So I've finally finished putting together my eight channel UCD180 amplifier to drive the LX521 speakers, and I think I'm pretty happy with it. I absolutely plan on going back and tidying up my wires and tying everything down, but for now I'm just listening for a little while.
The question I have is- are these amplifiers 'harsh', or could I be getting that from the lousy wire routing? The speaker wires are all tightly twisted, but the power wires are not, and are longer than they should be. The signal wires are shielded and twisted, but four of them are a lot longer than they need to be.
It may be a little while before I can get set up for proper measurements of distortion (for some reason the loop-back in REW on my Asus Xonar is showing significantly higher distortion than the manual claims), but until I troubleshoot all of that I just have listening impressions.
Overall the system is staying ice cold, and I'm running with peak volume in the low 80s at the listening position. Imaging is good, bass is strong, midrange is detailed, but on certain albums I'm getting a bit of listening fatigue. The last one I noticed was The Black Keys: Brothers. Could it just be that the source material contains a lot of distortion effects and the speakers are faithfully reproducing that?
The question I have is- are these amplifiers 'harsh', or could I be getting that from the lousy wire routing? The speaker wires are all tightly twisted, but the power wires are not, and are longer than they should be. The signal wires are shielded and twisted, but four of them are a lot longer than they need to be.
It may be a little while before I can get set up for proper measurements of distortion (for some reason the loop-back in REW on my Asus Xonar is showing significantly higher distortion than the manual claims), but until I troubleshoot all of that I just have listening impressions.
Overall the system is staying ice cold, and I'm running with peak volume in the low 80s at the listening position. Imaging is good, bass is strong, midrange is detailed, but on certain albums I'm getting a bit of listening fatigue. The last one I noticed was The Black Keys: Brothers. Could it just be that the source material contains a lot of distortion effects and the speakers are faithfully reproducing that?
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That's rather a mess- clean up the wiring and give them more of a listen. They shouldn't be harsh- UCD's errors are those of omission (a slight lack of detail and resolution aka soft sound) rather than commission (harshness).
Are you possibly pushing levels beyond what the LX521 tweeter is happy with? That's always a recipe for fatigue. High 80s at listening position isn't terribly loud but are you sure that's really the peak? It's easy to underestimate how loud stuff is playing (I always oversize speakers for that reason)
Are you possibly pushing levels beyond what the LX521 tweeter is happy with? That's always a recipe for fatigue. High 80s at listening position isn't terribly loud but are you sure that's really the peak? It's easy to underestimate how loud stuff is playing (I always oversize speakers for that reason)
I'm fairly certain about the levels; I do have an SPL meter with a fresh battery. That's in the 'fast' setting, dBA. For a given level of the volume control that agreed reasonably well with white/pink noise.
I can turn them up significantly louder if I want to, and I don't notice any onset of distortion as it gets louder.
I can turn them up significantly louder if I want to, and I don't notice any onset of distortion as it gets louder.
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