Naim-Shahinian too bright for comfort -- Low Current?

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Since moving abroad, the brightness in the system has reached intolerable levels. Treble is seriously 'glassy/harsh' and hurts the ear. The tonality of the Arcs has also changed significantly - becoming much less 'rich' than before.
All the kit is on a Mana rack, using black Snaics and black burndy, with NAC A5. I've checked the direction of all the snaics and cleaned all the terminals.

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What is your room like? Are you suffering from bad room reflections in the treble region, or cancellation in the bass? This would be my main suspicion. Have you tried moving the speakers round a bit?

Can't really comment on the mains, in the UK I have found poor mains just makes things sound less clear and fun, not really harsh.

The other thing is to check your Mana, if poorly set up it can give a hard metallic edge to the sound, though when correct it should be warm and bouncy. Check the Mana forum for setup techniques (manaforum.atinfopop.com).

Tony.

5) IMO Mana is a no no for Shahinians, I have heard a few dealers /distributors who recommend wooden supports..but I reckon it will sound more neutral on a wooden support. I know that on this forum Mana has it advocates by the dozen. My vote goes to Isoblue/Hutter.
6) Shahinians do work with other amps. I changed from a NAP 180, trying a 250 and 135's. eventually now use Dynavector's poweramp with Naim pre's, this smoothes out that raspy sound!
7) A Supercap also is one of the best upgrades ever too! ( but get the fundamental problem sorted first)
8) Depending on the version of the Arc, the ABR at the back can be upgraded, and try the newer tweeters, but this could be more expensive...Earlier Shahinains are very current hungry and do have a much brighter sound than the current models, due to the metal dome tweeter.
9) Oh yeah check your electricity supply/quality...try a mains block purifier thing...
To sum up
In my experience the speakers only play what they get in quality of input, all sources are fine, amps are sufficient too. My hunch is warm up time, and THEN speaker placement in a suitably furnished room, then my advice would be if you don't need more juice, then a Supercap is the way to go, THEN the poweramps. I feel perhaps the dealers lack of experience with them ( may be wrong) is telling you the easiest selling option for him...! :-)

This should get you going!
Cheers
Goose

I recently redecorated (maple floors, blinds not curtains etc) and a system that I’d happily lived with for 7 years became unbearably bright, especially on CD. This was CDI/72/hi-Cap/250 and SBLs. To cut a long story short, the solution was a pair of Shahinian ARCS. Believe me, you’re there’s no way on earth getting a pair of SBLs is going to cure your problem!

Although bright, the airy out-of-the-box presentation of the ARCs mitigates against this subjectively. In contrast, the rather harder, drier, forward presentation of the SBLs will likely exacerbate the problem – at least this has been my very definite experience. You’ll also loose a lot of bass moving to the SBLs, which will also add to any impression of brightness. I’ve been absolutely astonished at the improvement these, albeit idiosyncratic, speakers have wrought in my system. I dragged them round to a friend’s house (who has essentially same system) – see Noel above - where they similarly worked their magic, being noticeably more spacious and less aggressive than his SBLs – although to be honest my friend wasn’t too sure about the ‘up-in-the-air’ presentation. The bass step up in both our systems was astonishing (my friend is an ex-dealer before you all cry ‘set-up’!). Overall I’ve found the musicality of the Shahinians astonishing; no gaskets to deal with is a peripheral bonus. I wish I’d bought them 7 years ago (the SBLs replaced Kans, which replaced Saras). They’re probably the biggest upgrade I’ve ever made…but my eulogising doesn’t solve your problem.

Although they clearly make a difference, I’m not a great believer in essentially minor adjustments dramatically changing the overall character of a system. Tweak as much as you want but it does sound like you’ve got either a major room problem or perhaps something got damaged in the move? If not, and you don’t fancy redecorating, you’ll need to try something warm, fat and muddy – like a pair of Linn Saras for example! Just not SBLs in my opinion.

Let us know how you get on,

Steve

(Hey Noel! Great to see you on the Forum at long last after I know you’ve been lurking for ages. Got an Armageddon and tons more Mana this week! Call me)

Great to know there's so much support in the forum!

To be honest, it never really occured to me that my room could be the problem. Lots of soft furnishings -- but also a fair bit of glass, including a rear corner that is almost completely made of tempered glass sheets.

So, got home yesterday and started hanging 13.5 Tog duvest on corners and the glass bits of my room. A bit extreme, I know, but thought I'd give it a go anyway.

The brightness is now 75% gone!

Vocals have benefited the most, imaging has improved and there's a lot more control and definition in the lower end.
My Arcs aound rich and musical again!

The 25% left is an annoying sibilance problem. Will go and re-setup the Mana rack and see what happens. Any other advice?

Put the 135's on after that , and didn't really like them. IMHO, they are a little too forward for the Arcs and somehow throws them off balance. Sibilance also increases greatly, and it makes things seem a tad too edgy for my ears.

I'm taking the thread's advice and going to focus on getting a 52/Scap in first. I'll worry about power a little later.(Maybe a Dynavector?)

If any of you are ever in my part of the world -- Drinks are on me!

Afzal.