My system is bright? I need help. thanks


Hi. it is my first time here in this forum. i would appreciate input and help from all of you. No sacrasm or bad langauge please. I had bad experience with other forums in that aspect. music loving people and audiophiles should be an elite, high caliber and classy community. This is rare to find today. Ok Down to the point.

My system
Musical fidelity kw 500 sacd player. I use the tube output.
Musical fidelity kw 500 integrated amp.
speakers:eggleston andra (not andra 2)
speaker cable: satori acoustic zen
interconnects: Nordost baldur and nordost quatrofil RCA
USe a dedicated 20 amp line with regular power cords(came with the gear) and a panamax 20 amp surge protector and filter.

This is in my family room so there is little room for treatment and moving things around.

problem: bright. the highs are killing my ears, after 1-2 hours of listening my ears start to hurt,sometimes 3 minutes. I have to turn the volume down. I tried postioning, it got a little better. I will try acoustic zen silver ref II may be it will help. The sound is otherwise phenomenal, i could be happy with more bass, but overall it is very good. Depth, tranparency, acuity and soundstaging are great. As for mids, i can see the person infront of me,I can hear the articulation of the tongue in the mouth before the words and tunes comes out. no kidding, but not for long because of fatigue.

I would really appreciate your input.
Scientist73
scientist73

Showing 3 responses by reb1208

I own the MF A5 cd player with the same 6112 output stage as found in your gear. IMO, the bright/fatiguing sound your experiencing is that of your MF gear. I would keep the KW cd player for now, but definitely would change to a different amplifier. Pick an amplifier that has a more relaxed and harmonically rich presentation. Two pieces of that MF gear linked together is what is killing your ears.
You have made your situation quite clear, I do have some further advice. Definitely continue to work on speaker placement and room treatments. Changing speaker cables is what you should do with your limited funds. I have owned the Satori cables that utilize the OCC Continuos Cast Copper. These cables, in my system sounded light weight in the bass and had a glare in the highs. Being that you are keeping the speakers and the amplifier. The most logical move is to change the interface between them- being the speaker cable. What speaker cable to use then? Start a new post asking for a warmish sounding speaker cable or perhaps search the archives.

Good Luck
Using 6112 tube pre-amp section in the KW integrated into the Cello amps is not the answer. You need a "real" tube pre-amp to tame down the KW SACD player.