2. amps-preamps
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I'm depressed, my system hurts my ears.Please help

I've been enjoying my stereo for quite some time now, but my latest component addition is hurting my ears. My system is as follows:

Music Hall CD25 CD player
McIntosh MC2105 amp (30 year old amp)
Joseph Audio RM22si signatures
Signal Cable Analog 2 interconnects
Kimber 4TC biwired speaker cable
Denon AVR1700 HT receiver as preamp

With the Denon the system sounded pretty good, but it was the obvious weak link, and was actually performing its own unnecessary A to D to A conversion). I swapped the Denon for a Creek OBH12 passive. I added the Creek because in my careful, volume leveled comparisons of the Denon compared to no pre at all, no pre was much cleaner and more natural (I an use no pre because amp has volume knobs).

So I put in the Creek passive to keep that clarity along with switching and an easy volume control, but now I can't sit in the sweet spot of my speakers and listen, because my ears start to hurt at volume levels that used to be just fine. Is this clipping due to an impedance matching problem? Is this just me receiving the full spectrum of the sound and my ears can't handle it? I remember having a similar problem with a very nice car stereo I installed, it sounded very good but always hurt my ears compared to my worse sounding older car stereo.

I almost wish I had never started down the audiophile path, this is depressing. It's tough to do swapping style comparisons because once my ears start hurting, any music will make them hurt until they have a chance to recover. Any suggestions would be most appreciated.
matt8268

Showing 2 responses by matt8268

matt8268 OP
92 posts
 
Thanks for all the suggestions. One thing I should reiterate is that the sound is not necessarily bad, but that it literally hurts my ears. Like it is too loud (resonating) at certain frequencies, probably midrange. Midrange resonations I believe are super unpleasant because human ears use these frequencies to speak to each other, so they're the most sensitive.

It's so hard to believe that this is because my system is now so transparent that I can't handle it, and that cables alone could fix the problem. I'm willing to try, just don't know an easy way to try out lots of cables. I may also experiment with the room treatments suggested.

Thanks for your suggestions,
Matt.
matt8268 OP
92 posts
 
Well, thanks for all the different suggestions. I ended up replacing both the McIntosh amp and the Creek passive with a Plinius 8200 mkII integrated. System now sounds wonderful, and Plinius JUST went in, so it will no doubt get better as this component warms up.

Before adding the Plinius, I experimented with running through my Denon (crappy) preamp. Although it muddled the sound, it got rid of the ear hurting problem. Therefore, in my system, I believe the Creek was the culprit for the ear hurting problem. It is possible my ears hurt because there was too much accurate musical information coming out of them. I sort of doubt it, however, and know for sure that if that is what accurate music sounds like, I want no part of it.
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