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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
audphile1's avatar
audphile1
7,830 posts
 

Interconnects are DH Labs Pure Silver Revelations from DAC to preamp and from preamp to amp.
 

@stevehardy1 pure silver interconnects usually work best in combination with pure copper. In example, silver between DAC and preamp, copper from preamp to amp. 
I avoid using silver cables in my system completely. After years of trial and error I never got any iteration of my system to sound natural with silver in the mix, even if it’s just silver plated copper. 
What you’re fighting is part recording part system and room. Silver will exacerbate issues  

I highly recommend swapping out both silver cables for pure copper neutral interconnects. Even basic bluejeans will work as a proof of concept. Then find the cables that sound good to you. Will the faults in the recording be completely eliminated? No. But good cables will make it less annoying. 

zlone
1,321 posts
 

+1 @audphile1, I have tried to make pure silver and silver plated work in my system, except for digital cables, I have banned it. Copper sounds right to my ears.

audphile1's avatar
audphile1
7,830 posts
 

@zlone yes silver in digital sounds fine to me as well. Good point bringing up this exception. 

stevehardy1 OP
120 posts
 

I avoid using silver cables in my system completely. After years of trial and error I never got any iteration of my system to sound natural with silver in the mix, even if it’s just silver plated copper. 

+1 @audphile1, I have tried to make pure silver and silver plated work in my system, except for digital cables, I have banned it. Copper sounds right to my ears.

Pure Silver interconnects can sometimes be on the bright side, with silver coated copper even more so.  The DH Labs Revelations are open and neutral with no perceived brightness.  Since the time I started this post, I have substituted Audio Envy OCC copper and Blue Jeans  copper interconnects for the DH Labs and they had no effect on the glare. 

Last night I inserted some Mills .91 ohm resistors for the tweeters and .75 ohm resistors for the mids and that has reduced the glare considerably.  

slaw's avatar
slaw
26,433 posts
 

From my experience high quality silver will sound better on higher quality components.

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