What am I to do about

Cford what types of music do you listen to and who are the record labels ? I see plenty of folks blame their equipment for just bad recordings.Unfortuntely some recordings are just not made well.It maybe time to bring out the tone controls.The more revealing your system becomes the more you will notice it.You could do like some and buy a tuby preamp and smooth things over. A preamp with good tone controls would probably do the trick.This way you could adjust it to your liking.

Also whats the toe in on your speakers? You may want to toe them out a bit.I see people say the room is important..which is true. But what about the recordings.The recordings are also important. Some of them you just have to take them how they are or toss them ! LOL

Maybe one of these days all record labels will be on track like Chesky,Blue Note,Telarc,Rounder and Verve.
Until then I will continue to be very selective of the recordings I buy.I listen to mass market in the car!

Good Luck!

I've got the Stratos dual mono amp, and it is definitely not harsh. It can't be the culprit. I play it with Harbeth Compact 7's and a NEW 12AX7 preamp, and the whole system is very warm. The amp has a very low input impedence (10k) - so if you decide to try a tube preamp, bet one with a low output impedence (<1k). Sounds like playing with some blankets on your walls is in order in your room. Good luck.

Here is a little more info:
I did not say that the Polk were very good, just that they were not harsh. The problem is not in the low freq but in the highs, vocals with words starting in "t" or "s", cymbals and the like but bells are very good and clear. The 3 rooms are very different, one 14 x 24 with carpet, one very small with carpet and the last 18 x 24 with 10 feet ceiling and hard wood floors so I don't believe they all could be causing harsh highs. I hear the harshness with all sources so I doubt its the CDs. The JM Labs speakers, with their acclaimed inverted dome tweeter, are harsher than the Paradigm were. I tried them with both the Arcam and Classe preamp and it made no difference. I live in a small time area where there aren't any high end stores and I don't know of anyone else that has equipment I could try.

You speak of sibilance.This is common on older and some newer mass market recordings.The Stratos nor the Paradigm 100's have this built in.You may want to buy that boombox.
I can't imagine how all your gear can have this.Have you tried some form of power conditioning on your sources ?

Also, get yourself one of those test CDs---the one that runs the full gambit of tests and includes some examples of excellant recordings. You might notice something as it will usually send the same signal first to your left speaker, than to your right.

Some stores such as Wharehouse has them. Also, you can do a search for 'Test and CD and Stereo' in your search engine.

Beware: read the fine print as some of these test CDs should never be played at full volumn, especially at the high-end signals.