Fatigue Subjective???

I'll try to describe the "fatigue" more, and I probably won't do a very good job. Almost immediately with the NAIM system, I wanted to turn it down, and turn it off. It had something in the treble, I would guess, that was very uncomfortable to my ears. I get this from my factory car stereo sometimes, especially if I'm listening to CD patched through the headphone jack of my discman - and in the car it's not a high res situation. I play the thiels with a mccormack amp, and SS ARC preamp, and I have to stop and reset my ears. If I use the mccormack and a passive control unit, it's much more bearable. If I use a golden tube power amp, I can use the ARC SS preamp with no problem. So, I feel there are alot of factors - preamp, power amp and the source (digital). Maybe it's just the digital thing - I've heard many converters produce some nasty odd order harmonic distortion. The levinson setup did not make me want to turn it down, but it did not have alot of the spatial info the Naim setup had. If it's a software issue, one problem is that alot of good music is not that well recorded, so I don't want to paint myself into a corner with just a few listenable CD's.

I thank you all for your comments.

Robert

Listener fatigue is sujective and very real. I'll tell you a little secret, I find it often happens sooner at live musice performances than on good "systems". I find many live performances unnecessiarily and/or over ampilified. Sean is right on about how sound quailty seems to vary with ac and time of the day. As I've previously posted, I used to live in an apartment in New York that was across the streeet from a high school computer lab. With in hours of the school's closing, the sound of my system would improve. Upon the school's reopening the grundge would return. The Thiels aside from the low impedance, usually provide an easy load for amplifiers. I don't believe them to be bright, just not rolled off, as such they will show up componenet colorizations quite easily. You seem to have identified these coloriztions quickly. That's probably a very good thing. As there is no such thing as a completely neutral componenet, one has to find ones that have a balance that works for you. May I suggest you try the Thiels with Pass, Krell or the high current Conrad-Johnson (2300 or 2500 series) amps. There are other's that come to mind but I have not heared them with the Thiels, so I'm hestitant to recommend them. Good luck.

Based on personal experience, the Thiels sound good with the Rowlands and the BAT amps, also.

I'll second the Rowlands.

I guess, because Meadowlark Shearwaters were incredibly fatiguing to me. But no one else has ever mentioned Meadowlark as being fatiguing.
I don't get your comments on Naim having good soundstage depth. I always found it worse than pretty much anything else of comparable price.
Naim stuff is colored in the midrange and is overpriced compared to other brands IMO.
Try Thiel with Musical Fidelity, or tube gear. I found it to be clear but not fatiguing.