Harshness – What causes it? What relieves it?

[caesar]

So many of today’s “high fidelity” speakers/ systems sound harsh. Is hearing all the harsh artifacts a result of good engineering or bad engineering?

Depending on whom you speak to, some harshness is caused by the resolving speakers... to the speaker guys, it is caused by the amplifiers or something up the chain... the source material guys will tell you that you can only listen to audiophile grade recordings... vinyl guys will tell you it’s because of digital...tube guys will tell you it’s because of solid state... room guys will tell you it’s the room, electricity focused guys will tell you to get new lines....and if you have cheap cables, someone will tell you to get some better cables…

Yet we have all heard exceptions that break these.

So what is harshness, what causes it, and how can it be cured?

 

[Andre Marc]

So many of today’s “high fidelity” speakers/ systems sound harsh. Is hearing all the harsh artifacts a result of good engineering or bad engineering?

Depending on whom you speak to, some harshness is caused by the resolving speakers... to the speaker guys, it is caused by the amplifiers or something up the chain... the source material guys will tell you that you can only listen to audiophile grade recordings... vinyl guys will tell you it’s because of digital...tube guys will tell you it’s because of solid state... room guys will tell you it’s the room, electricity focused guys will tell you to get new lines....and if you have cheap cables, someone will tell you to get some better cables…

Yet we have all heard exceptions that break these.

So what is harshness, what causes it, and how can it be cured?

It is all fashion.

Screaming tweeters, "tamed" cabinets, and horrific, non music friendly materials all contribute.

Gone are the days of holding coherence, tone, timbre, and a human quality as design goals...except for a few guys still doing it that way.

 

[zztop7]

So what is harshness, what causes it, and how can it be cured?

harshness = anything your ear does not like.
what causes it = every part of the chain from the artist to the eardrum.
cure = paper cones that have been used for years so they are very broken-in & alnico magnets. Smooths out the problems. Kind of like the beautiful smoothness of an inline 6 cylinder vs. the unbalanced harshness of most V6 engines.

zz.

 

[GaryProtein]

All things considered, more SPEAKERS have made my ears bleed than any other component.

Speakers have more than TEN TIMES the distortion of any other component.

 

[esldude]

2 glasses of wine or a couple shots of bourbon smooth it right out.

Now honestly, I think it comes from speakers having more and more extended treble response than in the past. Also if you listen to newer music the mastering has become atrocious. But in good equipment unless intentionally otherwise everything up to the speaker is truly flat in response.

If you look at room correction software, much of it suggests a 'house' curve not too different from one I saw espoused by Peter Walker of Quad. Mr. Walker's curve was a gentle continuous slope downward dropping 9 db from 20 hz to 20 khz. Many good quality modern speakers suddenly sound fine, and highly resolving if you apply such a curve.

In the beginning of this thread you can see the Dirac suggested curve. The software could do flat if desired, but people do not like truly flat as it always sounds too bright.
http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showt...y-with-Dirac-Live-Impulse-Response-Correction

 

[JackD201]

Flat for work, curved or sloped for pleasure has been my motto for a long time.

 

[Andre Marc]

Flat for work, curved or sloped for pleasure has been my motto for a long time.

Now, that is good.

 

[Mosin]

All things considered, more SPEAKERS have made my ears bleed than any other component.

Speakers have more than TEN TIMES the distortion of any other component.

I agree. Do they purposefully make them that way to allow for old guys with high frequency hearing loss? I can't name the number of rooms at shows that sound edgy and bright to me. Maybe it's the thing these days; maybe it's just me. Whatever it is, I'll pass.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

"Harshness" is distortion or emphasis of high mids and trebles. And emphasis is relative. Many seem to feel that what is actually linear, is emphasized. I think that is simply a result of what they're accustomed to listening to.

What causes it? Overwhelmingly, recording and speakers.

Tim

 

[Joe Whip]

I agree. Do they purposefully make them that way to allow for old guys with high frequency hearing loss? I can't name the number of rooms at shows that sound edgy and bright to me. Maybe it's the thing these days; maybe it's just me. Whatever it is, I'll pass.

I am with you 100%. It tends to be the old guys (I am getting there too at 56, but I can still hear to 17khz) that can afford expensive speakers. The speaker manufacturers are catering to this group. I have sat in rooms with very bright speakers at numerous events and homes and can't believe how bright the systems sound. Some of the older guys say wow, I say get me out of here. Some systems are tube based and some vinyl. I have also noticed that hyper detailed speakers tend to very bright.

 

[Diapason]

people do not like truly flat as it always sounds too bright.

Totally agreed, but I wonder why this is? What happens between performance and playback that allows for this change in perception? I assume that a "flat" response in the recording venue sounded absolutely fine when listening to the live musicians. When I go to concerts of live, unamplified music, harshness isn't generally a problem (although I have heard evidence of it in some smaller rooms for some concerts, which may be a question for another thread) so what gives?

It seems to me that close microphone techniques exacerbate the problem, and that recordings with a bit more space and a bit more of the recording venue don't generally sound as harsh. Naively, I always feel that an utterly flat everything from recording to playback leaves you with the sound of instruments from the position the mic was placed, and let's face it, many real instruments actually do sound very harsh up close. Is this overly simplistic?

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

It seems to me that close microphone techniques exacerbate the problem, and that recordings with a bit more space and a bit more of the recording venue don't generally sound as harsh. Naively, I always feel that an utterly flat everything from recording to playback leaves you with the sound of instruments from the position the mic was placed, and let's face it, many real instruments actually do sound very harsh up close. Is this overly simplistic?

Not simplistic. Mics, like speakers, are transducers, and have poor fidelity relative to decent electronic components. But I don't think the placement is necessarily the issue. There are far too many excellent, close-mic'd recordings to support that.

Tim

 

[awsmone]

I am not sure that the harshness you are hearing is actually in the upper treble, but may actually be in midrange

I am often surprised that the issue is midrange not treble

when i adjust by ear my system and measure it, the measurement show i prefer flat response, not peaked

How many high end speakers have peaked upper frequencies when measured?

What you lock onto when listening to a speaker can vary, if the midrange is recessed then the treble may sound too much

also the way it radiates can change your perception, a lot, not so much on axis frequency response that can be flat

I think with high end speakers with very good linear high frequencies the dispersion and interaction with the room and bass response will be critical

In show room conditions this can often not be optimised in the time available

I can easily demonstrate in my system without changing the high frequencies, which are dead flat: that the perception between harsh treble and good response has nothing to do with the treble response itself, wish it was that simple

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

I am not sure that the harshness you are hearing is actually in the upper treble, but may actually be in midrange

I am often surprised that the issue is midrange not treble

when i adjust by ear my system and measure it, the measurement show i prefer flat response, not peaked

How many high end speakers have peaked upper frequencies when measured?

What you lock onto when listening to a speaker can vary, if the midrange is recessed then the treble may sound too much

also the way it radiates can change your perception, a lot, not so much on axis frequency response that can be flat

I think with high end speakers with very good linear high frequencies the dispersion and interaction with the room and bass response will be critical

In show room conditions this can often not be optimised in the time available

I can easily demonstrate in my system without changing the high frequencies, which are dead flat: that the perception between harsh treble and good response has nothing to do with the treble response itself, wish it was that simple

At approximately what frequency do you feel audio transitions from "midrange" to "treble?"

Tim

 

[jadis]

It is all fashion.

Screaming tweeters, "tamed" cabinets, and horrific, non music friendly materials all contribute.

Gone are the days of holding coherence, tone, timbre, and a human quality as design goals...except for a few guys still doing it that way.

Sadly that is the reality. I can relate. Coloration sounds good to one camp, and bad to another.

 

[DaveC]

2 glasses of wine or a couple shots of bourbon smooth it right out.

Now honestly, I think it comes from speakers having more and more extended treble response than in the past. Also if you listen to newer music the mastering has become atrocious. But in good equipment unless intentionally otherwise everything up to the speaker is truly flat in response.

If you look at room correction software, much of it suggests a 'house' curve not too different from one I saw espoused by Peter Walker of Quad. Mr. Walker's curve was a gentle continuous slope downward dropping 9 db from 20 hz to 20 khz. Many good quality modern speakers suddenly sound fine, and highly resolving if you apply such a curve.

In the beginning of this thread you can see the Dirac suggested curve. The software could do flat if desired, but people do not like truly flat as it always sounds too bright.
http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showt...y-with-Dirac-Live-Impulse-Response-Correction

Good post! I agree the major thing is we have many speakers that measure very flat combined with poorly recorded music. One thing to note is the basic design of speakers may not have changed much but the quality of tweeters has gone way up and we have tweeters that are very accurate and flat well past 20 kHz. Beryllium, plasma and ribbon tweets are all very flat and detailed these days, but some find them harsh when I believe they are just used to a rolled off frequency response.

There are some contributing factors that can make an otherwise very good speaker with flat frequency response sound harsh and bright, so it is also a combination of these things. Excessive EMI/RFI on the AC power line will cause harshness and glare, so do brass connectors and low purity (4N or less) silver wire. Poor parts selection in components and crossovers will also add harshness. Electrolytic caps and cheap resistors can often add harshness depending on where they are used and any capacitor in the signal path, i.e. coupling caps in tube gear and crossover caps used in series, have the potential to really mangle the music. Good film caps are expensive and rarely used in anything but cost no object gear.

On the other hand there are also parts that can smooth out the signal by adding warmth, but this is often accompanied with the smoothing out and loss of detail. Overly warm copper interconnect cables, carbon resistors like Kiwame and some tubes and tube circuit designs can cause a loss of detail that is unacceptable.

It is not easy to put together a system that is both very resolving and also non-fatiguing due to all these possible pitfalls.

 

[arnyk]

So many of today’s “high fidelity” speakers/ systems sound harsh. Is hearing all the harsh artifacts a result of good engineering or bad engineering?

Depending on whom you speak to, some harshness is caused by the resolving speakers... to the speaker guys, it is caused by the amplifiers or something up the chain... the source material guys will tell you that you can only listen to audiophile grade recordings... vinyl guys will tell you it’s because of digital...tube guys will tell you it’s because of solid state... room guys will tell you it’s the room, electricity focused guys will tell you to get new lines....and if you have cheap cables, someone will tell you to get some better cables…

Yet we have all heard exceptions that break these.

So what is harshness, what causes it, and how can it be cured?

Harsness can be:

(1) A simple matter of suggestion or even auto-suggestion. Or, a matter of what you have become acclimatized to. If its the latter, just bear with it - your perceptions will likely re-adjust.

(2) Nonlinear distortion

(3) Poor frequency response in the speaker or due to the room, usually an midrange or treble peak, or a tipped-up response. Correspondingly, not enough bass.

 

[JackD201]

Totally agreed, but I wonder why this is? What happens between performance and playback that allows for this change in perception? I assume that a "flat" response in the recording venue sounded absolutely fine when listening to the live musicians. When I go to concerts of live, unamplified music, harshness isn't generally a problem (although I have heard evidence of it in some smaller rooms for some concerts, which may be a question for another thread) so what gives?

It seems to me that close microphone techniques exacerbate the problem, and that recordings with a bit more space and a bit more of the recording venue don't generally sound as harsh. Naively, I always feel that an utterly flat everything from recording to playback leaves you with the sound of instruments from the position the mic was placed, and let's face it, many real instruments actually do sound very harsh up close. Is this overly simplistic?

The simplistic answer is that people don't like flat because hearing is most sensitive in the upper midrange and lower treble. If this is botched anywhere from the artist to the loudspeaker it will be unpleasant. Now what constitutes botched is looooooong list. Spitty singer? Untuned instruments? Lousy technique? Distorting mics? Overloaded mic inputs? So on and so forth until we get to a poorly implemented loudspeaker. Literally anything from point of origin to final destination. Obviously if your job is to make sure the recording is good you want a monitoring system that will let you hear everything anomalous. So flat it is. If one is a listener and spotting goofs is his thing then by all means let him have at it. Most of us just want to wind down after a long day and get swept away. Given that we don't want to limit ourselves to just great recordings most of us simply opt to choose or tune systems to be more forgiving.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

The simplistic answer is that people don't like flat because hearing is most sensitive in the upper midrange and lower treble. If this is botched anywhere from the artist to the loudspeaker it will be unpleasant. Now what constitutes botched is looooooong list. Spitty singer? Untuned instruments? Lousy technique? Distorting mics? Overloaded mic inputs? So on and so forth until we get to a poorly implemented loudspeaker. Literally anything from point of origin to final destination. Obviously if your job is to make sure the recording is good you want a monitoring system that will let you hear everything anomalous. So flat it is. If one is a listener and spotting goofs is his thing then by all means let him have at it. Most of us just want to wind down after a long day and get swept away. Given that we don't want to limit ourselves to just great recordings most of us simply opt to choose or tune systems to be more forgiving.

Which is exactly what I've done with my Genesis speakers as they incorporate bass and tweeter controls on the rear panel. I have a setting for vinyl playback and another for digital playback. If I come across a recording that sounds harsh due to a mastering effort I don't particularly care for, I further adjust it slightly with the tone controls on my IA.

 

[rockitman]

if your system is harsh...don't necessary blame your speakers or components...blame electronic hash that enters the system via the signal ground plane. It's an easy fix...Entreq !