2. amps-preamps
  3. 1043613580

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 1 response by redkiwi

redkiwi
1,092 posts
 
It sounds like flutter echo to me. All sounds good, other than a shoutiness (ie. it sounds like mid-range performers and instruments are shouting at you). If you can put the system in another room for a day?

Otherwise, set the system up for nearfield listening for a day. That is, with speakers well away from all walls and you sitting very close. Then see if your ears still hurt.

If this seems to cure the problem then flutter echo is probably the cause. This occurs when you have two relectivs room surfaces in parallel. The simplest cure can be moving from firing the system down the long side of the room, to firing it across the room at you. Otherwise the issues are as discussed above concerning dampening reflections and careful speaker placement and listening position.
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