JP Denon blog claims that feet/spikes improve audio quality of speakers and other audio equipments. Is that true?

[vroad]

Is this even remotely true? I doubt it. For CD players, maybe those feet help a little if the speakers are on the same shelf, but why put cables/power amps on them?
The article even calims that materials and shapes of the feet, how many number of points (3 or 4 points) you use to support the equipment, also matters a lot.

The article refers to feet/spikes as "insulators". Somehow those products seem to be called differently in Japan.

For speaker feet, I've seen Ethan Winer's article on expensive speaker isolation products:

Testing Loudspeaker Isolation Products

ethanwiner.com

Ethan says that the majority of sound comes from speaker driver's cone. If so how wooden feet make the sound warm and metal ones make the sound clearer, like Denon blog article claims?

I doubt that speaker feet matters a lot in most cases at least for speakers, as long as the speaker is a good one, is placed on a sturdy speaker stand, and is not audibly rattling.
If the speaker is not very great and has not enough damping material in it, using expensive feet probably won't help.
If the speaker has already good amount of damping material in it, then feet probably won't matter much in terms of audio quality.

If the speakers are on a desk, feet might help in preventing you from feeling the vibration transmitted from the speakers, even when it's not rattling.

I attached screen shots of blog articles translated to English with Google Translate.
If you want to read full article in English you could use Google Translate or DeepL for that.

超初心者のための「インシュレーターって何？」 | Denon 公式ブログ

「インシュレーター」という言葉をご存じでしょうか。「絶縁体」や「断熱材」などの意味を持つ言葉ですが、オーディオの世界でインシュレーターといえば、オーディオ機器と設置面の間に挟むことで振動を抑えるアクセサリーのこと。今回の『超初心者シリーズ』では、スピーカーやプレーヤーなどの下に挟むだけで手軽に音質向上が期待できる「インシュレーター」をとりあげてみました。

www.denon.jp

Speaker placement article also says the same thing about "insulators".

超初心者のための「スピーカーの置き方」 | Denon 公式ブログ

音楽は普段、スマホとヘッドホンで、という方も多いと思います。でもしっかりとセッティングしたスピーカーで音楽を聴くと、ヘッドホンでは味わえない広がり感や豊かさを感じることができます。今回は、超初心者シリーズとして、ミニコンポやHi-Fiシステムで活用できる「スピーカーの置き方」についてご紹介します。

www.denon.jp

 

[GXAlan]

It’s probably exaggerated but what might be accurate and reasonable is this

“suppresses the transmission of vibration between the two speakers”

In their setup on that table, and presumably the design of many Japanese homes, maybe the resonances from one speaker can affect the other.

 

[Ken Tajalli]

From what I remember, spikes on speakers were designed to penetrate carpets, to seat the speakers firmly on the floor-boards.
It was argued that the flexible carpet would allow the speaker cabinet/baffle to dance back and forth with music muddying up bass.
There was some truth to that.
But on amps and CD players, it was a marketing ploy to cash in on the idea.

 

[JSmith]

But on amps and CD players, it was a marketing ploy to cash in on the idea.

From what I hear the only thing that works for CD's is the green marker trick.

JSmith

 

[Ken Tajalli]

From what I hear the only thing that works for CD's is the green marker trick.

View attachment 370509


JSmith

Oh yes!
I had one of those pens.
worked wonderfully, less distortion, bigger soundstage ....

 

[vroad]

It’s probably exaggerated but what might be accurate and reasonable is this

“suppresses the transmission of vibration between the two speakers”

In their setup on that table, and presumably the design of many Japanese homes, maybe the resonances from one speaker can affect the other.

Even if the speaker stands are on the wooden floor, most of vibrations came from the speakers are killed by damping material inside the speakers and the stands before actually becoming a problem, unless you play extemely loud, I guess.

 

[vroad]

From what I remember, spikes on speakers were designed to penetrate carpets, to seat the speakers firmly on the floor-boards.
It was argued that the flexible carpet would allow the speaker cabinet/baffle to dance back and forth with music muddying up bass.
There was some truth to that.
But on amps and CD players, it was a marketing ploy to cash in on the idea.

But spikes won't do any good for bookshelf speakers placed on shelves like in Denon's blog article, no?

 

[GXAlan]

But spikes won't do any good for bookshelf speakers placed on shelves like in Denon's blog article, no?

“Funny thing, it produced so much bass that combined with its smooth plastic base, it slid back 1 inch on my metal stand!”

JBL HDI-1600 Speaker Review

This is a review and detailed measurements of the JBL HDI-1600 two-way bookshelf speaker. They were purchased new and drop shipped to me for testing. The HDI-1600 costs US $900 for one. Note: my company Madrona Digital is a dealer for Harman products such as JBL line (although we hardly sell...

www.audiosciencereview.com

So it’s definitely possible….

But possibility and probability are two different things.

 

[Ken Tajalli]

But spikes won't do any good for bookshelf speakers placed on shelves like in Denon's blog article, no?

I did not look at the blog.
i suppose.
Spikes were couplers, not insulators.

Just glanced at the blog, it's BS!
It is talking about cable lifters, don't waste your time on it.

 

[vroad]

I did not look at the blog.
i suppose.
Spikes were couplers, not insulators.

Just glanced at the blog, it's BS!
It is talking about cable lifters, don't waste your time on it.

Yeah it looks marketing BS to me, too.

It's sad to see that a bigger company like Denon (or D&M Holdings?) is spreading misinformation on their blog. It seems that many people in Japan only read Japanese information and don't even bother reading ASR posts or blog articles from independent experts.

I have one of their products, AVR-X3800H. While it's not recommended by amir for having worse objective performance than last gen, it's doing good enough job for me.

Denon AVR-X3800H Review

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Denon AVR-X3800H 9.4 Home Theater Audio/Video Receiver. It was kindly drop shipped to me by a member and costs US $1,699. Not much to say about the look of the unit as it is pretty much similar/same as last generations. Here is the back panel...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[DJNX]

Speakers can make things resonate. Make something with enough square meters resonate and you have yourself a phantom speaker (just like reflections).

It’s all dependent on how your room is constructed and materials. For bookshelves, sturdy stands are enough to resolve the problem.

 

[Thomas_A]

Spikes do not improve sound. Debunked long time ago.

 

[sq225917]

There's enough energy in speaker cabinets that swapping between spikes and compliant feet could reasonably make a measurable difference depending on the surface they're terminated into, concrete slab or bouncy wooden floor over cellar cavity.

In my music room compliant pads do very definitely reduce the bouncy wooden floor from singing along.

They are however the only such tweak in my hifi, nothing else gets footers, fancy shelves or anything of that nature.

 

[kemmler3D]

A well built speaker should not transmit enough vibration through the cabinet to need isolation (or coupling) to the floor.

However, not all speakers are well built.

My understanding is that if your floor is prone to re-radiating vibrations into the air (some wooden floors) then isolating feet might help a little.

If the floor is solid (concrete) but the speaker is creating audible problems by vibrating itself, spikes can help a little by helping it "stick" to the floor a little better.

To the extent there are vibrations hitting your gear, in theory certain electronic components can be microphonic and create sound of their own when vibrated. So to the extent that's actually happening (it's rare), isolating feet for gear can help a little.

Turntables sometimes need isolation from loud bass, but generally lot of that is traveling through the air, not the floor / furniture.

As usual with audiophile tweak-o nonsense, there is a kernel of truth that is poorly understood and then extrapolated beyond all reason. Isolating / coupling feet can sometimes solve problems if you have the problem, they don't enhance anything per se, and most people don't have problems with isolation in the first place.

 

[Audiofire]

Embarrassing nonsense from Denon, at least the cable insulators (seriously, in the Japanese link). Wooden insulators under the cable. Anyhow, metal spikes are a little silly to me when an elastic material absorbs resonances instead of metal that does nothing about that.