Most likely it's the room. You probably don't have much in the way of room treatment and have long reverberation times. This is usually less of an issue at low volumes, but you quickly get to the point where you are hearing all of that sound bouncing around. At higher volumes it gets fatiguing very quickly.
You can learn more about acoustical issues at this Basic tutorial on Room Acoustics.
Disclaimer: We are an acoustical engineering group and design listening and home theater rooms. However, you can read some of our resource pages and easily get some of the basics done yourself very inexpensively.
You can learn more about acoustical issues at this Basic tutorial on Room Acoustics.
Disclaimer: We are an acoustical engineering group and design listening and home theater rooms. However, you can read some of our resource pages and easily get some of the basics done yourself very inexpensively.