Sibilance how do I get rid of it?

The 3 times I have heard Dynaudio Speakers they allways struck me as Sibilant. SS amps do not help matters.

Dynaudio are ruthlessly revealing speakers,I don't think they are bright, if you hear sibilance from them the problem is either the room or your upstream components, cables included.

In your case it sounds like your power is really the culprit followed by your room.

As far as I know every system has a problem with sibilants to one degree or another. But obviously some much, much worse than others.

I am confused a bit as you attempt to include your room acoustics and demensions into the equation. Having an extremely live room adds reverb/echoing affects but should never change an 's' sound to a 'shhh' sound. At least as far as I can tell. I just don't see the connection.

Of course, electrically noisy neighborhoods, inferior recordings, IC and speaker cables, and components could inject all sorts of junk into the signal leading to sibilants and other ill effects.

Assuming that your neighborhood, recordings, and equipment are not contributing to the problems, I believe sibilants has everything to do with the purity of AC power.

With that said, I would recommend the following tweaks:

1. Well, I can't really recommend this one from a safety perspective but it is a fact that grounding your AC outlets introduces much noise into the AC. Removing the ground has the opposite affect. Isolated grounds are better that common grounds. No grounding produces the best results.

2. Install a minimum of three dedicated circuits/lines. One for the amp, another for your digital source, and yet another for your pre. You are probably aware that digital adds much noise to the circuit it is connected to. Therefore, any other equipment sharing that circuit will also pick up much of that noise and eventually will amplify it. At the very least get the amp and pre onto it's own dedicated circuit/line, and put the ditigal on an undedicated line. Assuming your equipment is of a certain caliber, you should notice a tremendous improvement with this relatively cheap tweak if you stop right here.

3. For your dedicated circuits/lines, use an upgraded romex wire, not just the cheap 12 gauge available at Home Depot. I'm using 10ga. 99.95% OFC romex which is still very cheap compared to any other tweaks you may do. Do not allow for any breaks (junction boxes) between the service panel and the outlet.

4. Some will say that one phase or leg of the service panel can make your system sound better than the opposing phase or leg. I don't doubt it. If you have alot of motors and/or dimmers on one phase at the service panel, then it is entirely possible your dedicated audio circuits will produce cleaner AC if they are on the opposite phase.

5. Install some audio grade wall outlets such as FIM at $60 an outlet.

6. Eqaully important is a first rate AC power conditioner. I happen to be using Foundation Research LC-1's in-line power conditioners for digital and pre and an LC-2 for my amp. These are not cheap by any means but since these take the place of a power cord and an active power conditioner they could be considered somewhat of a bargain. Two Foundation Research LC-1's and one LC-2 will set you back about $2000. Considering that good active power conditioners are quite expensive and you still need aftermarket power cords, $2000 is a pretty good price.

The Foundation Research LC's work directly on the sibilants problem and you would immediately notice a very serious improvement here. Not to mention a much lowered noise floor in general and greater imaging and dimensionality.

7. If you've bought into anything I've said thus far, then you could even entertain a few more extreme tweaks. For example:

o A second AC line to the house dedicated to your audio equipment. It's as close to the outside power transformer as you're going to get.
o A beefed up silver or high purity copper industrial grade service panel and circuit breakers. A friend bought one for over $1k but then later found an even better one for about $250.
o Converting some or all of your gear to 230volts and run 230 volts (balanced power) straight from the service panel. Audio equipment connected to each other but connected to opposing phases/legs at the service panel can introduce noice into the AC.
o Install the new service panel as close to your system as possible.

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I've performed suggestions 1 thru 6 above and noticed very obvious improvements with each tweak made. I no longer perceive sibilants to be an issue in my system. They've made such tremendous improvements at the micro- and macro-dynamic levels that I fully intend to one day perform most/all of step 7 just to see what additional benefits may be gained.

Again I'm assuming that your neighborhood electrical, your equipment, and your recordings played are not serious contributing to the sibilants problems you may be experiencing. If this is true and you do the above, sibilants will no longer be an issue to you. But getting to bed at a decent hour will be.

As far as I know, there is no other remedy to actually resolve or seriously deminish your issues with sibilants. Somebody correct me if I am wrong.

One last note: if you should decide to purchase any kind of power conditioner (active or passive), just like any other component, there are good ones and bad ones. Of course even the bad ones can receive good reviews. And there are some popular ones out there that are even worse than not having any power conditioner at all.

-IMO

Try this first as I have similar floors. Buy a nice area rug you like and lay it as close to the speakers and as far out into the room as it will run. Then listen to the sibilance. Any difference? Now what are you components sitting on? Try this as it won't cost much and lets you hear what the sibilance is doing. Take one maple butcher block and place it under the cd. The take one Dr scholls' foot rub cut into three cubes. Place two under the front of your player and one on the rear of it, not under its feet...now listen again. Is your sibilance decreasing? Let me know how you do. You want to locate the problem without throwing money at it. Good luck....

I will second everything Stehno said. I think AC power is the primary source of sibilance, followed by interconnects and cables. Some seem to be better and worse than others. I just changed interconnects and the remaining sibilance that is not "recording related" completely disappeared.

Another tweak that will help considerably is to suspend your cables off of the floor. Made a huge difference in my system. I don't know what the dielectric of Linoleum is, but I believe it contains a lot of PVC (and who knows what else), so I suspect the dielectric of the floor is not helping the problem either.