Magico M3 MPod 3 Point Speaker Stands

[FrantzM]

I was expecting your prompt reply, even the "We, audiophiles" - surely with the exception of you, a few selected members and me .

99% of the people who infer that "while very good but can't be better than" do not have direct experience with your FM Acoustics example, but have direct large experience with as many equipment as you or me and have watched that as as general rule, when properly matched and optimally used, a more expensive item can return a better sound quality.

You second subject has nothing to deal with this aspect - if people are prepared to spend more money, designers are allowed to designed better products at an higher price. Perhaps some of them will not make a proper use of their extra budget, members of forums like WBF should warn consumers in such cases if they have sufficient evidence of it. The law of diminishing returns makes this ultra price zone a dangerous zone - any one knowing about error propagation and logarithms will understand it - a lot of experience and self control is needed here. Nothing new here ...

And yes, we all now know about the MG3.7 and ask ourselves why you do not consider a pair of MG3.7 or MG201.1 for you. Will you elucidate us of this mystery?

Sigh I give up! after this display of circular reasoning ..

but before I go I will politely answer your last question:

I have owned Maggies from the SMG to the 20.1. The new Maggies (.7x series) remain in my view contenders but I believe that cones have arrived. I am also more and more attracted to High Sensitivity speakers: JBL 4367 and Gedlee New Summa are speakers I will audition and so is the M2 system. The Q3 was very seductive to me and is still in the running. Will investigate YG and Vivid Giya Series too... Will take the time for the Quintessence Acoustic which by many reports are excellent ... so likely cons or horns for me and multi subs for the lows ...

 

[Folsom]

I guess it's important to ask, is pricing based on performance totally acceptable?

I have no problem with business plans that say charge 10x their cost, or whatever. When I become a little irritated is when someone wants to charge me more for no reason aside from I have more money than the other guy who just asked about a price. Now if I get improved service, by all means, have a business model that compensates for that fact. I guess my wish is for consistency, not lower prices. On top of that I don't know that these footers are not priced within a business model of markup, but as I've said several times, it doesn't appear that way.

BTW the M5 could easily rack up costs over the M3. The size of aluminium to machine is much bigger, costs can become exponential at some point. And then considering the parts Magico uses in their crossovers, before markup this could be thousands of dollars difference in capacitors. That's on top of larger more expensive drivers to make. $21k? I don't see why not.

 

[KeithR]

I fail to understand how a wise strategy of buying used goods is connected with the perception of quality and price.

The used market is a very good arbiter of value imo. Many of these "me too" uber high end products aren't worth much after the initial sale.

 

[microstrip]

The used market is a very good arbiter of value imo. Many of these "me too" uber high end products aren't worth much after the initial sale.

IMHO, prices are dominated by offer and demand, not always by quality. We can see both scenes in high quality pricey items - dropping enormously and keeping decent values. Also the prices vary enormously on time- e.g. after a significant upgrade or a new model, usually there are a few pieces coming to the market simultaneously at low prices, but soon prices go the to normal values.

Unfortunately, most of the time, I find similar items with low prices when I am selling and high prices when I am buying ... Am I alone?

 

[microstrip]

Sigh I give up! after this display of circular reasoning ..

but before I go I will politely answer your last question:

I have owned Maggies from the SMG to the 20.1. The new Maggies (.7x series) remain in my view contenders but I believe that cones have arrived. I am also more and more attracted to High Sensitivity speakers: JBL 4367 and Gedlee New Summa are speakers I will audition and so is the M2 system. The Q3 was very seductive to me and is still in the running. Will investigate YG and Vivid Giya Series too... Will take the time for the Quintessence Acoustic which by many reports are excellent ... so likely cons or horns for me and multi subs for the lows ...

Great - this time you forgot the latin words - "circulus in probando", dear Frantz ... No, it was not a reasoning just an exposition. I do not want to prove anything - just presenting my own experience and beliefs.

So , it is a question of shape and beliefs, unfortunately most of them leading to choices of much higher price than the Maggies! But you will surely have a great time listening to them all.

 

[stehno]

The new stand replaces the spikes and offers a much better coupling to the floor and eliminates extraneous resonances from the floor.....mechanical vibration control.

How is it possible for these half-spheres to provide for superior coupling over even the most grossly engineered spikes? If per chance you're thinking superior coupling for some surfaces but not others, which surfaces are you thinking?

Do you understand what the term "coupling" implies? Especially in the realm of high-end audio?

 

[Folsom]

I suggest you read Gary's guide on this, in his circle.

Spikes only couple vertically, and not horizontally. The issue is that doesn't work that great on the rear of a speaker, but is rather beneficial on the front.

 

[cjf]

I suggest you read Gary's guide on this, in his circle.

Spikes only couple vertically, and not horizontally. The issue is that doesn't work that great on the rear of a speaker, but is rather beneficial on the front.

I would argue that Spikes couple both vertically and horizontally assuming they "sink" into the floor surface a few millimeters.

 

[Folsom]

I would argue that Spikes couple both vertically and horizontally assuming they "sink" into the floor surface a few millimeters.

Go read it, get some education on the subject. You're saying utter non-sense. Why on earth would anyone choose spikes to couple when you can mate larger surface areas?

 

[NorthStar]

The new stand replaces the spikes and offers a much better coupling to the floor and eliminates extraneous resonances from the floor.....mechanical vibration control.

• http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showt...ing-with-particular-reference-to-loudspeakers
? http://www.primacoustic.com/recoil-science.htm

"Speakers produce bass frequencies that will transfer vibrations through the speaker stand to the floor, the walls and what ever else is physically connected to the speaker. This is called acoustic coupling.

When sound vibrations couple with the speaker stands or the shelf, they resonate and produce unwanted sound coloration. To sum up, coupling causes a frequency bump at the resonant frequency which in turn changes the speaker's performance. What happens is that the resonance will either be in phase or be out of phase with the loudspeaker which will invariably cause a frequency shift commonly known as comb-filtering."

 

[stehno]

Go read it, get some education on the subject. You're saying utter non-sense. Why on earth would anyone choose spikes to couple when you can mate larger surface areas?

Perhaps you should first ask yourself, what is the originally intended general fundamental purpose or goal of joining (coupling) a platform to a speaker and joining (coupling) a speaker via its platform to the flooring system? And does that make sense?

What is Alon Wolf's intended purpose? How does his verbiage and executions align with the originally intended general purpose? If Wolf's verbiage and intended purpose generally do align, do Wolf's chosen materials match his verbiage and purpose?

Another consideration. Might there exist more superior ways of accomplishing the same purpose and at much less cost that what Wolf designed here?

Lastly, if per some odd chance these things don't fundamentally align with the originally intended general fundamental purpose or goal, what might that tell you about Magico, Wolf, and perhaps even yourself and others?

 

[Folsom]

The only thing I was doing was trying to inform someone how spikes work. So maybe address someone whom is on the topic you're on? You're discussing how the Magico things work, I'm not.

 

[stehno]

The only thing I was doing was trying to inform someone how spikes work. So maybe address someone whom is on the topic you're on? You're discussing how the Magico things work, I'm not.

Well, you used the terms education, utter non-sense, spikes, larger surface areas, etc. all in a derogatory manner so I just assumed you had some knowledge and hence must have some interest.

 

[audioarcher]

My take on these feet/stands is that they would only be good for hard surface floors. I would not use them on carpet.


They appear to use Isodamp dampening material sandwiched between metal. At least that is what the older Q footers did.

Have not heard these footers, but I have tried something similar on my own custom stands I made for my own speakers. I did not care for 1/8" thick Isodamp between two 1/4" layers of hard anodized aluminum under my speakers. So I removed the Isodamp and just bolted the aluminum plates together instead. None of this means that the same will apply to Magico speakers of course. If I owned Magico's I would want to hear these stands first in my own home before purchasing.


As for the price of these, they are high but inline with the rest of Magico's offerings. If you like the sound and can afford it why not?

 

[beaur]

I don't have a dog in this fight as I won't be buying the Magicos but I might come by and take Rob up on his offer just to see how an A/B would be accomplished!!

Beau

I would invite any of you kind gentleman to stop by for a visit if in NYC for a listen to the M3's with MPods in a few weeks once they arrive and then I would forward to your opinions.

 

[stehno]

My take on these feet/stands is that they would only be good for hard surface floors. I would not use them on carpet.

They appear to use Isodamp dampening material sandwiched between metal. At least that is what the older Q footers did.

Have not heard these footers, but I have tried something similar on my own custom stands I made for my own speakers. I did not care for 1/8" thick Isodamp between two 1/4" layers of hard anodized aluminum under my speakers. So I removed the Isodamp and just bolted the aluminum plates together instead. None of this means that the same will apply to Magico speakers of course. If I owned Magico's I would want to hear these stands first in my own home before purchasing.

As for the price of these, they are high but inline with the rest of Magico's offerings. If you like the sound and can afford it why not?

I sure like your car more and more every time I see it. Is it a '67 GTO?

I appreciate your sharing the experiment you did with your custom stands. Since you only implied sonic differences before and after and assuming you still have the damping material removed, would you mind sharing your thoughts on the performance differences?

As well as your speculations how those differences might have been accomplished?

 

[audioarcher]

I sure like your car more and more every time I see it. Is it a '67 GTO?

I appreciate your sharing the experiment you did with your custom stands. Since you only implied sonic differences before and after and assuming you still have the damping material removed, would you mind sharing your thoughts on the performance differences?

As well as your speculations how those differences might have been accomplished?

[FONT=&quot]Thanks Stenho. Yes, it's a 67' GTO.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]It's been some time since I did that experiment, but from what I remember the sound with the isodamp was a bit muddier and dull. Maybe too much dampening for my situation. If I try a thinner layer of isodamp say maybe 1/16th " thick maybe that would work out better. Hard to say. Might be worth a try one of these days. Another thing I tried for fun was putting 3 ball bearings in recessed cups between the two plates. Kind of like Rollerblocks. That was interesting but did not pan out either. The mids and highs sounded nice but the bass had issues at certain frequencies. Most likely the frequency the bass drivers were moving the bearings at. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Anyway not sure how much damping material Magico uses in their feet. My speaker cabinets are made of mdf. Magico's are metal, so they may benefit from more dampening then speakers made of softer material. [/FONT]

 

[PeterA]

Do we know that these Magico speaker bases have isodamp in them?

 

[audioarcher]

Do we know that these Magico speaker bases have isodamp in them?

Hi Peter. No that is a guess on my part. It is the right color (blue) for isodamp, and isodamp is one of the better dampening materials out there. If it is not, then it would be interesting to know what it is.

 

[PeterA]

I'm also curious if the front footers are the same as the back footers. They may see different loads from different directions and thus have slightly different designs. I would think that the type of floor surface and how solid the floor is, and whether or not a speaker is ported or not would all be variables to consider. I can see how it would become mathematically complex very quickly. Computers could do the calculations, but one would have to understand the forces involved and understand what to look for. I have no idea what is really involved, but it seems to me that Magico addresses problems in serious ways and seems to push technology.