how to tell if my audible distortion is due to speaker or amp or something else?

[Beershaun]

Hi All,
On a specific song when I turn up the volume on my system to a reasonably loud level ~80db at my listening position (1m), I can hear distortion static and buzzing in the speaker when the rhythm and lead guitars strum. Not the intentional kind of guitar distoration. The static kind that says you are hurting your speakers. When I turn the volume down the static is still there. I can get up close to the speaker and hear it get louder and softer as I change the volume. I swapped out one speaker and the problem is actually more pronounced on the second speaker. I checked the same song on a different system and there is some slight distortion and static but nowhere near as much.

How do I figure out what is causing the distortion and if it's the nature of the recording, something in the recording demanding too much from my amp, something broken in my amp? I don't expect my amp to be clipping at this volume. I wonder if others with better systems and more power hear the same thing.

This album, Alabams Shakes - Sound and Color won best engineered album grammy in 2015 so I am skeptical it's the recording itself. But I may be wrong. Would love if others could chime in to see if they are able to reproduce the same static and distortion.

Song: Alabama Shakes - Don't wanna fight - Very noticeable during the introduction and first ~30s of the song when the guitars are strummed.
Sources (2): Tidal hifi (not masters) and local copy on my NAS 24/44.1 FLAC.
Speakers: Elac Debut Reference 62. Second speaker is BIC DV62si
Amp Onkyo TXDS-787 (100w rms 2ch).
Set with 80hz crossover for sub out.

 

[Beershaun]

I listened to the same passages on my ATH-M50x headphones and hear the static as well. Again not as pronounced but definitely there. Is this part of the recording then? If so it seems like a terrible mistake.

 

[Beershaun]

No interest in trying to reproduce my issue?

 

[MrPeabody]

You simply have to continue experimenting with different combinations until you've pinned it down. You've already established that it isn't the speakers. If the amplifier you were using with the speakers was not being used with the headphones, you can rule out that amplifier as well.

You wrote, "I checked the same song on a different system and there is some slight distortion and static but nowhere near as much."

What exactly does "different system" mean? That you played the same file from a different computer or digital streaming source, using a different amplifier? Eventually you will need to do just this, and doing this is probably the shortest path to determining whether it is the file itself vs. the hardware. I would likely move the file to a different computer and listen to it using headphones. You can use the same headphones you've already used, since the likelihood of this being an issue with the headphones is essentially nil, because you first heard it using two different speakers. If you still hear it using a different computer, you will know then that it is the file. In this case the next step will be to download the same piece of music from a completely different source, or possibly purchase it on CD, and listen to see whether you still hear what you're hearing. If you hear something that sounds pretty much the same but is maybe not as noticeable, it is the same thing. If you don't hear it all on the alternate copy or CD, then the file you've been listening to is hosed. If you hear it at all on the alternate copy or CD, then at least you know that it isn't your gear and that it isn't per se the file copy you had. But in this case you may find yourself trying to obtain information about whether all commercially available versions of the piece of music are identical, or whether some copies were produced by remastering, etc.

 

[Beershaun]

Thanks @MrPeabody for your response.

Different system= I am playing the same local file and same Tidal stream (same sources) locally on my Macpro output via USB to my Dragonfly Red DAC and plugged my ATH-M50x headphones into the dragonfly. So the DAC, Amp, headphones are different.

So it sounds like it's one of 3 possible issues:
1)the files have errors causing the static
2)the nature of the recording (demanding too much headroom from my system? causing my system to overdrive the speakers or clip the amp) or 3)an artifact actually in the recording from the ADC step that was not removed by the engineers during mastering.

Is that correct or can I rule out #2?
As I said above the album (Alabama Shakes - Sound and Color) won a grammy in 2015 for best album engineering so I am surprised if #3 is the case.

Maybe we can rule out the files themselves being damaged or the recording demanding too much from my systems.
If you have access to the same album through your streaming service of choice, would you be interested in trying to reproduce the issue on your end? Are you also able to reproduce the same static hear the same distortion? That might tell me if it's my file and Tidal's file or the nature of the recording causing my systems to mis-behave.

 

[SimonSB]

I wouldn't worry

I've just listened to it here, and the noise issue is definitely audible. My system isn't the most resolving, but the drums definitely sound a bit off too.

I also passed the audio file (from the link above) through sox and it tells me that it is indeed clipping, meaning your audio system is indeed fine and just fairly resolving, and that the band probably just bribed whoever issues grammy awards to give them one

             Overall     Left      Right
DC offset   0.000006  0.000006 -0.000004
Min level  -1.000000 -1.000000 -1.000000
Max level   1.000000  1.000000  1.000000
Pk lev dB       0.00      0.00      0.00
RMS lev dB     -9.05     -9.22     -8.89
RMS Pk dB      -4.59     -4.63     -4.59
RMS Tr dB       -inf      -inf      -inf
Crest factor       -      2.89      2.78
Flat factor    13.97     13.85     14.06
Pk count       13.5k     11.5k     15.4k
Bit-depth      24/24     24/24     24/24
Num samples    11.8M
Length s     245.105
Scale max   1.000000
Window s       0.050

Pay attention to the peak level and the peak count. Bear in mind the one you have recorded on CD may return different results, but the problem looks the same

 

[MrPeabody]

Different system= I am playing the same local file and same Tidal stream (same sources) locally on my Macpro output via USB to my Dragonfly Red DAC and plugged my ATH-M50x headphones into the dragonfly. So the DAC, Amp, headphones are different.

Sorry but I wasn't able to follow that. Perhaps I could if you would clearly identify (1.) What is common in the two setups, and (2.) What is not common in the two setups.

 

[Beershaun]

I wouldn't worry

I've just listened to it here, and the noise issue is definitely audible. My system isn't the most resolving, but the drums definitely sound a bit off too.

I also passed the audio file (from the link above) through sox and it tells me that it is indeed clipping, meaning your audio system is indeed fine and just fairly resolving, and that the band probably just bribed whoever issues grammy awards to give them one

             Overall     Left      Right
DC offset   0.000006  0.000006 -0.000004
Min level  -1.000000 -1.000000 -1.000000
Max level   1.000000  1.000000  1.000000
Pk lev dB       0.00      0.00      0.00
RMS lev dB     -9.05     -9.22     -8.89
RMS Pk dB      -4.59     -4.63     -4.59
RMS Tr dB       -inf      -inf      -inf
Crest factor       -      2.89      2.78
Flat factor    13.97     13.85     14.06
Pk count       13.5k     11.5k     15.4k
Bit-depth      24/24     24/24     24/24
Num samples    11.8M
Length s     245.105
Scale max   1.000000
Window s       0.050

Pay attention to the peak level and the peak count. Bear in mind the one you have recorded on CD may return different results, but the problem looks the same

Thank you @SimonSB That's really interesting and useful data! I really appreciate the time and effort to help me understand my system is fine. So the peak level is 0.00 meaning it's DB full scale at full volume or hitting the upper volume limit in the recording, aka clipping. And it occurs in 13.5K samples in the song.

 

[Beershaun]

Sorry but I wasn't able to follow that. Perhaps I could if you would clearly identify (1.) What is common in the two setups, and (2.) What is not common in the two setups.

Sorry for being unclear.
What is common is the two setups is the 2 sources I have for the same song. 1)The 24/44.1 FLAC file on my home server and 2)Streaming from Tidal the "hifi" version of the song.

What is different between the two setups is:
1) The DAC (dragonfly Red vs. Topping e30)
2)The amplifier (dragonfly red vs. Onkyo TX-DS787)
3) the speakers (Elac dbr62 vs. ATH-m50x headphones)

Or said another way. After listening to the song on my system in the basement I went upstairs and listen to it at my desk to see if they same thing happened.

 

[MrPeabody]

If I understand correctly you hear the same thing with both setups. As such, you can rule out both DACs, both amps, and the speakers and headphones, because of the extremely low likelihood that two of these components would be producing identical distortion on the same song at the same point. I still cannot tell from what you wrote whether the player is the same in both setups, i.e., the home music server, or whether (for example) you might be using a computer with one setup. If you want to rule out the possibility of an issue with the home server, you still need to play the same file from another player. But it sounds like you're content with SimonSB's information, that the encoding bumps the ceiling at that point. So it doesn't matter anyway.

 

[thunderchicken]

I find this super interesting- I had some issues with Baroness albums that were controversial.

 

[Beershaun]

I listened to the same song on the same original system streaming from Spotify (ogg vorbis lossy format) and the static noise was gone. Maybe the compression algorithm threw away the noise because it was...ya know...noise.
.

 

[dasdoing]

I listened to the same song on the same original system streaming from Spotify (ogg vorbis lossy format) and the static noise was gone. Maybe the compression algorithm threw away the noise because it was...ya know...noise.
.

is it realy static, or only at the strums?
Do you have loudness normalization turned on on Spotify? this would eliminate any intersample overs since the music is probably turned down.
anyways, even with normalization turned off, the Spotify limiter would come into effect and eliminate (or not) the overs

 

[ronwan]

I have had similar problems once, and rules out everything until I was left with the decoder. One decoder (Bluesound Node 2 with digital out to MiniDSP SHD) had distortion, the other (Foobar with ASIO out to Topping E30) had not. But the source was some (MP3 IIRC) encoded music downloaded from internet. The logs showed errors while playing, I did some debugging back then, but don't recall what was my conclusion...guess I just deleted the problematic files in the end.

 

[tomtoo]

Can only hear the video on YT and there is a lot of static that sounds it comes from bad ground of guitar and guitar amp. So in the video its definitly from recording. But hey who cares?! Great voice, great song! So thx!