Has anyone tried alternative Mana top plates. and is willing to admit to it?

I've not experimented, but I'm assured the material under the laminate isn't MDF.

I may try some experiments soon, since the glass top buggered my CD5's music-making abilities completely and I have a spare laminate board - I'll try it when I get bored.

Glass works well under the LP12 though.

Andy.

I'm also keen to try other things - it doesn't hurt to try - but expect that the Mana solution will probably be the best combination.

John

Stuart

1. Putting 2 x SoundFrames on the SoundOrg further improved the turntable (Heybrook TT2/RB300/DV10X4) considerably, using a non-Mana19mm MDF slab between the SoundFrames, and non-Mana clear, undamped 10mm float glass on top. Our CD5 however, exhibited precisely the symptoms previously described by Andrew W.

2. Replacing the non-Mana MDF with a Mana laminated board, and the non-Mana glass with Mana clear glass with damping strips resulted in a further improvement for the turntable. All gain. The CD5 was subtly different, but no particular gains.

3. Putting the SoundFrames on the floor with the CD5 on them was magnificent, to me a complete no-brainer with no losses. I tried this with both the Mana and non-Mana glass & board and found the Mana ones much better. I couldn't try this with the TT as the wire isn't long enough.

Conclusions:

1. Certainly with TTs, and probably with CD players, levelling is possibly more important than stands. However, usually it is the stand which provides a relatively easy means of levelling, so the two are inextricably linked.

2. Mixing religions confuses the issue. The CD5 loves pure Mana, but hates Mana on SoundOrg. If you want to try a bit of Mana, do it on the floor, get it level and give it at least 24hrs to settle.

3. The notion that Mana is hard to set up is complete arse, IMHO. The instructions and their forum FAQ are confusing and jumbled, but quite clear on the tuning procedure. The spike threads and nuts are good quality and of a fine enough "pitch" to make adjustment easy. Target speaker stands are a complete pain in comparison.

4. Everyone should own a bubble-type spirit level. A properly designed one should only be really sensitive when reading "close to level". It cuts setup time by about 75% compared with conventional alternatives.

5. The Mana board appears to be some sort of very fine-textured, sealed, 19mm particle board with hard laminate applied on the upper side and all edges. It's very light and very stiff. The laminate avoids "spike-sink" which makes life a lot easier. Good value at 20 quid.

Your mileage, etc.

Best;

Mark

(an imperfect
forum environment is
better than none)

fascinated by your experiments/findings. Have you now replaced 'my' glass with Mana clear permanently? Best wishes, Bob.

I'm using 2 levels for the TT with damped Mana glass on top and one of their boards in between. This lot sits on top of the old 5 tier SO rack.

Mana glass doesn't fit inside my SO rack so I'm using plate glass of the same thickness for the 32.5 within the 5 tier rack.

Presently, the CDS2 sits on 2 Base platforms on top of a 6 tier Base Rack. The next 2 shelves are empty (Linto to go on one of them). The bottom 3 shelves have 250 - CDPS - Supercap.

This mix-n-match seems to be working very well for me although I may slowly move to Mana throughout the system.

The only alternative top-most material that I have been thinking about seriously is granite - it seems a theoretically ideal material and works wonders in practice for my speaker stands.

Alex

quote:

---

Mixing religions confuses the issue. The CD5 loves pure Mana, but hates Mana on SoundOrg. If you want to try a bit of Mana, do it on the floor, get it level and give it at least 24hrs to settle.

---

It seems to hate Mana on Target too, or at least my Target Beta 5.

Must try it on the floor, when 2 yr old is asleep!

Andy.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Andrew L. Weekes:

It seems to hate Mana on Target too, or at least my Target Beta 5.

Must try it on the floor, when 2 yr old is asleep!

Andy.

---

Andrew, when I tried this I had pretty much a parallel experience to your own. At first, it all seems fine, and it sounded terrific. However, my reaction to the music was somehow considerably diluted, which only became obvious to me while washing up in the next room. I then noticed your post effectively expressing the same thing.

I have two borrowed SoundFrames, with 1 non-Mana glass and 1 non-Mana board (as previously described). I also have two brand-new SoundFrames, with 1 Mana glass and 1 Mana board. Having tried everything every which way (which was a pile of hassle!), all the new stuff is now under the TT on the SO shelf (and very happy), with the borrowed stuff (temporarily) under the CD5 on the floor. I found it all a bit of a nightmare as at every stage you almost have to try to forget that you've changed anything, and then continue with life as normal until something occurs to you out of the blue... Moving things around too frequently also means that I personally get utterly sick of it, so for me, it has to be worthwhile!

I have to say that in many ways, the CD5 should have been uncompromisingly better up on the SO shelf/Mana combination. Our whole installation is very cramped, and the "Mana on floor" scenario puts the CD5 close to power amps and HiCaps, with all its cables in very non-ideal places. I think it's possible that the CD5's soft feet and various internal compliances combine in an unfortunate way with some supports, or combinations thereof. I suppose I should also have tried the CD5 just on the SO shelf, with no Mana in the room, but I didn't.

One last thing; I have tried a MW block (not the leads) in this system, and can honestly say I found it made no difference. Some of our s/h boxes also arrived with non-Naim AC leads, and changing these to Naim leads was obvious and worthwhile. I mention these things because for all I know they may indicate that part of my brain is missing, and all "results" should be read in light of this!

Best;

Mark

(an imperfect
forum environment is
better than none)

What's going on? It almost seems as if we are after some overall resonance frequency to the support and that the optimum frequency varies from component to component.

It would be nice to have an adjustable/tunable rack that could be set - much like VTA or tracking weight on a turntable. Maybe the overall stiffness/compliance and the resonant frequency would be tuneable.

Just a thought...

- GregB

Insert Witty Signature Line Here

I guess that the next stage, or is that phase, will be to replace your wall shelf with Mana or at least get a Mana board for the existing one?

Best wishes, Bob.