Hi Warrenh. My odyssey has been largely trial and error. A few years ago I freaked every time I played CD's featuring flute or soprano sax or upper register piano. It just sounded shrill. Hurt your ears kinda shrill, especially at advanced volumes. Everything else sounded cool.
My first thought was that the recording microphones were distorting. My second was that the digital transfers were dodgey. The first victim was the speakers, but no fix there. Then I upgraded the power amp. But I still didn't get it. I changed interconnects and speaker cables; upgraded my DAC; found the matching transport. Everything was getting better balanced and more focused but the problem persisted. Then I switched pre-amps. Yippee! Everything fell into place, the shrillness vanished. I'd uncovered the culprit. I firmly believe that the higher up the feeding chain you go, the more intolerant the system is to distortion and the more important degrees of "fineness" become.
So nowadays my searches are more about refining what I have. But even when I miss a score on some unit that I think will increase the rhapsody that I've stumbled upon so far, it really doesn't bother me. Happy holidays and hi-fi happiness to you :^)
My first thought was that the recording microphones were distorting. My second was that the digital transfers were dodgey. The first victim was the speakers, but no fix there. Then I upgraded the power amp. But I still didn't get it. I changed interconnects and speaker cables; upgraded my DAC; found the matching transport. Everything was getting better balanced and more focused but the problem persisted. Then I switched pre-amps. Yippee! Everything fell into place, the shrillness vanished. I'd uncovered the culprit. I firmly believe that the higher up the feeding chain you go, the more intolerant the system is to distortion and the more important degrees of "fineness" become.
So nowadays my searches are more about refining what I have. But even when I miss a score on some unit that I think will increase the rhapsody that I've stumbled upon so far, it really doesn't bother me. Happy holidays and hi-fi happiness to you :^)