Speakers sound too bright.

I had this same issue with a new pair of DIY single driver speakers. Break-in did help some but not enough. Repositioning speakers did nothing. Switching to warmer tubes did very little but some. Switching from 4 ohm to 8 ohm speaker connections along with using Duelund DCA10Ga cables was my solution and happy ending. Not sure any of this applies but just sharing what I went through.

Since you asked for suggestions.....

My suggestion would be to restate your question and include as much information as possible such as:  Room, amplification, source, cabling & power conditioning.

If the forum members know what you're dealing with you should get some helpful and thoughtful responses.  Hope the new speakers will ultimately work out. 

Give them time to run in.

My suggestion would be to restate your question and include as much information as possible such as:  Room, amplification, source, cabling & power conditioning.

@rick_n  +1.  Hard to assess anything without that info along with what speakers you were using before.  Also, 1-2 hours isn’t nearly sufficient — you should give them a minimum of 100 hours to begin to seriously judge them, and they could well improve further to 200 hours and beyond. 

I'm new to this "forum" stuff.

Room: 30ft X 30ft.  

• Set up is on the front/right side of the room.  back wall is 15ft back from the listening position.  Left wall is 20 feet from the listening position. Right wall is 10ft from listening position.  In as sense, I'm in the right/front corner of a 30ft x 30ft room.

1. Amp -- Two Schiit TYR Monoblocks.
2. Pre-Amp -- Schiit Freya +
3. DAC -- Schiit Yggy O.G.
4. Speaker Cable -- Blue Jean Cable (10 AWG)
5. Source -- Lumin Streamer

I was using KEF R3 meta before.

@rwalsh07 

Do you have any acoustic treatment, are there a variety of furnishings, rugs, etc. or is everything bare walls and bare floors?

Pretty much bare wall, no room treatment, flooring is a mixture of carpet and laminate flooring.  I had my KEF R3 Metas set up identically but weren't nearly as harsh.  I changed speakers because the KEFs sounded a too analytical/metallic for me. I thought the MLs would richen it up a bit, floor is a mixture of carpet and laminate flooring.  The listening area has carpet, approximately 15ft x 15ft.  The speakers are on the carpet.  

The reviews I’ve read of your speakers do not indicate an inherent brightness at all, and your associated equipment also should be fine so I’m thinking additional break in should yield significant improvements.  What interconnects are you using?  BTW, if you’d like to significantly upgrade your speaker cables here’s a pair of Acoustic Zen shotgun bi-wire cables (I’ve used these for many years) for only $350, which is a ridiculous price for these cables.  You should jump on them, and if you don’t like them for some reason you can probably sell them for a profit. 

https://www.usaudiomart.com/details/650194860-acoustic-zen-satori-shotgun-biwired-speaker-cables/

Appreciate the feedback. Thank you sir.

Break in, I'd say at least 100 hours. I have heard these speakers after break in and they didn't sound the least bit bright or brittle to my ears.

Honestly I'd say if you can return them do so rather than trying bandaids to try and fix them.

I agree with jond.....return them....

stringreen +1 and jond +1

Far too many speakers out there to try. If you get the right pair, your toes should tapping immediately and it will sound better with room treatment and break-in. Return the speakers and try your best to audition the potential next pair. My two cents..

Double check to make sure they are hooked up in phase. How do you have the speaker cables hooked up to the speaker terminals? Do you have a double run of your speaker cables, metal jumpers or short cables? 

Are you sure the rear jumpers are in?

@tksteingraber 

Agree about the Dueland DCA 10ga.They tamped down my Cornwall 4's without loss of detail, and they had been thoroughly broken in by being in the loop of an old telephone transfer station for decades.

Also affixed one inch diameter punched out pieces of black gorilla tape one each to the "mouths" of the the midrange horns.

The nails on a chalkboard sound. Once one hears it, it’s near impossible to unhear.

It may seem like a crazy question, but how long is your speaker cable? 

These speakers have a rising top end from 7k up when pointed at your ears. Pointed straight ahead, though, they measure much flatter. If they still sound too aggressive pointed straight ahead, you might check out something like Dynaudio Evoke 30s or Emit 30s, which I'm betting would be more balanced and less fatiguing. 

I’m using the metal jumpers that came with the speakers. My speaker cables are 8ft.

i’ll try positioning them straight. 
 

They do have better dispersion and soundstage than my KEFs. It’s just the harshness than I’m struggling with. Maybe they just need to be broken in. 🤷🏻‍♂️

My personal opinion is you have a very open and telling speaker system now. I think you are hearing a problem somewhere else in your system 

 Break in will help but basically for me it is rare to go from ugly to great. Certainly new speakers sound held back and times settle in and detail comes out but a drastic change is rare in my mind. Don't get me wrong there can be huge changes but just not from unacceptable bright to wonderful perhaps on the first couple of hours. If you have a friend close by that can bring some different wire or components 

 I would try that. 

Good luck regards. 

Y net is your speakers are more resolved than a bunch of your equipment. 

If after break in your still not happy, try some MIT cables or Transparent , these are what we use to soften up a bright sound.

Matt M

I had a pair of these. While the bass and mids were very good I found the motion tweeters to bright. Point them forward and not towed in. Also put a piece of fabric or foam on the tweeters. It worked for me until I could sell and move up. I found soft dome tweeters are more to my liking. 

Some folks have a higher sensitivity to high frequencies.

Likely best to return speakers, then get something maybe with a soft dome tweeter

Sorry to hear your first reaction. But, you really need to get them broken in. I would put them pointing at each other and play them 24 hours a day for a week. As loud as possible without disturbing you. 

The most likely problem is breakin. Then as someone pointed out, they may be a bit sizzly. If so, tube equipment would be  much warmer. Typically, speakers first, then upgrade electronics to optimize... but you want to like the speakers. Did you hear them before buying? You liked them?

Touch your woofers and make sure they are active.  Just want to cover the possibility they are malfunctioning first. :)

@rwalsh07  Aside from the speakers, have a look at this site for assessing the room itself.  There  seems to be some real issues you could address around the room size itself.  If it's true the room is 50% of the sound, your 30 x 30 room is not helping?  Cheers.

https://www.acoustic.ua/forms/rr.en.html

Try replacing the metal jumpers with some heavy gauge copper wire and switch back & forth with the Blue Jean Cable from the lower to upper binding posts on the speakers. See is you hear a difference between them.

You were sensitive to a similar issue with your previous speakers. Look elsewhere in the system. 

My experience with ML is they are not inherently bright.  The AMT tweeter dispersion pattern is not sensitive to floor/ceiling reinforcement and you said you experimented with toe-in.  Therefore, I would let the speakers burn in 300 hours before you critically analyze them.  That said, are the metal jumpers the “clips” supplied by ML which are simply a piece of copper, not a shielded wire?  When I had Apogee speakers, they came with similar copper jumper clips manufactured to the dimensions to slip between the terminals.  They had no shielding. The result was a grainy, harsh sound.  My recommendation is to use speaker cable, equivalent to or better than your current speaker cable as jumpers, or better, bi-wire the speakers. Both options improved the SQ of my Apogees, the bi-wire option significantly.  Bear metal jumpers can be a point source for EMI, including RFI, to enter your system which produces a glare like distortion.  I recommend trying this to see if it improves SQ.  Also, the AMT tweeter design has a wide dispersion pattern so I also recommend experimenting with side wall room treatment.  Good luck. 

Clarification:  the AMT design has a wide horizontal dispersion pattern, narrow vertical dispersion pattern. Therefore, no ceiling/floor reinforcement, but possibly side wall reinforcement.  

Besides brightness/harshness, what else do they clearly do wrong ? New not burnt-in equipment and cables can do many funny things at the same time. I can't know if this is the case. Find a few very high quality recordings and see what they do with them. Don't even listen to them for longer than a minute at a time before you get at least 50 hours of play. I suggest starting with low volume and then gradually increase it to moderate while accumulating hours. Don't push it.

I would think it would be premature to return them unless they just sound like a complete junk. This pair might actually be defective. So yeah, I would give it a try.

Any new speaker will require 100-200 hours of break in.  If you replace them have you thought of used speakers or store demos that have some hours on them.  
It’s painful for me breaking in new stuff which includes cables because I’m so impatient.

Brightness (lack of) is not usually what improves with speaker break in. What you normally hear in brand new speakers is a "tightness", the speakers don’t swing and let go of the notes. And the bass can seem somewhat lacking, the bass and midbass fill in when the driver suspension loosens up.

That said, a speaker can sound top heavy if the bass isn’t balanced with everything else. A tweeter will sound more prominent in a bass shy speaker. That could be what you are hearing and that just might change with more hours.

How long can you keep the speakers and still exercise the return option? If you have time, put a track on repeat while you are at work and let ’em rip for a few days. If they haven’t come around after ~200 hours, send ’em back.

@rwalsh07 "Pretty much bare wall, no room treatment, flooring is a mixture of carpet and laminate flooring." There's the vast majority of your problem . 

Until you address the room, there's nothing any tweek, speak, or electronics change can do that will help in any meaningful way.

@knighttodd +1! Good idea of yours to put some fabric in front of the tweeters. The OP can then experiment with adding layers until he is pleased with the sound.

I would return them and head to The Music Room ....

Well, because you like Schiit, add one of their equilizers.   The Loki Mini will work. Or, if you are adventurous, replace the resistor in the tweeter circuit with a higher value.

I owned 2 pair of Martin Logan speakers, ESL15A and ESL13A. I enjoyed these speakers for many years. In the end I moved in another direction because as I listened to music in longer sessions they caused ear fatigue. I would also add that they were a bit bright as well. I used transparent cabling which helped a bit. I also had them paired with McIntosh 1.25kwh Monoblocks which were not the perfect match.  Martin Logan speakers dip low in ohms so I would check out ohms law and see if your amp goes low enough so support them. I think you have tubes which should help the cause but maybe you need to move to lower ohms on your taps. Also, more importantly you need to turn those speakers up loud and let them run for a week or two and break them in.  Lastly, try giving Martin Logan a call.  Think the are in Kansas, very helpful people. They actually sent a field tech out when I first purchased them properly set them up as I was having a few issues adjusting the subs to integrate properly. Good Luck and let us know how you make out. 

How do you know if it’s just your speakers or any part of your system contributing to this sound? For example, if you use a Benchmark dac with any speaker, it will sound analytical/shrill. 
System synergy is more important than any 1 piece, after the room of course.

I had the same experience with the XTi60's and could not mitigate the brightness. Good ribbon tweeters cost money and quality can vary a lot. The ML's are perhaps a bit too much of a bargain.

I found the RAAL tweeters in the Ascend Towers to have a similar footprint and much better performance. I recommend Ascend.

https://ascendacoustics.com/products/elx-tower-pair?variant=40602626916406

You are jumping the gun here. Let them break in

I agree with many here that your room is probably your biggest challenge.  I have the ML Motion 60's, and actually focused the other direction.  I added a pair of small, sealed Subwoofers (SVS SB-2000) and it was the best money I've ever spent on audio.

For everyone pointing at the room, I tend to agree that is a weak link. But the OP has stated that the KEFs didn't exhibit this behavior, so the room and the equipment are the constants in this scenario. Room treatment will certainly help any speaker perform it's best, but that might be the primary issue here.

I would also recommend letting the woofers loosen up through break-in time.  I bought a used set of B&W 805 D4 speakers that were super bright with little low end.  I solved it by adding some wall treatment but mostly by adding in a Schiit Loki Mini equalizer.  Big difference!  Just $149

Hey guys, appreciate all the feedback. I’m soaking it all in.

something interesting last night, I checked the polarity last night and my left speaker was positive and the right was negative. Everything was plugged in color coordinated between the amp and speakers. Should I swamp the right speaker inputs to achieve positive polarity?

Greetings,

Sounds like speaker break in is important. 
Question is the best way to do that. 
Your advice is greatly appreciated. 
Someone noted placing the speakers facing each other 24/7 for a week.

If so, how much space in between them? Maybe it doesn’t matter. Is as loud as possible recommended?

Thanks to all. 
 

Square room doesn't help the situation.  Change what you can, speaker placement, acoustic panels, rugs furniture room treatments, seating location.  Here's a good article for understanding room acoustics; https://realtraps.com/art_room-setup.htm#:~:text=THE%2038%20PERCENT%20RULE,-The%20placement%20method&text=This%20offers%20the%20best%20compromise,back%20from%20the%20front%20wall. 

No experience with ML, but the first thing that I would do is get a real pair of speaker cables.  Check some threads online for cables that work well with ML.  Good luck!

Some have suggested impedance matching as an issue.  Both your old KEFs and your new MLs have a nominal 4 ohm impedance.  The Schiit monoblocks are know  to be stable to 4 ohms and put out 350 watts into that load.   So, while impedance mismatches and amplifier clipping can cause high frequency grain and distortion like you describe, I believe it is a low probability root cause.  

Your ML model is an AMT tweeter design, not their usual large panel drivers they are known for.  While the AMT tweeter is less subject to beaming, it still has that characteristic compared dome tweeter dispersion tweeters like in your old KEFs.   However, you have stated you experimented with toe-in already. So you have ruled out this potential root cause.  
 

AMT tweeters are dipole designs but, correct me if I am wrong, I believe ML is not using the tweeter free mount like late 70s Heil speakers.  In this configuration, they are not dipoles and not as sensitive to rear wall placement distance as ML large panel designs.  Of course, rear wall distance is always important, but since the design is not a dipole, this would affect potential bass reinforcement or cancellation, and sound staging.  So I believe this is a low probability root cause. If I am wrong and they are using the AMT in a dipole configuration, rear wall placement may be a root cause.  
 

So what’s left:

1. Burn in as I and others mentioned in previous posts. 
2. Jumper clips.  Garbage for the can.  Experiment with a bi-wire  connection.
3. The tonal pallet of the design is not for you.  I would discuss this issue with your dealer and see if the dealer has other recommendations.  He will get the drift you are unhappy.  Therefore, if you wish to return, it will not be a shock.  Keep track of return policy deadlines.