Even though the left SL2 is slightly toed in and the 300PS is just below the top of the base cabinet I suspect that, at higher volumes, there is a fair amount of airborne vibration hitting the brawn rack.
I know that ideally I’d have the kit as far down the left wall and away from the speakers as possible but things like length of speaker cable (5m of SL) mean that the brain rack (including the 300HU) is nearly as far away from the right speaker as it can be.
Is the proximity of the left SL2 to the brawn a real problem or am I concerned unnecessarily?
Hi Dave, A change from 252 to 552 I see! Congratulations and wishing you lots of enjoyment.
Would a move to the other side of the room help? It must be a wide room if 5m speaker cable is tight. I expect that that is not possible. Some cut a grove in the underlay.
In an ideal world the kit would be many meters away from speakers. I have seen some even have kit in an adjacent room. However, most of us have our Hi-Fi in a room shared with the wider family, TV etc. My own situation has my LP12 only a few centimetres from my speakers. Far from ideal and yet it still sounds really good even at quite high volumes. In the real world we often have to make do.
Many thanks. Other side of the room is not an option as the wall runs pretty close to the right side of the right speaker and my power sockets are all down the left side.
Running the right speaker cable under the carpet is, I guess, something to consider so thanks for that.
The system sounds great. Just one of those things that has often bugged me; it’s a lot of expensive stuff and I’m sure we are all trying to get the most out of it albeit recognising that there must be compromises in any domestic environment!
My 272 is 11 inches from the woofer in the SL2 but I think the Fraim does a pretty good job with vibrations and any impact to the sound is small if not at all.
Dave,
When the Fraim, black boxes and SL2s look as thoroughly tasteful as they do in the photos, I would leave well alone and enjoy it.
I suspect that any mechanical transmission of vibration from the feet of the SL2s via the floor to the Fraim spikes will be more significant than air borne vibration.
Frankly, I see only 2 solutions: mechanical isolation of the FRAIM feet from the SL2 spikes or more distance between speaker & Fraim. The former means playing with Townshend Podiums, Isoacoustic Gaia feet, Stillpoint feet, Cerabases or similar to hear if they make the sound better or worse with SL2s (or under Fraim). The latter involves 7m long Superlumina speaker cables.
Is it worth all the hassle?
Can’t you obsess over ethernet / streaming cables instead? It’s all the rage at the moment. or so it seems!
No @Bluesfan it most certainly is not worth any of that hassle! I will leave well alone. It sounds wonderful and I’m most grateful to be able to enjoy music reproduction of this quality.
Thank you for your advice, which is well received.
Had a long conversation with a speaker manufacturer over this by email about 7 or 8 years ago. Very interesting. With certain speakers it matters a great deal but performances compromises are hard to recoignise sometimes until someone shows you. I was shown and it was something of a shock. I still have to live with the compromise of my stacks being close to my right speaker and the knowledge of what I’m missing but what I have is pretty damn good so…
was a revelation and the right speaker is only 20cm from the brain rack.
However, I have no idea if they work under a pair of SL2 speakers.
By all means ask your dealer for a demo set to try but messing with speakers is a real faff, so you really do have to feel the need. If everything sounds great already, I wouldn’t feel the need…
Another vote for leaving exactly as is. If there was a turntable on top of the stack then I would be worried and I would do something about it. However, the SL2 is firing into the Power supplies and the Fraim and the Naim boxes will more than cope with any airborne vibrations coming form the speakers,
FWIW I have my 2 Naim stacks in between and somewhat behind my large Sopra 3 speakers. Room design/features dictate this. Everything is a carpeted, suspended floor. Speakers are piked as are the Naim stacks of course. I put a glass of water on the top black box of each stack and played various music and normal listening levels. Provided I was not walking around and sitting in my chair, I couldn’t detect any movement/rippling of the water in the glass. Don’t know how relevant this little experiment is but such is the result.
Yeah, it ain’t gunna be an issue. TTs matter most, sensitive electronics like phono stages and preamps are next, but power stuff. Nah. Not gunna be affected.
No 
