Sibilance


Some recordings I hear it, sometimes I don’t. I just listened to "Time" from Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon through BluOS and my Bluesound Node 2i, upgraded CJ PV-10AL, Emotiva XPA-2 Gen3, and Maggie 1.7is. It’s very noticeable to me on "S"s and high hat on that song. Thoughts?
jkf011

Showing 2 responses by mijostyn

There is none on the album.

Real sibilance is due to a lot of energy in the 3000 Hz region where our ears are most efficient. It is also a region where a lot of rooms cause trouble. Female voices and violins are frequent affected. If you have the capability putting a 2-3 db filter between 2500 and 4000 Hz will magically make sibilance disappear. 

The usual culprits are speakers, rooms and the interaction between the two.  You can see this on a frequency response curve which can be easily generated with a computer and measurement microphone. You can also see the results with added sound deadening. 

Clearthinker, jitter sounds much different than sibilance. I had a great jitter lesson once. I was trying to set up Pure Vinyl (Channel D) and was using an ADC and DAC on different clocks. It sounded like pop corn. That was a severe case. In minor form it sounds like little pops. 

Stringreen is right. There is no sibilance in any version I have heard.

jfk011, I hate to be blunt (right) but, you have two choices to fix this.
You can deaden your room starting with the first reflection sites or you can get a DSP and program a notch filter as I previously described. This is purely an acoustic phenomenon aggravated by a bump in our ear's sensitivity in and around 3000 Hz. Google Grundy Curve or BBC curve.
It is not your equipment doing this. Cartridges miss tracking can sort of sound similar but that is distortion. Sibilance is not distortion. It is a frequency response aberration.