Parametric / graphic equalizer recommendations

Well, I'm so impressed by the thoughtful responses I'll say more than I want.
1) Spent a week with our local symphony orchestra and going back to my system, made me realize how bright, even tizzy on a bad CD it can be. At one point I listened to the orchestra with a Yamaha MS-100 monitor up to my left ear and orchestra in my right ear. I could instantly go from the monitor to real music and compare the two. The active monitor was bright even with treble turned way down. It was like shining a spotlight on the high freq.
2) I had a high quality mini system for 18 years. When the recorder stopped working on one speaker, and since I could afford it, stepped up to Nautilus 804 / Musical Fidelity. My room is 13' x 15'. No carpeting, hard walls, and windows on one side with a thin drape. Got the system in Oct. 2001. You can't imagine the amount of stress this whole stereo stuff has been as this was a huge sum of money for me and not even sure why I did all this. I do not part with my money easily. I'd sell it all right now except for the thousands of dollars I would loose. This is because now this whole mess has given me recruitment with associated permanent hearing damage. There are times when in only 10 minutes at 65 dB (conversational level) my ear is burning and in pain. Mild pain which goes on for days. People talk in my room louder but after 10 minutes the stereo is killing my ears. Understand that I never listen above 80 dB and usually around 70 dB so I have not been some smart ass who did this to himself.
I did cover all the walls and floors with carpet and blankets and this cut the reverb but it took something on every wall to help. But this is not enough in my case.
I refuse to turn my living room into an anechoic chamber and I'm not looking at different speakers because of some preference issue. The high frequencies need to be attenuated in a precise and adjustable way. If someone wants to suggest interconnects, I'd want to see measured high frequency attenuation, not just what they hear.
I agree that the reverb has to be addressed, maybe with a carpet. But need to stress: This Is NOT Enough. So if I cannot roll off the highs my whole stereo will go and in a way I'll be glad. I used the CD input on my boom box today, turned down the treble, and listened to music for the first time in almost a month. But even with this, now my ear is paying the price.
Any suggestion would be welcome.
I wonder:
- Why won't a parametric eq. work on high freq's?
- What is exactly bad about graphic eq?

How precious. Right down to the use of "loose." I see I apparently missed where you said room treatment didn't work, but no one responding above intended any offense. Sometimes we're distracted, or sleepy.

Back to your questions. Either, or any, kind of equalizer should help immensely, though I have to add, there is a difference between brightness and harshness. Maybe you should just get a nice receiver or an integrated amp with a treble control that you can turn down.

Whew! Have you been to an ear doctor? (I'm serious.) It seems very unlikely to me that your stereo caused this problem, but if I were you I'd certainly want to find out what did, and what I could do about it.

Your concern is not with "good" sound in the home, but with sound that is personally tolerable to you. If a boombox with the treble turned down can give you pain, an EQ may not help you much with your system. You need to get some auditory testing done. No one wants you to "turn your room into an anechoic chamber", and besides it seems as if you have already gone a long way towards that end. Attenuating the treble may do something, but it won't make your CD's sound like a live orchestra - the differences you heard have as much to do with the effects of mic'ing as they do with your system's balance or the CD medium.

To address your specific questions from above:

1) A parametric EQ will work fine on high frequencies. I think you may be misunderstanding what Rives is getting at with his description of his company's device. It sounds like a brilliant bit of applied engineering to me, but in any case not what you are after here. It is designed to deal with bass frequency room modes specifically.

2) Nothing is "bad" about graphic EQ for your application. In fact, a graphic model might well be the easiest thing to try out in order to satisfy your curiousity.

You are obviously not primarily concerned with "audiophile-approved" solutions, and besides it's not at all clear that there will even be a satisfactory solution to your dilemma. It would be easy to say, with the benefit of hindsight, that a B&W/Musical Fidelity system probably wasn't the best choice for your particular set of ears in your small room, but that's no guarantee you'd feel very much differently had you bought something like a tube electronics/electrostatic speaker system or a SET/small monitor system instead, or even purged your CD's and went all-analog. The devices you are looking at are relatively cheap, so buy one and do some experimenting if you like, but by all means get yourself to a specialist who might be able to help you with your fundamental auditory issue. Best of luck to you!

Cdc: You should see an audiologist or ENT. I am not a physician, but it does sound like you have tenitus (I'm sure I spelled that incorrectely). It is painful and is generally triggered by high frequencies. Speech is midband and does not cause the problem. If you listened to a live jazz band--or just a few cymbol crashes you would probably have the pain. It's frequently caused by some damage to the ear. It can be from being exposed to high SPL for long periods of time (doesn't sound like this is the case for you). But can happen from other things. Divers get it from the changing pressure on their ear drums when diving. I had a friend get it from an air bag going off in a car crash.

I strongly agree with the above comments about seeking medical help.

If all anyone wants to do is in/decrease high frequencies then a low pass filter is more effective than a parametric EQ circuit. Go to the following website and look at the parametric and shelving curves at the bottom of the file and you'll see the difference. The site is a paper presented by George Massenburg outlining the engineering behind parametric EQs. A graphic EQ can be considered as a special case (fixed frequency and sans Q control)of a parametric curve. Traditional treble controls are an example of a low pass filter. As a practical matter nearly all commercially available parametric EQ devices also offer separate low and high pass filters.

http://www.massenburg.com/cgi-bin/ml/parametric.html?id=FhaBkZYi

CDC, as a quick fix have you ever tried disconnecting your tweeter?