Speaker isolation foam stuff

Today I bought some of those foam pads for sitting your monitors on. Spent about £20 on them. TBH I've always been a little bit skeptical of em, seamed like maybe it's a clever way of selling cheap foam off cuts.

Anyway, trying to get some tracks finished, really stressing over getting the mixes right, so figured I may as well give em a go.

well impressed!

Before getting them I used to have monitors on some little stands I'd made from polystyrene slabs, which worked ok. using the foam though, they are so well isolated, no low end transmitted through my desk. Every thing sounds so much tighter, so much easier to tell what's going on in the low mids/bass and sub ranges.

Really recommend getting some to anyone. I'm sure the same effect could be achieved with the right type of density foam, finding it and shaping it would be a bit of a ball ache mind.

Anyway yeah, speaker isolation things are cool. Make your own, or buy some, either way it's worth doing.

*Is terrified of the elusive4 shaped Pandora's box that's just been opened*

generally be best to source sorbothane than to rely on foam with unpublished mechanical properties:

http://www.sorbothane.com/

http://www.sorbothane.com/faq.php

http://en.wikipedia....wiki/Sorbothane

http://www.amazon.co...ords=sorbothane

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwziSvLXLUE

decoupling is important but regardless the monitors/stands shouldn't be on the desk to start with...

lol

  On 9/3/2012 at 10:05 PM, elusive4 said:

generally be best to source sorbothane than to rely on foam with unpublished mechanical properties:

 

decoupling is important but regardless the monitors/stands shouldn't be on the desk to start with...

huh.. Fair enough, that's something new to me. Stuff looks pretty impressive to be sure. I think the video is a touch unrelated though, since it demonstrates the ability to deal with large shock impact rather than vibration. Presumably though, a thinner layer would act well for isolation and also probably be less rebound happy.

of course, you're right about speaker placement, and in an ideal world I'd have a far better set of monitors, on some proper stands, in a well treated room. However reality kinda gets in the way.

the point was that most people end up making music is such conditions, but a small change in some form of speaker isolation, be it foam stands, sorbothane hemispheres, or home made DIY jobs, can make a big difference to mixing. I was pretty impressed by how much of a difference I got for a small ammount, thought it worth suggesting it to others.

it's definitely worth suggesting. i've had stands for years but know I definitely would have benefited from some pads before, when I had less space and speakers on a desk.

it's a good tip.

I should do this...

  On 9/3/2012 at 7:41 PM, mcbpete said:

*Is terrified of the elusive4 shaped Pandora's box that's just been opened*

Hahah!

  On 9/4/2012 at 1:16 AM, TechDiff said:

the point was that most people end up making music is such conditions, but a small change in some form of speaker isolation, be it foam stands, sorbothane hemispheres, or home made DIY jobs, can make a big difference to mixing. I was pretty impressed by how much of a difference I got for a small ammount, thought it worth suggesting it to others.

. what was stated was in addition to your input, as to otherwise who may be passively reading. shame if people continued to spend ~40$usd on a pair of foam pads as ive seen them now going for when lower cost and more effective solutions exist : I

actually, you can get 4 for less than 20 quid these days. :)

I'll probably just build some speak stands. Just found out my father in law has a welder :D

After years of Auralex MoPads, I bought IsoAcoustic's monitor stands. They're a bit expensive but damn, what a huge improvement in my monitoring. Highly recommended.

I was lucky enough to be hanging out in my local music store when a salesperson from Primacoustic (daughter company of Radial Engineering here in Vancouver, they make DI boxes and stuff) was in demoing their products in the interest of gaining a retail account. I eavesdropped a little bit and was very impressed with the improvement the under-speaker pads had on the sound. Picked some up a little while later and have never looked back.