Difference Between Granite and Concrete Bases

So is there any difference between a slab of granite and a Home Depot 16' x 16' x 2 1/2" concrete patio paver? (other than a diminished ego and the paver costs $3.50).

Looks have no bearing, cause the speakers and slabs will be hidden behind my HT stage columns/walls.

Sometimes I think we take this hobby too seriously. If nobody is going to see it, I'm sure that concrete vibration absorber from Home Depot would be fine.....and would free up money for some other audio purchase, properly spent.

If I had to look at it in my house I would have to have the granite. Since you're going to cover it up and I doubt you would hear a difference, why spend more? My floor is concrete covered with carpet and I'm sure it would sound the same if granite was under the carpet (although I wouldn't have carpet if that were the case).

Live or memorex? Concrete or Granite?

Have you ever seen highly polished concrete? It can look very nice!

LaserMark4 said:

So is there any difference between a slab of granite and a Home Depot 16' x 16' x 2 1/2" concrete patio paver? (other than a diminished ego and the paver costs $3.50).

Looks have no bearing, cause the speakers and slabs will be hidden behind my HT stage columns/walls.

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Concrete might even be better. Properly poured and cured concrete will have a more consistent density 2.6-2.7g/cm3 than that of natural granite density is ~2.3-2.7g/cm3. Either way both are fine and the concrete is a lot less expensive.

jjqiv said:

Have you ever seen highly polished concrete? It can look very nice!

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Agreed. Highly polished concrete is very fashionable...perhaps more so than granite.

It's also very easy to do. Build or buy a framed box. Line it with Saran wrap and pour in your ready mix cement. You could also take it a step further and put in a thin sheet of cork board to absord even more vibration. Gently sand and put a satin/sealer finish on it.

I learned this on The Matha Stewart show... Concrete has been the recent theme.

I am sure Martha Stewart's love of concrete has diminished lately. However, if you need some granite, just go to a commercial tile company and ask for their scraps. They throw away hundreds of pounds of the stuff daily. Coming from a geologists point of view, concrete and granite may have similar densities, buy granite ranks much higher on the hardness scale. I think concrete is about 3/10 and granite is 7/10. So, without making any Cialis jokes, do you want dense and soft, or dense and hard?

Great humor, gang-- LOL!!

I guess I agree, Paul-- we DO take this a bit too serious at times.... yes?

Splitting hairs is definitely a part of the nuiance of being the audiohaulic-- squeezing that last bit of excitement out of the system! What if we had real problems to contend with??

Q.-- What do you call two attorneys up to their necks in concrete?
A. -- Not enought concrete!

mattables said:

I am sure Martha Stewart's love of concrete has diminished lately. However, if you need some granite, just go to a commercial tile company and ask for their scraps. They throw away hundreds of pounds of the stuff daily. Coming from a geologists point of view, concrete and granite may have similar densities, buy granite ranks much higher on the hardness scale. I think concrete is about 3/10 and granite is 7/10. So, without making any Cialis jokes, do you want dense and soft, or dense and hard?

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I belieive dense and soft is supposed to the best choice. Granite can produce a ringing tone that has a bad affect on audio reproduction

jjqiv said:

I belieive dense and soft is supposed to the best choice. Granite can produce a ringing tone that has a bad affect on audio reproduction

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What would be both dense and soft?

What have you tried?

Darn it jjqiv, you have me thinking of inventing a waterbed for my speakers.

EDIT: Perhaps I'm going in the exact wrong direction.................found this.

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4507816.html
A standard waterbed is shown having added thereto a sound wave system having four loudspeaker housings positioned within the floor pedestal of the bed beneath the supporting deck for the water-filled bladder mattress. Each of these loudspeaker housings is an airtight, acoustically insulated loudspeaker enclosure that supports a loudspeaker in the top portion thereof which faces upwardly to be in alignment with the plurality of openings formed through the deck. These loudspeakers are wired to an external balance control box that includes a volume control as well as a left and right hand and a head and foot speaker volume control capability. This external balance control box is wired to a stereo amplifier of a stereo radio and/or phonographic sound system, whereby the sound waves projected from the loudspeakers cause waves to form in the water within the mattress so that a person reclining on the mattress will feel as well as hear the sound and music passing through the mattress.