Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

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Arjen
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Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Dear friends,
I’m rather new on this forum.
With two topics: slipsik in excelsis deo and damping feet. Contributions about what should be a good sound.
At this moment I experience limits of upgrading and tweaking. I ‘m afraid i’m somewhere beyond limits. Upgrading was about better amp, better cartridge, better phono preamp, better cables, links and feet. A promise of better definition, details, soundstage etc.
And indeed, every step gave the image of a better sound. All sounds very detailed and bright, but open up the volume like I used to do before, it hurts my ears after a while, like looking into the reflections of the sun from waters. In this metaphor you ‘ll get your sunglasses. But for very bright sound I have no sunglasses. Do you?
Does anyone experienced this and what is the remedy, backward downgrading? Or turning the volume down? Arjen
Lenco 76/S TJN, Dr. Fuss, Supernait2, CD5X, Slipsik7.1, Millon Phantom, Soundeck, AudioSensibility
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

I started a backward downtweaking. Replaced front damping feet from both amp and turntable. First impression Katanga! (Curtis Amy and Bolton Dupree) on Pacific Jazz Record is a pleasant listen after the downtweaking with no downtuning of the musicality of the record. Hope my first impression will lingers onto longer impression. Arjen
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by beck »

Arjen wrote: 2021-07-26 15:53 I started a backward downtweaking. Replaced front damping feet from both amp and turntable. First impression Katanga! (Curtis Amy and Bolton Dupree) on Pacific Jazz Record is a pleasant listen after the downtweaking with no downtuning of the musicality of the record. Hope my first impression will lingers onto longer impression. Arjen
Downtweaking is a skill that shall be taken very seriously! :-)
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Any experience with downtweaking yourself, Beck?
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by beck »

All the time. Two steps forward and two steps back is not unusual. :-)

It is the only way to learn.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by David Neel »

When a tweak happens, there will be a difference. Because the mind will latch onto this difference, a lot of tweaks will appear to be upgrades. But remove them, after some time being used to them, and see if they really are upgrades...

I experimented with "audiophile" power blocks and power cables. Starting with just one, then discovering which piece of kit benefitted most, then adding another, and so on. At each step I heard a small improvement. After the whole system was gradually migrated onto this expensive block and power cables, I wanted to see how big these improvements were, in total. So I removed them all and went back to standard cables and my no-brand block. That was when I realised that all the little "improvements" had cumulatively strangled the musicality...

I've had similar experiences with supports and isolation accessories.
The search for knowledge is not nourished by certainty, but by a radical distrust in certainty
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Thank you both. Strangling musicality is indeed the risk of tweaking as David says. Thank to our own eagerness and the audiophile jungle created by the lot DIY starting startups. And maybe neglect tuning lessons. I was at a friends home, just moderate setup, no tweaking, partly pre used by myself. i
It was surprised the sound that maybe not very defined, but filled pleasantly filled his not tol big room.
Two steps forward, three steps backwards, and then the good one forward again. Yes, lots of lessons to learn. Best lesson perhaps to leave things when they sound allright to you and not rambling in the audiophile jungles. But then again, we are created to adventure I’m afraid…..
And so, I please would like to hear more experiences, more audiophile narratives, about how to avoid strangling by trying to upgrade, to keep listening pleasant.
Last edited by Arjen on 2021-07-26 21:23, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by u252agz »

Deciding by yourself that a tweak has been successful or not is very difficult in my opinion.

All too easy to be seduced by the Hi Fi sounds at the expense of musicality.

As a result - I do not stray from recommended upgrades from people whose ears I trust ( quite a few on this forum) and this is a recipe for a peaceful stress free and enjoyable Hi Fi experience.

I have had limited experience of non recommended changes and these have all been painful ( with Network switches and digital volume controls)
and quite upsetting in what they did to the music.

For me, I find listening in the next room a good way to see if an upgrade / tweak is successful. If it sounds good and pulls you into the room - this is a good sign. If it leaves you cold wondering what happened to the music - its not been a successful change.

Tune dem is of course the recommended way but does take some practice .
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

U2, yep. Listening in the next room to judge. Remember me of hearing music outside small pubs at the Atlantic (West counties Ireland, like Ballydavid, Dingle), seducing music from a ‘seisiuin’, floating into the air, like a breeze around your head. High end only High end when it ends pleasantly musically and seductive in your ears. That is also the principle of my speaker designer, trying to get the just sound by listening to streetmusicians. So thank you for your words of inspiration.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Charlie1 »

Combining tuneful/musical products doesn't automatically mean you'll end up with a well balanced system. Like you say, either go back to where you were before, or continue your search for a new (and hopefully better) system. These things can take a long time but I doubt you'll just get used to it.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Thank you Charlie for your reply. With the Slipsik 6.1 between Lenco 76/S with Nagaoka MP300 and Supernait 2 I think the system is OK, It is only to get the best out of it, eventually by downgrading or downtweaking upgrade accessoires.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by beck »

The best you can do Arjen is to learn how to post comparison clips on the “playground” using an iphone or an ipad. Use a free dropbox account to upload your videos. Then make links to post on this forum.
This will give you an outside “view” of what your system is doing to the recorded music.

It only takes one “bad” component or cable to ruin the music. It is an extremely delicate balance we are searching for.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Thank you Beck. Now that I’m away for a couple of days, I can have a fresh listen in a few days again.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by lindsayt »

Arjen wrote: 2021-07-26 14:40 Dear friends,
I’m rather new on this forum.
With two topics: slipsik in excelsis deo and damping feet. Contributions about what should be a good sound.
At this moment I experience limits of upgrading and tweaking. I ‘m afraid i’m somewhere beyond limits. Upgrading was about better amp, better cartridge, better phono preamp, better cables, links and feet. A promise of better definition, details, soundstage etc.
And indeed, every step gave the image of a better sound. All sounds very detailed and bright, but open up the volume like I used to do before, it hurts my ears after a while, like looking into the reflections of the sun from waters. In this metaphor you ‘ll get your sunglasses. But for very bright sound I have no sunglasses. Do you?
Does anyone experienced this and what is the remedy, backward downgrading? Or turning the volume down? Arjen
It all depends what you mean by it being the equivalent of looking at the sun reflected on water.

If you go to a live classical performance - for example a Tchaikovsky ballet performed by one of the top ballet companies - it should be an extremely tuneful listening experience. As in: can't get more tuneful.
You will also find it - at times - ear piercing. Crescendos will make you flinch. The music is attention grabbing. But even though your ears are being pierced sometimes, it's not fatiguing. You could listen for hours and forget the passage of time.

If your system has that sort of honest natural tunefulness then I'd say you have a great system.

On the other hand, I've come across systems that are artificially bright. Or bright in a non-tuneful way. Ones where the system is pulling frequency response stunts that draw attention to certain instruments, whilst pushing others to the background, or virtually inaudible.
Or systems that as you get to generous volumes, start playing the music how the system wants to and not how it was performed and recorded. With it squashing / merging / distorting transient peaks involving multiple instruments played together.
In these cases, one or more wrong turnings have been taken.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Lindsayt, thanks for your comment.
Nick Cave sings (Brompton Oratory) “a beauty impossible to believe (….) and there ain't no god up in the sky, no devil in beneath the sea”. He really sounds natural, not artificially, Voice, piano. And still there is a kind of pressure for the ears. But maybe I was the ‘idiot prayer’ in me by too much and intensive listening each step of tweaking and upgrading, not take some rest to relax and recovering from listening. so result of too close listening in the past weeks. Now, first step is to kinda recover from this hard listening, then listen with fresh ears again and if needed downtweaking where I might have taken a wrong turning. And tell myself no more Idiot tweaking, but just tuning, for there ain’t no audiophile god in heaven other than the devil waiting for you at the bottom of too ambitious audiophile dreams.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Now that I’m back home after a week listening music at my setup, there is still some hurting ear pressure. Downgrading the main powercord to from the wall to the bar was of no relief. Then scrolling through the forum I came across the item of the proof is in the listening and from there to the placing of the speakers. The tuning approach of Fredrik by placing the speakers, different from what you use to read about he physical geometrical placement, seems to be helpful. Though I’m not free which wall to place the speakers nor to blind the wall (in between is doors to the garden, but lucky there is curtains too), the guidance of Fredrik is very helpful to diminish the airpressure of the musical noise, to relief the ears. Closer to the wall (thanks ThomasOK for the ca. 14 inch), farther away from my listening position and only a very little toe-in. So far my first impression of tuning by speaker set up. Hope I’m not faking myself, hoping the relief is real to my ears. Q, has anyone the same experience?
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by lindsayt »

When I place speakers in a room I start with them in the corner and play some music.
Then I pull them into the room till the bass snaps into focus. Or to put it another way snaps into tunefulness.
From there I adjust toe-in. Listening for the most tuneful angle.

my understanding is that this is a personal variation on Fredrik's method?

And that's about it, with maybe a bit of checking / double checking with different music and different positions, back towards the wall or out more or bit. Shuffle side to side.

Some people get very anal about it. With my systems in my rooms, to my ears, I've almost never been able to hear the difference that one inch has made.

One big exception to this has been my full sized corner horns. They have a giant rear facing woofer that treats the corner of the room as an extension of the speaker cabinet. These sounded most tuneful 1 inch from the corners of the room.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by Arjen »

Thank you Lindsay.
I’m now using Fedriks guideline. but then again, everybody has his/hers own gear, setup and roominterior. And you listen with your own ears. As you say tuning than is your own personal variation of his guideline. And that’s different from most what you read on the internet about placing the speakers. For example the distance of the speakers to the back wall. After all the upgrading and tweaking (see Slipsik in Excelsis Deo and Damping Feet) the noise started to offend my ears till earache. The speakers were rather untouched, placed about a meter from the back wall, in a triangle with the listening sofa.
Then I thought of a relief by downtweaking. A hard and not succesful job. Fredriks guideline of speaker setup and some comments on that was an eye-en ear opener to me. I shuffled the speakers back to the wall, and only slighly toed in.
Result a more easy, pleasant, more integrative musically sound. No listening to speakers but music.
My conclusion is that is was not the upgradig and tweaking itself that caused painful listening, but it is related to the fully setup, speaker setup included. Tweaking and upgrading needed adaption of that too. So now I’m joyful listening again with the speakers in a radical other position, a 32 cm from the back wall and 200 cm from each. Hope this will prove itself with more different music.
Job done while listening Bonnie Prince Billy Night Noises ans Beach Boys Take a Load off your Feet.
This Fredrik guideline definitely takes a load off my ears. The magic is back.
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Re: Limits of upgrading and tweaking: can it irritate and hurt your ears?

Post by V.A.MKD »

Arjen wrote: 2021-08-11 20:16 I’m now using Fedriks guideline. but then again, everybody has his/hers own gear, setup and roominterior. And you listen with your own ears. As you say tuning than is your own personal variation of his guideline. And that’s different from most what you read on the internet about placing the speakers.
Result a more easy, pleasant, more integrative musically sound. No listening to speakers but music.
This Fredrik guideline definitely takes a load off my ears. The magic is back.
+1, Yes definitely. Fedrik guideline for me "like" Etalon ... this is 1 meter ... and that's it.
When ever I go left or right I make mistake and whenever I go back to it I have perfect result ...
It simply works and it's perfect ...
Music First ...
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