Speaker Asylum: REVIEW: Star Sound Technologies SPK Series 20 Speaker Stands by emailists

Model:	SPK Series 20
Category:	Speaker Stands
Suggested Retail Price:	$879
Description:	Speaker stand
Manufacturer URL:	Star Sound Technologies
Manufacturer URL:	Star Sound Technologies

Review by emailists ( A ) on January 17, 2007 at 13:39:31
IP Address: 69.86.120.212

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for the SPK Series 20

I received my SPK series 20" speaker stand from Star Sound. After listening for an entire evening, my initial comments are as follows.
The sonic improvement these stands make is on the level (at least in my system) OF GETTING BETTER SPEAKERS!!!!
The sound seems to emanate much more from within the structure of my apartment - like it's connected. With vocals on multitrack recordings it becomes so much clearer that they were recorded in different acoustic spaces and even perhaps tape generations.
The presentation of acoutic jazz becomes more forcefull and refined at the same time.
On Mofi's 1/2 speed Aja, suddenly a new lower midbass authority popped out, that definitely was not there previously.
On digital playback, The glass falling on the table of Patricia Barber's Companion, "If this isn't jazz," I was now able to hear the surface of the table the glass was falling onto, rather than just the glass itself.
Previously I had the monitors on the matching Cerious synthetic ceramic Bass unit, and then on some Plateau F series stands. While the Plateau are not high end stands, I feel the subwoofer gave me an idea of what a very heavy - overbuilt vibration controlled stands would be like. The Sistrum provides a marketly better platform than either, with improvements that are not suble. I have always been of the mechanical grounding school, rather than the "isolation crowd" and the results I am getting with the Sistrum bear that out.
I am currently using their brass protection discs on my wood over concrete floor, but once I find the final speaker position I may remove the discs and let the points penetrate the wood, which could make even more of an improvement. I'm using the discs on the speaker as well, but who knows I may even remove those at some point and let the brass spikes contact the speaker directly - though this would put a small hole in the leather bottom of the speaker.
If there is one critcism of the product and the manufacturer, Star sound, it would be that now, after hearing one of their products, I now want to order all of their products, subwoofer platforms, equipment stands, etc. Sistrum should be declared a controlled susbstance by the DEA!.
http://www.starsoundtechnologies.com/compactmonitorplaforms.HTML

Product Weakness: Powder coated finish can be scratched assembling if not careful.
Product Strengths: Sound quality,

Associated Equipment for this Review:
Amplifier:	PS Audio GCC-100 (or Atma-sphere MA-1)
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated):	NONE
Sources (CDP/Turntable):	WTT classic/Sumiko Celebration
Speakers:	Cerious Too/Bass
Cables/Interconnects:	Cerious
Music Used (Genre/Selections):	acoustic Rock/Jazz
Room Size (LxWxH):	21 x 10 x 13
Time Period/Length of Audition:	1 day
Other (Power Conditioner etc.):	PS Audio Power Plant Premier
Type of Audition/Review:	Product Owner

Product Weakness:	Powder coated finish can be scratched assembling if not careful.
Product Strengths:	Sound quality,