Fluid Audio DS5: Decoupling adjustable monitor stand for 4-5" speaker loaded studio monitors

I've wanted to raise my near field monitors up about 5 inches, some stuff was blocking a direct line and I either had to lower my ears or get the speakers more in line with my ear holes. I chose wisely. You've seen the prices on some of the other speaker stands, silly prices, silly silly prices. Even these Fluid's were pricey I thought but I am happy, really really happy I purchased them.Now, are they effective? - Yes, yes. Your setup may have different results but I lost some resonance that went away, I could no longer feel the vibrations through my thick computer work station.Do they change the sound? - Hummm, how do I answer. Yes but your ears will adjust to the change that is for the better. If you like bassey bass, you may want to keep them on the counter. I have a sub that I didn't even adjust after elevating the monitors with these Fluid stands, the three components meld quite nicely. Currently, after living 54 years this is the best desk setup I've ever had.

I bought a set to elevate my JBL 305 studio monitors to ear level. I found that it was difficult to find stands that were 5"-6" tall. It seemed like what I found was either under 4" or over 9"-11". The Fluid Audio stands worked perfect for the height I needed. I did like the fact you can angle the speakers depending on what combination of rubber discs were used.What everyone says about the paint chipping is true. But if you are careful with assembly and dont just shove it all together, you will be fine. These stands worked great for my needs.

It's a great alternative for the overpriced original version, it's also somehow logic they claim that it's made of MDF same as their monitors, which I also have a pair of their Fx50's.It is the only solution I could find to solve the issue of having monitors at ear level on a desktop, whiteout being bulky.They do perform better (imho) than having them on acoustic foam. I was using foam before these. Are they sturdy? Yes, good MDF but easily peels/chips off, and plastic side structures are well made. Rubber feet are great too for stability, and I live in a seismic country, no major events so far but, already endured small shakes. It's the best buy I could get for my need. Perfect but...Here's the hell I had to put on. Assembling was painfully a waste of time and an example of poor and cheap outsourced workmanship. The plastic is so hard that in order to fit into the groove, if you go just ahead an press it, you'd end slicing a top layer of the mdf from both sides, wood color will contrast immediately after you chipped that black thin layer. Hence, I had to develop a "technique" to assemble which I can't even explain, the idea is positioning one side of the plastic edge to the groove and in a swift arc movement you yank the plastic, slide it into the groove and push down in order to fit below and not chip the MDF. Are you catching such purgatory? Having to do this trick on all sides?Here's hell: The screw holes where you are supposed to install the screws, which allegedly matched with the plastic holes, are not even well aligned, I even had to create new holes since they didn't even show through the holes!.The main idea is to have the screw flat into that hole, since you are putting a rubber foot on it, and if the screw head protrudes, you'll have an unbalanced base!!!HERE'S THE UBER MEGA SATANIC HELL: Screw holes are just a reference for a hole, these are not drilled according to the screws you have, it's just 5% of the whole way to screw down (and it doesn't protrude)So I had to shape drill every holy hole on each MDF side and I don't have a driller! I had to do each one by hand...Finally, a good pair of desktop supports for your studio monitors .Great value for the money if you are willing to do the rest of the outsourced underachieving underpaid blue collar line regarding pre-assembly work. :)

Others have discussed poor construction of these stands snd the need to assemble them. My problem was the absence of screws in the box, which stopped my assembly in its tracks. Amazon offered to replace the whole box, but it seemed simpler to contact Fluid directly (the Amazon Customer Service rep gave me the contact info). Kevin at Fluid got back to me immediately and dropped a package of screws in the mail. I was finally able to finish putting the stands together. I haven’t put them through rigorous testing yet, but they look like they will work fine. These days, I am always grateful for responsive customer service.

This really didn’t do much for me. It worked great for raising the monitors to ear level but in terms of decoupling the speakers from the surface it only gave me a marginal difference.Not only that but the quality of materials is terrible especially for the price. The MDF wood gets chipped very easily and the vinyl veneer gets unstuck too fast, in fact parts of the vinyl were already sticking out right out of the box. I found that the MDF didn’t do much to help with the damping of the frequencies as I still had a lot of feedback coming straight into my desk. Also the sticky feet are not so sticky as they fell off even if I simply grabbed the DS5 to move it. The sticky part of the feet is also off center just like the other reviewer here mentioned. I wanted to like this but for the price we should get something that doesn’t resemble a homemade creation made for $2. Fluid Audio, here is a suggestion to take home and make an actually good product people will enjoy, make the top and bottom base out of solid wood not cheap thin MDF that doesn’t even come close to a speaker cabinets MDF. Also maybe make the plastic bits out of a hard rubber or some type of suspension system like a shotgun microphone holder. And maybe get some better rubber feet not these hard rigid things.

To fit 5” speaker like focal alpha evo 50 that is a bit small.

If one follows the instructions carefully, these are wonderful stands that work very well with my Mackie CR4-X speakers. The polypropylene legs are flexible, so they can be fairly easily spread apart when attaching them to the wood pieces. They are tight fitting which makes the stand work better in my opinion. I ended up using the 6 degree tilt configuration.