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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
marakanetz's avatar
marakanetz
5,473 posts
 
There is another cheap solution to acquire Musical Fidelity X10 tube buffer for your CD-player. Despite adding extra pair of interconnects this unit realy brings lifeless digital components with CDs together to the life.

I believe in your situation you simply experience "digital sickness syndrom" that I used to have not a long while ago thus transfered my collection almost entirely to vinyl. As to this X10 unit it realy brings digital playback to life since I heard in ensemble with vintage NAD CD-player.

It is well known that re-locking errors, lack of resolution brings very unpleasant audiable waveforms onto the wide-band amplification components that can affect upper mid-range, high freequencies and even but not to the significant level bass. Your new passive Creek tend to reveal everything good and bad so the solution is to improve the source at first.

Also you can try to get high quality DAC such as Bel Canto DAC1 that can also someway cure DSS.

As to my digital setup I have a very good transport with relatively mediocre DAC. It doesn't produce any fatigue freequencies to me but I admit sounds cold. For now I only care about analogue and digital setup will probably be for the separate system(bedroom).
unsound
6,115 posts
 
My guess is Subaruguru is on the right track. I hope this condition is system dependant?
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.
zug
21 posts
 
No I would DEFINITELY agree 100% with Maraken and newbee that this is symptom of digitis -- the source is your CD player or more precise it is "jitter", the technical term -- well there's a very simple test, just, listen to some other source such as your tuner or turn-table etc. If you don't get sick listening to those, then it is the CD player (just a "bright" sound does not make one sick). The cure? Well you can "cover it up" as many posts here suggest, with different cables or speakers or amps, tube or other. But that REALLY doesn't make it go away completely. The only true cure, to keep a fairly hi-res system, is a digital upgrade. (Or just throw away all your possessions digital, the end, fini -- a perfectly acceptable solution too!). But if you REALLY want good CD sound you just have to work at it. There ARE good, and non-irritating-sounding players out there and you may have to auditon some at your local dealer. I personally use a good transport and an MSB Link Dac with an anti-jitter device too and now I must say (finally) I have decent digital sound. But it does take time and patience. That digital sickness is quite disturbing to those with sensitive ears, and can have an actual depressing effect on some individuals -- myself not excluded. So, best of luck.
unsound
6,115 posts
 
I have had the same thing happen to me at live concerts. Much more often at amplified ones than unamplified ones. There are moments when silence is golden. Especially if you expect the musical ones to be golden. The point I'm trying to make is give your ears a break.
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