak AT ALL. HOWEVER, what I have witnessed is that the minute there is some minute distortion, it seems that it becomes very difficult for the system to keep the soundstage at that outer limit and it starts to 'crumble'...the ability to keep the soundstage to its outer limit without having one particular crescendo note 'collapse' back into the center stage...is exceedingly difficult in my experience.

But as distortion reduces, the system is able to allow the whole soundstage to be 'completely stable'...which THEN enables each instrument to perform on its own, to 'breathe' in terms of reverb, decay without 'colliding' into another instrument whereby BOTH instruments each lose their decay into a messy bit of noise that can no longer be distinguished as 2 separate instruments.

And THIS (for me) has added a sense of ease, naturalness...where every instruments seems at ease to play in its own space and play its own lines of music in tandem with other instruments which are also breathing naturally on their own.

 

[Audiophile Bill]

People here really didn't get this when I tried to relay what Stacores were doing in my system. Something as radical as Emile's description.
It's not subtle.

Marc - I think people probably did get that you got a benefit from using your Stacore on your TT although maybe a little more surprised about the balanced power supply.

Mike’s situation is very different - we are talking about the 5th active platform with custom LPS and top plate and grounding in a custom designed acoustically treated room with reference components across the board. Mike is talking about how applying this active approach across the *whole rig* has yielded kind of an exponential gain.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Oh sure. I'm just imagining THAT effect w me completed in Mike's case, as an even bigger holistic experience.

 

[Taiko Audio]

Oh sure. I'm just imagining THAT effect w me completed in Mike's case, as an even bigger holistic experience.

Do you have a stacore underneath every component in your playback chain? If not you should try. The last one really is transformational in mine and apparantly Mike’s system.

Wheter this is due to some sort of synergy effect from using the same platforms or just a lowering of total system distortion is an intriguing question.

 

[Taiko Audio]

But as distortion reduces, the system is able to allow the whole soundstage to be 'completely stable'...which THEN enables each instrument to perform on its own, to 'breathe' in terms of reverb, decay without 'colliding' into another instrument whereby BOTH instruments each lose their decay into a messy bit of noise that can no longer be distinguished as 2 separate instruments.

Agree, also notable is the vanishing act the loudspeakers pull as sources of sound. They do really dissapear.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Mike hosted me for an evening of music and audio fun earlier this week. It was a great time. Mike is such a gracious host-Thank you!!

As he mentioned, it’s been 6 years since the last visit and his system has gone through a number of changes, It’s hard not to have high (very) expectations when going to hear a system of this caliber. And it didn’t disappoint...

His system sounds better than on my last visit. It simply has a higher performance level. I can’t attribute it to any particular change of course but I can say it is operating at a much higher level. There is clarity in the bass and dynamic capability that’s well beyond what it did previously. One of the ‘war horses’ played was a Ben Webster Live At the Renaissance track which I also heard last visit. There is a drum ‘thwack’ in it that actually startled me on this visit- and I knew it was coming.

At one point we were cruising along with 102 DB peaks and the system didn’t flinch. It sounded like music and not a bit compressed on any of the peaks. This was not a testicular ride to see how loud it could play. It was more of a “let’s keep jamming” moment. Awesome!

I agree with Mike’s comment on vinyl delivering a superior experience to his digital. His digital is Top Rate. Vinyl is just better here.

thanks 'g' for the kind comments. i very much enjoyed hanging and listening with you.

 

[Tango]

Thanks Emile - very nicely written.

Bill your Indian espresso machine is in the mid of sound field. You have a lot of vibration karma. In your system could worth while.

Tang

 

[LL21]

Agree, also notable is the vanishing act the loudspeakers pull as sources of sound. They do really dissapear.

Yes! I have found that with greater and better isolation (on the equipment, not even necessarily the speaker), even extreme treble crescendos (which tend to 'pull' to the speaker tweeter) start to stay within the original space of the instrument within the proper soundstage.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

a reality that has presented itself to me is that the vinyl format is a 'feedback' format. meaning that any link in the chain will become the source for distortion. and if every link has resonance attenuation there is a multiplier effect on performance. in my case, the active isolation is orders of magnitude less distorted in the bass, and so the result is awesome. and this has much to do with how vinyl works reading the record.

sure digital is helped by this effect too, but not as much, and there is not as high a ceiling for information. maybe if i had Tana platforms for both my MSB power supplies and server maybe that could be trans formative......or not.

my opinion is that the effect of 'all-Tana' for my vinyl.......to vinyl system playback performance.......... is that it pushes it past 'any' other vinyl performance.

another way of saying that, is that whatever delta might exist between my vinyl and the arbitrarily best vinyl, is easily exceeded by the delta of other forms of resonance attenuation to all-Tana.

it's a game changer.

it's possible that with the particular bottom octave capability of my system, that the effect of all tana is more fully realized than a typical system. so it's hard to project my experience universally. but my expectations would be that it would similarly work in any system you might find higher level vinyl. and you do need an environment that is friendly to active devices; solid floor and racks.

 

[Taiko Audio]

It would not surprise me if active isolation is more beneficial to analogue then digital playback systems. You could argue vinyl sound reproduction starts with vibration before it converts to an electrical signal. It’s not that far fetched to assume this is easier disturbed then electronic circuitry. I like the feedback argument.

 

[spiritofmusic]

So Mike, my springy 35x30 wooden floor would likely not benefit from active Tana?

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Hi Tang,

I won’t be using any active solution with the Vyger cos it has a very effective suspension already in those large pillars.

However I am in discussion with Emile around a custom passive solution right now so watch this space.

 

[Audiophile Bill]

So Mike, my springy 35x30 wooden floor would likely not benefit from active Tana?

Marc I would suggest not revisiting this passive / active “thing” again lol

 

[spiritofmusic]

No problem Bill, my bank statement agrees w you.

 

[Rocoa]

Hello,

I recieved a Daiza platform some weeks ago and this heavy thing works wonderfully in my system.
At first I put it at the top shelf of my Finite Elemente Pagode without feet, where is located my Aqua CD Transport.



The sound improves with better resolution and speed maintaining the timbre correct.



After having installed the feet the sound becomes with more midrange body.

At last I tried it under the Aeris DAC and it will be remain at this place. Te DAC is apart of the rack, placed in a little table.
On this table I have a heavy teak shelf supported by Stillpoints and the Daiza is located in the teak.
I'm very happy with the sound but I'm affraid that I need more Daizas

 

[Taiko Audio]

At last I tried it under the Aeris DAC and it will be remain at this place. Te DAC is apart of the rack, placed in a little table.
On this table I have a heavy teak shelf supported by Stillpoints and the Daiza is located in the teak.
I'm very happy with the sound but I'm affraid that I need more Daizas

Thank you for posting. When you pull the trigger on more, we can cut them to size. It looks like it could be much smaller for the Aeris, this would be cheaper too!