1. Home
  2. speakers
  3. 198456-115932

Do You Ever Get Glare/Raspy Sound on High Pitched Female Vocal Lines?

I sometimes get a harsh glare or slightly raspy sound on female vocal lines when they sing loud, high pitched notes.  It’s hard to explain the sound exactly, but if you’ve ever experienced it, you’ll know what I’m speaking of.  Two examples are Norah Jones, Don’t Know Why at 1:57 with line  “You’ll be ON my mind”.   The other is Michael Bluble’s Quando, Quando, Quando featuring Nelly Furtardo.  Her line “I can’t wait a moment more, Tell me quando, quando, quando” at 1:53 is another good example.  This happens at moderate to fairly loud volume levels. 

Trying to determine if it’s coming from the midrange section or quasi ribbon tweeter, I’ve disconnected the speaker jumpers from one while keeping the other jumped and found it occurs in both the midrange and the tweeters.  I’ve also swapped out two other DACs and have bypassed the preamp by going directly to the amp from the DACS, but it makes no difference.  It doesn’t sound like clipping distortion or typical speaker breakup.  I’ve even inserted 1 ohm resistors on the Magnepans  and while it reduces it a bit, it’s still there.  I can also hear it to a somewhat lesser degree on my old Theil 1.5s and KEF KS50s at fairly loud, but not crazy volume levels.  Both of those speakers are driven with 400 watt @ 4 Ohms and a 300 watt @ 4 Ohms amps respectively.  I can’t imagine that I’m clipping the amps.

Does anyone else have this occur on their systems?  Any ideas on what’s going on here?

My system is Magnepan 3.7x speakers, PS Audio Airlens, Stellar Gold DAC, PMG Signature preamp & BHK 250 amp, streaming Tidal. 

stevehardy1
toddalin's avatar
toddalin
658 posts
 

OK, I'll bite.  I ordered her CD and it should be here in a few days.

stevehardy1 OP
120 posts
 

did you try to move the speakers closer together?

Yes, I moved them closer together and played around with the toe-in, but it didn't help with the glare.

stevehardy1 OP
120 posts
 

I posted yesterday, but I don’t see it, so I’ll ask again. Can you list the cables in your system? Its not what you think. There’s a specific issue that you need to rule out, but I need to know what type of cables you have. It may, or may not apply.

My cables are Audioquest HDMI Carbon 48 from the Airlens to the DAC.  Interconnects are DH Labs Pure Silver Revelations from DAC to preamp and from preamp to amp.  Speaker cables are Wireworld OCC copper Eclipse 8.

johnss
678 posts
 

would think the harshness is not coming from your speakers. 

Most likely coming from the rectifiers either in your amp or preamp. 

Try adding some film bypasses to the main filter caps and would think that harshness will disappear.  

skiznfliz
70 posts
 

@stevehardy1 

I too had maggis… The .7’s on Magna Risers, ditched em after 2 years missing the slam and attack I so desired. I messed around with various resistors, .5 & 1.0, but never got the sound I was looking for. What Maggi’s do they do very well, and everyone should have a pair once in their audiophile journey, but many times I felt they made it that I was only listening to music that sounded good on my Maggi’s leaving out out of the stuff I loved being it didn’t sound good. 
 

Try a .5 resistor and if you still have the issue, seriously consider you may have an issue with your hearing. Hearing tests are generally NO Charge, you have nothing to loose. 
 

Good luck 

More to discover