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Topic: anyone use tile/marble under speakers? (Read 25700 times) previous topic - next topic
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anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

I read an article about using stone/cement/marble speaker stands... and i'm probably gonna buy/make some... but i had a pile of floor tiles laying around... so i threw one under each speaker on their current stands and i put 4 under the subwoofer (1 under each leg, not stacked)...

the bass sounds AMAZING...  i can turn the volume up a lot higher than before with barely any awful vibrations from the sub... especially on pop/rap music... and any song with good bass parts sound a lot more real...  the floor isn't really vibrating at all anymore...

i'm thinking of going down to the tile store and seeing how much some thick marble costs... since i only need like 4 for the subwoofer, might aswell get some nice dense stuff...


this might be a good idea to throw under your cd player's legs aswell... (i don't have one, i just use mp3/wavpack)

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #1 –
You do not need hard materials beneath the CD/DVD/LD player. If the CD/DVD/LD is having problems with vibrations, put some soft absorbing material, i.e. rubber, beneath.

I have experimented a lot with garden tiles in my youth. Using them beneath speakers/subwoofer can be a mixed experience. Placing the speaker directly on the tile on a wooden floor, is usually not an improvement. The speaker should have as little a contact surface with the tile/floor as possible - spikes are required. If your speakers are small and require stands, use spikes between both floor-tile/stand and stand/speaker.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #2 –
Quote
You do not need hard materials beneath the CD/DVD/LD player. If the CD/DVD/LD is having problems with vibrations, put some soft absorbing material, i.e. rubber, beneath.

I have experimented a lot with garden tiles in my youth. Using them beneath speakers/subwoofer can be a mixed experience. Placing the speaker directly on the tile on a wooden floor, is usually not an improvement. The speaker should have as little a contact surface with the tile/floor as possible - spikes are required. If your speakers are small and require stands, use spikes between both floor-tile/stand and stand/speaker.

yeah, i just put the rubber feet on the tiles... 

what exactly are "spikes"? is that just another name for these little rubber feet?

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #3 –
Quote
I read an article about using stone/cement/marble speaker stands... and i'm probably gonna buy/make some... but i had a pile of floor tiles laying around... so i threw one under each speaker on their current stands and i put 4 under the subwoofer (1 under each leg, not stacked)...

the bass sounds AMAZING...  i can turn the volume up a lot higher than before with barely any awful vibrations from the sub... especially on pop/rap music... and any song with good bass parts sound a lot more real...   the floor isn't really vibrating at all anymore...

i'm thinking of going down to the tile store and seeing how much some thick marble costs... since i only need like 4 for the subwoofer, might aswell get some nice dense stuff...


this might be a good idea to throw under your cd player's legs aswell... (i don't have one, i just use mp3/wavpack)

Uh, major placebo effect here?  Ever hear of Peter Belt?  Did you try some tiles under your listening chair?

Speaker stands can make a difference, but there are so many variables to the room/speaker interaction that it would be hard to give any blanket recommendations on how to get better sound.  I do know that the physics are such that moving your speakers in the room even 10cm or so will have a bigger effect than putting tiles or marble or gold or plutonium under the speakers.  As a matter of fact, a tile under a speaker can make them more prone to moving/wobbling - it is generally better to use spikes to pierce through the carpet to stabilize a speaker than increasing the contact area with the carpet and pad.

Call me skeptical that your four tiles under the SW does anything audible unless the cone faces downward and was hitting your carpet.

If you really want to "kill vibration" then you need to use material that absorbs vibration (rubber, foam, etc.), not something that just transmits it like tile/marble, etc.  I'm not sure that killing the vibration will make the sound "better," you're talking about a reasonably complex mechanical system.

Suggest you measure the in-room response and post the before/after results, or buy a blindfod and do some ABX testing - you may be surprised how amazing the lack of difference is.
Was that a 1 or a 0?

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #4 –
Quote
yeah, i just put the rubber feet on the tiles... 

what exactly are "spikes"? is that just another name for these little rubber feet?

Spikes are pointy things your screw into the speakers/stands - around 4 spikes per speaker. They are height-adjustable so the speaker can stand without tipping. Since there is almost no contact surface, very few vibrations are carried between speaker and floor.



PS: The spikes will make small holes in the wooden floor or carpet - IMHO a small price. Putting a garden tile between, saves the floor/carpet - but I have had mixed results. I do not have tiles under my speakers anymore.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #5 –
well, the subwoofer was on hardwood floor.. i moved it onto the carpet with tiles under it... perhaps the carpet or both were the cause of the reduced vibration...


hmm... as for spikes, i'll definately look into them... sounds like a better route... (can you just get them in any decent audio store?)


i don't think the tiles under any of the other speakers made any difference, i should have been more specific in my first post...  i think the sub was the problem...    therefore putting tiles under my chair wouldn't really do anything but make my feet cold    this room isn't exactly setup for anything specific... so theres misc. rattles and vibrations i'm slowly working out...  that sub really made the floor shake when it got turned up... which created some nasty vibrations from other things closeby...


would it be benificial to put a thicker piece of carpet, and maybe extra carpet foam underneath the sub/speakers?

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #6 –
Aren't spikes provided with the speakers?
My pair of speakers was provided with spikes. In case you do not want the hooles in the underlying floor, there are some rubber provided that adapt to the spikes.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #7 –
Expensive speakers comes with spikes. The spike illustrated on the picture is the type where you drill a small hole (NOT ALL THE WAY THROUGH!) in the speaker cabinet, insert the thread and then screw in the spike. These are cheap and can be bought in any decent audio store. Otherwise buy them over the net by typing "speaker spike" in google.

There exist another type - cone spikes - Danish design from 1990's. A huge metal cone, approx 5cm/2" high and 5cm/2" in diameter. You just tape it to the speaker. Great if you want to sell your speakers later on, but quite costly. I belive the were priced at $20 a piece  in 1993 - you need 8 for to speakers...

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #8 –
Quote
In case you do not want the hooles in the underlying floor, there are some rubber provided that adapt to the spikes.

As an alternative, you can put a small coin between the spike and the floor. You can even buy some floor protection "coins". They have cork on the side facing the floor and some golden alloy facing the spike.  They also have a fixpoint in the center to improve the visual appeal.

If you decide to do without and do not own your home, be friendly to your land lord. I must have made at least 100 small holes during my six years at the dormitory. They cost me nothing.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #9 –
Just moving a subwoofer can dramatically change the sound. I have my speakers equalized with -10 db from 42 to 58 Hz on the left channel, and -30 from 40 to 62 on the right channel. I did it without measuring, using sweep tones to find where there was a resonance.
I switched the left and right speaker and the result was the same, I have much more bass on the right channel just because it is differently placed than the left one.

About vibrations : rigid materials transmit vibrations, and flexible ones stop them.
With rubber under your speakers, the speaker vibrates alone. It's not transmitted to the floor.
With spikes uner the speaker, the vibrations are transmitted to the floor, and the general behaviour depends on the floor itself.

In theory, the best is to use spikes below the speakers (three ones so that there is no problem of height adjustment), put them on a big, heavy stone, and put some rubber under the stone.
This way, thanks to the spikes, the speaker + stone behaves as one rigid block, it increases the inertia of the system, thus prevents it from vibrating.
The rubber prevents the vibrations to be transmitted to the floor, avoiding resonances in a wood floor.

It seems to me that when I added rubber under the stones, it made no difference. But I just cut an eraser into four, and it cost me 0.1 [Euro] per speaker.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #10 –
I have an easy way to adjust bass on my speakers.
As they are opened on the rear, the ammount of bass depends on how much air is passing through this hole, and the distance to the walls.
My way to adjust is (expect from adjusting the distance to the wall) is by putting some "kitchen filter" into this hole.
(do no know the english name of this material)
According to the ammount you put into the back hole, you change the ammount of bass.
It's a little "experimental", but it works and is very cheap.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #11 –
Quote
About vibrations : rigid materials transmit vibrations, and flexible ones stop them.
With rubber under your speakers, the speaker vibrates alone. It's not transmitted to the floor.
With spikes uner the speaker, the vibrations are transmitted to the floor, and the general behaviour depends on the floor itself.

In theory, the best is to use spikes below the speakers (three ones so that there is no problem of height adjustment), put them on a big, heavy stone, and put some rubber under the stone.
This way, thanks to the spikes, the speaker + stone behaves as one rigid block, it increases the inertia of the system, thus prevents it from vibrating.
The rubber prevents the vibrations to be transmitted to the floor, avoiding resonances in a wood floor.

It seems to me that when I added rubber under the stones, it made no difference. But I just cut an eraser into four, and it cost me 0.1 [Euro] per speaker.

When you put a 20 kg garden tile and a 50 kg speaker on top of a small piece of rubber, the rubber is no longer flexible. The level og flexibility depends on the material used and the weight placed upon it.

By placing a speaker on spikes on a wooden floor, the contact surface is somewhere around 4-8 mm^2 depending on the weight (how big holes they make in the floor). By placing the speakers on a hard surface, such as glass, metal or concrete, the contact surface is below 2 mm^2. Small contact surface = fewer transmitted vibrations.

Three spikes is the optimal solution if you live alone without pets and don't invite drunk people inside. The speaker will easily tip over when a cat decides to jump on it.

The optimal solution is to remove floorboards below the speakers and mold large concrete blocks (around a ton should suffice :). The floor boards are not allowed to touch the concrete. Then place the speakers on spikes on the concrete. Goodbye to floor transmitted vibrations. Let me know if you do this :)

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #12 –
Quote
I have an easy way to adjust bass on my speakers.
As they are opened on the rear, the ammount of bass depends on how much air is passing through this hole, and the distance to the walls.
My way to adjust is (expect from adjusting the distance to the wall) is by putting some "kitchen filter" into this hole.
(do no know the english name of this material)
According to the ammount you put into the back hole, you change the ammount of bass.
It's a little "experimental", but it works and is very cheap.

Does this affect bass only?

I had a strange friend once. He had spent five years building his dream speakers and claimed he knew something about absorbant material and speakers. We added some material, size like a T-shirt, to both my speakers (inside). The bass changed dramatically - much more firm. I contacted Snell Accoustics (manufacturer of my speakers) and asked why they saved the extra material. They replied quickly and very polite with something like this: We are happy that you like the new sound of your Snell speakers. The majority of our customer appreciate mid-range as well...

The mid-range was indeed affected -- it was too harsh. Soft female voices sounded angry with no charm etc. I did not realise this because I was focused on my superior bass. I quicky removed the extra material.

Putting absorbant inside the bass port sounds like something similar?

I've heard you are supposed to adjust bass level by the length of the bass port. B&W delivered pipes of assorted lendth with their DM640 model.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #13 –
Obviously it also has some effects on mid range. But it seems to me to be near zero.
Btw is my case the filtering material is not inside the speaker, but inside the bass port in order to reduce bass.
(my speakers are Jamo Classic 8 and are, to my mind, producing too much bass)

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #14 –
Quote
Small contact surface = fewer transmitted vibrations.

No, it's the opposite. With spikes you thightly couple the speaker to the floor, so if the floor is not rigid, it will follow speaker vibrations. And if you use just 3 spikes, the coupling is fewer than if you use 4, with 3 the speaker coupling is not so "stable".

The only way to reduce vibration transmission is the way Pio suggests, creating a lowpass mechanical filter. True that if there is much weight (mass) and the rubber is overcompressed it doesn't act as a compliance anymore. So, I guess it's all up to the type and amount of rubber you put and the weight of the speaker + added mass.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #15 –
Quote
I have experimented a lot with garden tiles in my youth.

Hey, who didn't? Ahh, to be young and reckless again... 

-- Uosdwis

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #16 –
Quote
Quote
Small contact surface = fewer transmitted vibrations.

No, it's the opposite. With spikes you thightly couple the speaker to the floor, so if the floor is not rigid, it will follow speaker vibrations. And if you use just 3 spikes, the coupling is fewer than if you use 4, with 3 the speaker coupling is not so "stable".

True, the vibrations from the speaker are transmitted to the floor. The floor is probably quite large and will absorb these vibrations. However, vibrations from the floor (feedback from the speaker) will try to vibrate the speaker itself. If the speaker is standing directly on the floor (bottom surface touching floor), it has a much lower weight distribution than it does if it stands on spikes. It takes a lot more energy to vibrate a heavy object  than a light one.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #17 –
Quote
It takes a lot more energy to vibrate a heavy object  than a light one.

Let me see if I understand you right : you consider speaker+spikes as heavy, then difficult to move, then stopping vibrations. I can follow you, but this way of seeing things is very confusing.
Let's study the system as a conductor of mechanical vibrations. Flexible materials have a short frequency response : they can vibrate slowly, thus conduct very low audio frequencies, but they absorb high audio frequencies, that are strongly attenuated over short distances.
Average materials like plastic and wood can resonate at audio frequencies, and conducts sound cahoticly.
Rigid materials (stone, metal, glass, ceramic), have a wide frequency response, and conduct even ultrasounds better than air. The fact that they are rigid, and therefore intuitively unable to bend and carry waves is just the manifestation of the very high speed of sound in them (several km/s, IIRC).

When the surface of a material is against the surface of another, the air layer between them acts like a barrier. It's like when you put two pieces of glass against each other : the interface reflects light.
But if you put a drop of water between them, or press them very hard against each other, the mirror effect disappears, and you can see through it. The same kind of thing happens when a speaker is just put on a stand or on the floor. If it is light a can freely slip, the vibrations are reflected, and the speaker vibrates alone.
If it is heavy and can't be slipped, vibrations are transmitted.
With spikes, vibrations are always transmitted, because they are strongly screwed into the speaker on one side, and strongly pressed against the floor on the other side.

Now all depends on what is below the spikes. The speakers act as a vibration generator, whose output impedance, if we compare them with an electrical circuit, is related to their ability to produce a [retreat][go back][feedback][move in the opposite direction][shock received by the rifleman][put the appropriate english word here] effect. This effect, that are nothing else than the vibrations we are speaking about, will be smallest if the mass of the whole circuit is maximal. it stands for the resistance of the equivalent electrical circuit.
If the spikes are connected to a heavy rigid object, vibrations of the speakers are transmitted to it. But this object (a stone for example) acts then as a big resistance, and prevents the speaker to generate vibrations (current).
A flexible object, on the other hand, converts vibrations into heat (it's the absorbtion we spoke about above). It acts a bit like a ground plug with very low resistance. It "eats" the vibrations coming from the speakers, that are high because it is allowed to move.
In both cases, audio resonances, like the ones that may occur if the speakers are put into wooden shelves, for example, or on a table, are avoided, but with the rubber, the speaker can move, and vibrate (the equivalent is the amount of current flowing into the ground plug), while with the stone, it can't vibrate (eq : same ground plug but with a big resistance in serial, thus a low current flowing).
Putting rubber between speakers and stones seems unuseful to me, like putting a resistance nearby an electrical circuit without plugging it. The rubber acts like a ground plug (low impedance) swallowing all the current from the generator before it reaches the resistance that would prevent it from being generated in the first place.

This is for the theory. In practice, the audible effect, if any, seems small. Maybe it is noticeable with light and powerful speakers.

PS : I have four pieces of rubber below the stones : 1.5 x 1.5 x 1 cm (WxDxH) each. And the speaker + stone is free to move a little, as the rubber bends below them.
Warning : don't increase the height of rubber. One of the "column" speakers of a friend threatened to fall, bending dangerously, as one piece of rubber (a piece of pencil eraser) was slowly crushed under the weight of the system after one night.
PPS : the physics course is a bit old in my head, please correct me if the electric-mechanic correspondance is false.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #18 –
With regards to minimising vibration and so easing the workload on your CD player, Cambridge Audio do a very nice-looking isolation platform:

http://www.intek.si/A_CambridgeAudio/cambridge5.htm - The K500, about a quarter of the way down the page.

Below that is an integrated iso platform and DAC, which will obviously reduce the workload of your CD player even more by just using your player as a "transport" and doing the digital-to-analogue conversion itself. I've no idea if these specific products will produce a noticeable improvement but I have had several CA components in the past and can honestly say that they're all good performers, especially for the price tag which tends to be lower than you might think.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #19 –
I think that today the cd transports do not have any vibration problems.
The cd reading is around 1X, and this process is quite easy, considering that we are able to have cd reading with peak value of about 40X.
It seems to me that there can only be a real vibration problem if you put your cd transport on a vibrating surface.

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #21 –
I just used old mousepads 

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #22 –
Quote
I just used old mousepads 

hah! didn't even think of that... i'm gonna go dig around... i know i have some, somewhere...

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #23 –
There are hundreds of snake oil things to put under speakers, cd players, amplis, etc, I even heard that placing your ampli on copper+steel scour [english ?] sponges provided better sound than copper only scour sponges.

We are not going to post all advertisement for audiophile cables, etc accessories, unless there is some ABX proof that the sound is improved...

anyone use tile/marble under speakers?

Reply #24 –
One of the main reasons for using spikes under your loudspeakers/stands and subwoofers is to create a more stable stance for the speakers. They provide a solid contact to the floor which prohibits any type of rocking or movement of the loudspeaker enclosure on the floor. Any type of movement like this can and will distroy the sound quality and blur the imaging of loudspeakers and will make a subwoofer become muddy and sloppy sounding.

It's just like the construction of a loudspeaker enclosure. If it is built with inferior materials that are thin and flimsy, the walls of the enclosure will vibrate(move), and cause distortion. The same applies if the whole enclosure is rocking or moving because of the movement of the drivers.

However, there is an added advantage to using spikes. They also acoustically decouple the loudspeaker from the floor and stop much of the vibrations from transferring to the floor, but not all vibrations!

Now for this part, I'm not sure how much truth there is behind this, but some believe that spikes are like horns or megaphones, meaning that if you use them facing down under speakers, the vibrations are muted or attenuated as they travel toward the point of the spike, leaving very little being transmitted to the floor. Likewise, when spikes are used for audio components, they should be pointing up into the equipment, thus attenuating the already attenuated vibrations that are transmitted through the floor and equipment rack.

For the use of rubber or foam for loudspeakers, I would not recommend it. The reason being that eventhough the rubber will absorb most of the vibrations, it still allows the enclosure to rock back and forth, leaving you still with the problem of wreaking havok with the sound quality of the loudpeaker and the stability of it on the floor. Just like Pio2001 said about his friend's tower speaker almost falling over from the rubber collapsing. However, using some type of material like rubber or DynaMat on top of CD players, preamps, etc will help improve the sound and attenuate any stray vibrations, and most importantly, air-born vibrations! You have to remember that no matter how many spikes you use, they will not help with air-born vibrations. For this, you should play around with other sound deadening materials such as those mentioned above, and various types of heavy stones like marble, granite, and so on.