Holostages - critical review
- Thread starter Halydean
- Start date
Received two Holo sets. As always you don't really know what you're getting into with such things. First attempts on devices didn’t work well. I generally don't like putting anything on devices or speakers. It sounds a kind of lifeless/muffle to me.. Placement 1x in the middle of the back wall and 1x opposite in the middle of the wall behind the system: Great result! Airy, light, very nicely resolved, high stage. The additional placement of a box in the middle of the right and left walls: Wow! Something's happening. The stage moves forward, everything sounds more holographic + 3D! Another box on the large LessLoss Firewall (the one for the power strip) and one on the power strip of the digital accessories such as switch, modem, TV box, etc... Interesting! Sounds rounder, quieter, in short: Fits! I'll have to find out where the other two boxes work best.
Conclusion: The result is impressive. The spatial image increases, the system becomes quieter, sounds more organic/real. In one word: Awesome! And all of this without crystals hatched under a full moon, but with graphene nanotube and piezoelectric crystal ion release technology (whatever that means - I'm not an engineer) - The Holos remain.
Conclusion: The result is impressive. The spatial image increases, the system becomes quieter, sounds more organic/real. In one word: Awesome! And all of this without crystals hatched under a full moon, but with graphene nanotube and piezoelectric crystal ion release technology (whatever that means - I'm not an engineer) - The Holos remain.
I’ve posted extensively about my positive impressions of the changes/improvements that Holostages make. Yes, I’m the one who described their effect as “swimming in music”. Some of you scoffed & that’s ok, but a number of you thought the analogy was spot-on.
I must have 4 sets of holostages tucked away in various places. They create such an immersive experience that the center image sometimes strays of course, so by placing 2 holos between the speakers (I had been placing them on top of each speaker) I find the center image snaps back into focus while retaining the immersive tall, wide & deeply layered soundstage.
The others are placed on top of or under power supplies & NA tempus switch, muon pro & eno2 filters, behind the listening position on either side, on top of & underneath Verizon FIOS modem (surprisingly restored full Wi-Fi service to several dead zones in the house) & on top of bi-wired speaker posts.
Half the fun is moving them around until you find the perfect configuration for your room & kit. The impact the holostages make is so easily heard, that the addition of only 1 set of will surprise you!
I have also integrated Krissy’s ground box booster to the chassis of my integrated, her usb box to the input of the integrated as well as her breaker panel box transforming the acoustics of the room while dramatically lowering the noise floor.
Highly recommended!
I must have 4 sets of holostages tucked away in various places. They create such an immersive experience that the center image sometimes strays of course, so by placing 2 holos between the speakers (I had been placing them on top of each speaker) I find the center image snaps back into focus while retaining the immersive tall, wide & deeply layered soundstage.
The others are placed on top of or under power supplies & NA tempus switch, muon pro & eno2 filters, behind the listening position on either side, on top of & underneath Verizon FIOS modem (surprisingly restored full Wi-Fi service to several dead zones in the house) & on top of bi-wired speaker posts.
Half the fun is moving them around until you find the perfect configuration for your room & kit. The impact the holostages make is so easily heard, that the addition of only 1 set of will surprise you!
I have also integrated Krissy’s ground box booster to the chassis of my integrated, her usb box to the input of the integrated as well as her breaker panel box transforming the acoustics of the room while dramatically lowering the noise floor.
Highly recommended!
Republicoftexas69
Well-Known Member
Not sure how she sells any of this as it is not listed on her site, the ground boxes ect..
I have 8 of the Holostage. Two are behind me on top of a cabinet. Two are on my Aries Cerat Aurora speaker crossovers and then one each on my mono amps, preamp, and Lucas Audio Music server.
I probably should try on my router/switch which is in a different room.
I just received the box that is going on my central fuse panel and I am looking forward to hearing the results.
I would love to hear other opinions on where you have placed the Holostage for the best performance.
I probably should try on my router/switch which is in a different room.
I just received the box that is going on my central fuse panel and I am looking forward to hearing the results.
I would love to hear other opinions on where you have placed the Holostage for the best performance.
The impact of Holostages on the listening experience is nothing short of astonishing. Initially, they almost overwhelmed me - placing 12 units across my system, including my router and modem, drastically altered the sound to the point where I barely recognized my setup. It was dark and dull and the soundstage was warped. Each slight repositioning created significant changes to a point it almost drove me crazy. I started removing units locking them far away in another room so they wouldn’t have an effect in the sound. In the end, I stripped down everything and started slowly from scratch.
After hours of trial and error, a clear pattern emerged:
- While placing the elements on components has an effect, their real magic lies in optimizing the room itself. Strategic placement transforms the entire listening environment.
- Each unit subtly pulls the sound toward its location. To maintain coherence, symmetry is essential; otherwise, an uneven placement can warp the soundstage to a disorienting degree.
Placement Strategy (I used nanotape so I can stick them anyplace)
First Step: Place one unit on the front and back wall at the top to expand vertical soundstage height. They must always remain in axis.
Second Step: Place two units on the sidewalls, midway between the speakers and listening position to enhance depth and pull the sound further into the room. Again, they must be in axis.
With these two steps my room „locked in“. From now on, I could place a fifth unit somewhere in the room without the drastic change of result and without the warping effect of the soundstage.
Lowering the height of all four Holostages helps find the optimal balance between body/darker timbre vs. airiness/treble energy. A higher position increases treble energy, stage height and airiness. A lower position increases body/weight, focus/smaller images and will lead to darker timbre. They must always remain in axis and at the same height for best results.
If more weight is needed, Holostages can be placed on top of gear. This increases body, but leading to a darker timbre and smaller images.
Holostages can drastically improve room acoustics and the listening experience by tuning the sound to one’s liking. However, achieving the best results requires a willingness to experiment. In my setup, randomly placing them on components only made things worse - but once properly positioned, the transformation was remarkable. With patience and careful placement, they will increase stage size and depth significantly and will make the music feel more alive than ever before.
After hours of trial and error, a clear pattern emerged:
- While placing the elements on components has an effect, their real magic lies in optimizing the room itself. Strategic placement transforms the entire listening environment.
- Each unit subtly pulls the sound toward its location. To maintain coherence, symmetry is essential; otherwise, an uneven placement can warp the soundstage to a disorienting degree.
Placement Strategy (I used nanotape so I can stick them anyplace)
First Step: Place one unit on the front and back wall at the top to expand vertical soundstage height. They must always remain in axis.
Second Step: Place two units on the sidewalls, midway between the speakers and listening position to enhance depth and pull the sound further into the room. Again, they must be in axis.
With these two steps my room „locked in“. From now on, I could place a fifth unit somewhere in the room without the drastic change of result and without the warping effect of the soundstage.
Lowering the height of all four Holostages helps find the optimal balance between body/darker timbre vs. airiness/treble energy. A higher position increases treble energy, stage height and airiness. A lower position increases body/weight, focus/smaller images and will lead to darker timbre. They must always remain in axis and at the same height for best results.
If more weight is needed, Holostages can be placed on top of gear. This increases body, but leading to a darker timbre and smaller images.
Holostages can drastically improve room acoustics and the listening experience by tuning the sound to one’s liking. However, achieving the best results requires a willingness to experiment. In my setup, randomly placing them on components only made things worse - but once properly positioned, the transformation was remarkable. With patience and careful placement, they will increase stage size and depth significantly and will make the music feel more alive than ever before.
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Tried in two more rooms today. It also works with two in the corner of the front wall and two half way between speakers and listening position. Also we experimented with different heights between 1 meter and 3 meters. We always found the optimal position to be around 2.20 meters. Above the soundstage gets unnaturally high and the sound looses body. If placed too low (approximately below 1.80 meters) the soundstage is too flat and the music gets too dull. But once the room „locks in“, it is absolutely incredible how much bigger the soundstage gets and how the sound fills the entire room. It really transforms the experience from looking at a painting in front of you to being fully surrounded by it.
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If I read you right, you do not recommend placing on your components? Second, is your router and switch next to your audio components or in another room?
I have my router and switch in a media closet in a totally different room. I wonder how that would impact the sound?
I have probably spent 10 hours using 0 to 10 holostages.
I agree wholeheartedly with glowstate.
For me; I need four. 2 in the front wall corners about 55-65% up the wall
2 on right left wall.
It is absolutely critical the right and left wall are half way between seat and the speakers AND that the boxes are perfectly aligned all the way around - same axis, same height etc with laser.
This is like a $15k+ to $20k upgrade. My room is like a live concert hall. It’s incredible.
Putting them in components can work but you have to be careful and really understand your room.
For me, I took them all out except for these four and it’s absolutely astonishing
Krissy is amazing. I now have ground box boosters and 2 fuse box booster and my system is completely transformed.
I agree wholeheartedly with glowstate.
For me; I need four. 2 in the front wall corners about 55-65% up the wall
2 on right left wall.
It is absolutely critical the right and left wall are half way between seat and the speakers AND that the boxes are perfectly aligned all the way around - same axis, same height etc with laser.
This is like a $15k+ to $20k upgrade. My room is like a live concert hall. It’s incredible.
Putting them in components can work but you have to be careful and really understand your room.
For me, I took them all out except for these four and it’s absolutely astonishing
Krissy is amazing. I now have ground box boosters and 2 fuse box booster and my system is completely transformed.
Yes, that’s how it behaved in the four rooms. I have router and switch in the same room and off axis from the four Holostages. Switch is even on the floor. Any holostage lying around on the floor kills treble energy. We accidentally forgot a box of 4 Holostages on the floor. It was almost ridiculous how much it killed high frequencies.
All my gear is in the listening room and below 1 meter. I presume their position was the reason they made the sound dark and dull not so much the fact that they were placed on a unit. So unless you want to slow down treble energy I would not recommend that.
If router and switch are in another room, you won’t get the „room position“ effect but only the effect of a Holostage being on or around a unit. I have no idea what that will do. But I‘d be interested in your experience with that.
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Made a sketch of how it worked for me…
Some advice please.
If I had to select 1 spot to try out the ground box booster, where would you recommend I place it......and exactly how should I safely connect it?
I have a Puritan 156 power conditioner connected to a Puritan City Master for example. I also have a Puritan Route Master connected to all my components, and the Route Master is connected to a Puritan City Master.
Or perhaps start with a simple chassis screw on my preamp?
I only have a "spade to spade" Audience Front Row ground wire for my test, I need to get a few more ground wires.
Thanks for the advice.
If I had to select 1 spot to try out the ground box booster, where would you recommend I place it......and exactly how should I safely connect it?
I have a Puritan 156 power conditioner connected to a Puritan City Master for example. I also have a Puritan Route Master connected to all my components, and the Route Master is connected to a Puritan City Master.
Or perhaps start with a simple chassis screw on my preamp?
I only have a "spade to spade" Audience Front Row ground wire for my test, I need to get a few more ground wires.
Thanks for the advice.
I just got mine and wired it straight to the binding post on my Shunyata power conditioner.
You’ll want to either ground it directly to your Puritan conditioner or star-ground all chassis & non-floating signal grounds to it with equidistant ground wires to make it nice & quiet
It was instantly obvious something good just happened to my sound. Probably this most impactful Heartsound product yet… really loving it and they say it gets better with some burn-in.
I’m SERIOUSLY impressed with this thing.
I’ve got mine wired with 11 gauge solid silver wire with hammered ends to hook into binding posts.
Heartsound Holostages were first reviewed on my website millercarbon.com in fact that is where they got their name! A bunch of these and your room is transformed into the Enterprise Holodeck only with sound. So I said it's like a Holostage- and it stuck! As crazy as it sounds they do indeed allow one to shape and tailor their soundstage and overall presentation, pretty much as people here have described. The kind of improvements in ease, natural detail, liquidity, and pitch black depth normally associated only with the most prohibitively expensive gear. Nice to see them catching on and getting recognition from discerning listeners.
Of course the Holostages being reviewed here are newer and a LOT more effective than the ones I reviewed a couple years ago. Krissy never stops testing and improving. Unlike a lot of other tweaks the stuff Krissy makes only gets better and better for the money. They were a good deal a couple years ago, the price hasn't really changed but the performance has only gotten better.
Of course the Holostages being reviewed here are newer and a LOT more effective than the ones I reviewed a couple years ago. Krissy never stops testing and improving. Unlike a lot of other tweaks the stuff Krissy makes only gets better and better for the money. They were a good deal a couple years ago, the price hasn't really changed but the performance has only gotten better.
Halydean and Miller,
Thank you both for getting back to me.
Halydean....when I connect the Ground Box Booster to my Puritan 156 as you suggested, should I leave the Puritan City Master connected to the 156 as well, or take that off and just use Krissy's Ground Box?
Miller, thank you for the additional feedback on the Holo's. I received 2 of those and placed them on the output transformers of my 300B mono amplifiers based on a suggestion I read in this forum. Since I only have 2 Holo's (so far) would you recommend trying to place them somewhere else?
I must confess, I was (am) a big fan of Tim's and Krissy's stuff. I still have my total contact in the freezer.
Funny story.....my friend's wife accidentally threw out a syringe of total contact when she was cleaning out the freezer. I swear I thought they were going to get a divorce!
Thank you both for getting back to me.
Halydean....when I connect the Ground Box Booster to my Puritan 156 as you suggested, should I leave the Puritan City Master connected to the 156 as well, or take that off and just use Krissy's Ground Box?
Miller, thank you for the additional feedback on the Holo's. I received 2 of those and placed them on the output transformers of my 300B mono amplifiers based on a suggestion I read in this forum. Since I only have 2 Holo's (so far) would you recommend trying to place them somewhere else?
I must confess, I was (am) a big fan of Tim's and Krissy's stuff. I still have my total contact in the freezer.
Funny story.....my friend's wife accidentally threw out a syringe of total contact when she was cleaning out the freezer. I swear I thought they were going to get a divorce!
I’d leave the Puritan City Master hooked up too — but I’d try with and without. I’ve got a Puritan Ground Master and was surprised to find it sounds better without it.
I should add that it is probably not due to the Puritan Ground Master— but due to my ground. My guess as to why it sounds better without it is because my main household ground must have a charge to it or a lot of noise, which is a problem that needs to be fixed.
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