Listening Fatigue

Every situation is different. I agree with all the posts but the culprit in anyone's system (including environment) can vary. Generally, for me, brightness is what causes fatigue and from my experience is normally due to a "hard" environment with few absorbtive materials (e.g., rugs, couches) or from a mismatch of speakers and amplifiers. Cabling can help alleviate that, but using cables as an equalizer may not provide the optimal solution (though it is cheaper than replacing speakers or amplifiers).

A bad source system is a nightmare. A bad cd is a nightmare. If either of those situations is there, forget about it. But, most source systems today that an audiophile would buy are pretty good.

I only experience listening fatigue when I play the "Best of Fingernails on the Chalkboard 2" SACD for more than an hour continuously.

Electronics and/or improper installation there of.

In addition to what Tireguy wrote, I also feel that speakers contribute to listening fatigue: If the power output from the drivers is not matched correctly (due to incorrect choice of drivers &/or ill-designed xover) then one or more area of the freq. spectrum will be emphasized. In my experience an accentuated tweeter causes listening fatigue real quickly + for me, excess bass also causes listening fatigue.
Now, several listeners like tizzy tweeters & ample bass! I was @ a Radioshack store buying a battery for my wrist watch & a HT system was demo-playing. The shelves in that section of the store were rattling & the bass boom was driving me nuts but the salesman told me "more, the better!". I can only extrapolate what his 2-ch might sound like if he had one!

It is both recording and system related. Really good systems have you turning up the volume with reduced fatigue, so it's not directly related to volume. Sean
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