Did I damage my speakers?


Group,
Need your expertise: I own a pair of Vienna Acoustics Beethoven Baby Grand SE's.

I recently paired them with a new-to-me set of Bel Canto REF600M monos, which replace a Bel Canto REF500S dual mono stereo amp. My preamp is a Bel Canto Pre3VB with the battery power unit.

This weekend the tweeters and upper mids, vocals (mostly female), piano,  sound hazy, at times somewhat distorted, grainy. My listening level is typically between 60-75db. I don't push these speakers hard, but I'm also getting acquainted with an amp now giving 100wpc more than I'm used to. Recently I may have pushed these speakers a bit too hard, getting up into the 80db range a few times. Could I have over-driven the tweeters with this more powerful amplifier?

I've owned the REF600M's for about two months; until this weekend, never heard this kind of distortion/congestion at the top end. Doesn't happen on everything I play (mostly CD's). Before this weekend the sound has been wonderful.

I've had these speakers for almost 7 years and have never noticed something like this before.

Wondering how to troubleshoot this.

Thanks in advance for your insight/perspective.

J


arcamguy

Showing 1 response by hshifi

Hello,
The one thing that is bothering me is you said it is mostly happening when playing CDs. This leads me to believe it’s not the speakers. If you or a friend has another set of speakers I would try them out or even better put your speakers on another system. This way you can eliminate the variables. It sounds like a connection problem or maybe the input you use for your CD player is messed up. You can try another input and see if it still happens. Get the individual components tested on another system or systematically test each component separately. In the Chicagoland area I use this repair shop. https://www.deltronics.com/
Sometimes when I purchase used amps I have them check it out so I don’t damage my other components. I also had them install a better tweeter on my speakers. It made a big difference!