Stereocilia STX5 Speaker Isolation Stands

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The under-appreciated, but highly advantageous part of a home/project studio revealed.

Stereocilia Spekaer StandsOK, I can hear the sigh's of the masses now..."Speaker Stands?, HRC is searching for the holy grail in speaker stands?" Well, rest assured, by the end of this next paragraph you will be a believer in what an important role stands can play in your studio.

How many people out there have their monitors sitting on top of their gear racks? Guitar cabinet? Desktop? Well, consider this...when listening to your mix, the sound your speaker produces is carried through whatever it is sitting on. The vibration of the speakers in turn vibrates the unit it is on and takes on characteristics of it and thereby colors your playback sound. There are many methods to lessen the flow of the vibration. Some companies sell little pads of foam, not unlike the sound absorbing foam you put on the walls of a studio, to set your speakers on, some people use little felt footers like you use on the legs of chairs that sit on a hard wood floor, some use rubber feet...the methods are endless and most of them work...to a degree.

The only way to really get the best results is to achieve a minimum of contact between the speaker and the surface it rests on, or, to have the surface it rests on sufficiently dampened from passing vibration through it. Stereocilia speaker stands incorporate several of the above mentioned techniques, plus others, into their stands to help isolate the vibration from passing through them.

Shipping and Construction

My order of the Stereocilia STX5's arrived today. You do not get just a standard issue stand, you go to a page on their web site at http://www.stereocilia.com/stx5_virtual.htm and custom select the colors of your stand, the height, the size of the top plate and the color of the corner hardware. The stands are each individually built with care and packaged well, and my stands arrived in disassembled, but mint, condition. When opening the box and pulling it out it says quality, the stands are built of 3/4" MDF pieces, which dampen vibration much better than any wood or metal can. They are wrapped in very thick cabinet carpet to the colors of your choice. In assembling then I did notice the instructions are less than informative. I was a machinist for 10 years, so I know the difference between a "screw" and a "machine screw", but everyone else may not be so, a little bit of illustration would be helpful.

In addition to the stands themselves, I got the optional "floating isolation top plate" which is the tour de force of isolation technique. This, as well could have definitely used a little bit of documentation. I know how to use them myself, but odds are many people, for whom this may be their first true high-end speaker stand, won't know. Let me explain:

The STX5's come with a heavy 1 1/2" MDF base which attached to the bottom of the main column of each stand with footing options of metal pins or rubber feet to be discussed later. These columns are hollow and come with plastic sleeves which you can optionally fill with sand to further the vibration dampening (sand is very good at that) and the columns each have four rubber washers on the top (these rubber washers are the optional "floating plate"), the top plate sits on these rubber washers, if you ordered that option, and screws go through the top plate and the rubber washers to screw into the column (but do not over tighten or the washers will loose their vibration dampening quality), if you do not order the floating plate option the top plate sits right on the column with no vibration dampening between them). Those two plates and the column with or without the sand filling, is the core of your stand.

Now, back to the footing options. The base plate of the stand, as previously said, is 1 1/2" thick MDF material, there are four pre-drilled and threaded metal inserts of each base, one in each corner. These inserts have two options for feet. One option being large rubber feet that screw into the inserts, the other are metal pins that are threaded on one half and tapered to a point on the other half. Each pin also has a nut to screw on it. These pins screw in to the base and the nuts screw on to them to help lock them in place. You can set each pin different heights to accommodate out of level flooring and such anomalies of construction. The pins could also be quick nice on carpeted studio floors to stop movement of the stands in loud situations and most of all, to help minimize the points of contact between the floor and the stand. The rubber feet would be very nice for cement, tile or hardwood floors.

Summing up the Isolation

Ok, let's review. So, we have a speaker...oh, I don't know, let's say a JBL 4206 (since anyone who frequents this forum knows that's what I have and love) for example...and it's sitting on top of this stand. The speaker is resting on four rubber feet screwed into the top plate, taking the point of contact down to under 4 square inches and all of that being an absorbent rubber surface. That top plate is screwed down to a column that is floating on four neoprene inserts which brings that point of contact down to about 2 square inches total (maybe a little more) and that is the absorbent neoprene surface. The column, which is optionally filled with sand dampens even more and it is screwed to a base plate which is resting on four pins that bring the point of contact to virtually...uuummmm, nothing!

Now, common sense here says that it would be difficult to isolate the vibration, and therefore the sound coloration, much more. But, how does it fare in a real world control room...the spec sheet really doesn't matter once the power is turned on...let's take a look...

Turning Up The Volume

I have a studio desk that I built myself, and I am quite happy with it, the main desktop came from our kitchen "island" countertop scrap when we had new countertops put in, cut the ends at an angle and on either side of that are two 19" racks that stand about 36" tall. I made the tops of those racks to accommodate my monitors and intentionally made the racks the height they are to be sure the monitors tweeters were at the height of my ears.

I had been researching different methods of isolation recently, wanting to improve the sound in my studio. I ended up adding those little felt feet for use on hardwood floors to the bottom of each of my monitors until I found a permanent solution.

With the speakers sitting directly on the top of my racks with nothing isolating them I quickly began looking for solutions, as I could feel the vibrations through my desk when the music was turned up. The little felt feet did help, not a whole lot, but it did help the immediate problem of the vibration and the resulting muddiness of the sound.

Once I assembled my stands and put them to use I could immediately notice a significant difference in the sound. The sound from the monitors, using these stands is more crisp and clear, with the high end being more pronounced, I presume due to the lack of "boom" created by the low end working its way through my desk and floor.

This more accurate sonic representation has also made mixing and mastering a bit easier as the sound is easier to work with to get to sound like I want in different environments, which is often the hardest part of the process...anyone can make music sound good in their studio, but what about their friends living room or their spouses car? Anything that can be done to make your studio sound as accurate as possible makes that job easier.

Other Stereocilia Models

In addition to the STX5's that I am using, which are their entry level model, they do have three other models:

  • STX8 - These appear very similar to the STX5's but have a bigger column size for more sand fill.
  • STW - Also appear similar but with a unique shaped column for a more mod look.
  • SBT - These are some serious stands, having a bass trap design in the column of the stand. This bass trapping design helps studios that need the low end tamed by helping further define and clarify the low end of your speakers.

Stereocilia is also in the process of developing desktop isolation plates for use in situations like my previous challenge mentioned above. Set the plate on your desktop and set the speaker on it. A very promising product I can say for personally facing the situation that would call for it. I hope I get the chance to check those out as well.

In Conclusion

Other than the slight confusion during assembly from that lack of documentation, I have to say that Stereocilia does make a hell of an isolation stand. They are obviously not some fly-by-night company with a gimmick. They know their business, and it shows in their product. They are quick to respond to support inquiries and customer input, they will help design the best stand if you are unsure of exactly what you need. They build and ship when they say and they are packaged with care.

Bottom line is this...the stands arrived in good condition, and once assembled and used, improved the sound of my studio, everything beyond that is immaterial.

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