Stillpoints or Audio Points, has anyone compared

Fiddler thanks for the nice try the open mind! There may be again, a second round. In the mean time listen and enjoy..Tom

Jayboard the whole approach is to not impede the flow but to allow the flow to happen more easily. If you add a point or mass to the top of a component you will disrupt the speed and have multiple points of exit..none being more coherent or efficient than the ones down below as when coupling with Audiopoints or Sistrum ..Tom

Jayboard, I don't mean any offense but I disagree with just about everything you've said above. Perhaps you've already indicated this in your post above, but upon a careful read of that post, you seem to indicate that you have experimented with and know perhaps as much about vibration control as some to many of the rest of us in this thread. Maybe less.

Nevertheless, you espouse your position with such eloquence and sense of authority, I wish I had your writing skills.

-IMO

Stehno, I'm sure I'm in the vast middle ground in terms of experience fooling around with different vibration control techniques. I don't claim special authority on this topic. If my post came off that way, it's only because I want to be specific enough about my point of view so that people who want to argue it can be specific, too. That gets the discussion a little farther along, I think.

I am suspicious of pure doctrines in hifi, especially those that take the form of "this approach is the best for every situation." Things usually are way more complicated than that. That's why I try to critique "isolation v. coupling" as a useful dichotomy. I prefer to take a systems approach in looking at what we're doing when we try to control vibration.

My main beef (at least if you ask me today) is the implied assertion by the Pure Coupling camp that mechanical energy behaves the same way as electrical energy, that earth is always at zero potential with respect to vibration of objects upon the earth, so coupling to it is naturally the best solution for vibration control. This sounds nice, but is there any basis for this assertion? (Whether coupling to earth is practically achievable, given wood floors, etc., is a whole 'nother question.)

This is a little off track, but I somewhat misquoted Starsound's Robert in my post, and I'd like to correct that. He said "The Sistrum Platform...vibrates continuously and simultaneously...The Sistrum Platform is also the noisiest platform in the world...Our noisy 'rattle triangle' vibrates creating a multitude of frequencies...well above as well as well below that of our human hearing." How is this draining vibrations to earth?

Thanks for your comments -- absolutely no offense taken.

In the interest to those who offered me assistance in this thread, I emailed Robert Maicks at Star Sound Technologies and explained my results with Audiopoints.

Robert emailed me back and generously offered to refund my purchase upon return of the product. He said, "I have been following the active thread on Audiogon as I would like to determine as to why our product has produced a minimal effect within your environment."

In my email to Robert I stated that I would take the loss on the Audiopoints coupling discs since the spikes had scarred them during setup. He replied, "We will take back all products, regardless of condition as there is no reason for you to lose any financial investment. We truly do stand behind our satisfaction guarantees."

Furthermore, Robert asked if I would provide additional feedback about my equipment in an effort to better understand what may have caused the performance issues. He also genuinely expressed an interest in trying to help address my problem in the future if he arrives at any solutions.

I must say I have been impressed with Star Sound Technologies committment to customer satisfaction, the manner in which Robert communicated with me and his desire for information to continually improve his product and to possibly help my situation.

Until I do a major upgrade of my system next year, I am extremely satisfied with the results that I have acheived recently with decoupling. However, when I do ultimately upgrade my system, I have committed to myself that I will re-visit Star Sound Technologies products. Robert earned both my respect and my willingness to do business with his company again.

Unfortunately, my results with Audiopoints were not what I had hoped for, but one couldn't ask for a better consumer experience, audio related or not.

Once again thanks to those that offered me feedback and help in addressing my vibration issues.

Warren