Bear with me, I'm a little concerned...
The VP150 and m22's have been running great for a week. Last night when I arrived home my wife said that the speakers didn't sound quite right to her. Went to the Den to check it out. She had been listening to the soundtrack for "What Women Want", which features a lot of classic 40-50's jazz (Sinatra, etc), at pretty high volume, but not *super* loud, just loud. She also had the receiver (Pioneer Elite 43TX) set to a Jazz soundfield, which routes sound to all 7.1 chanels, focusing a lot to the center channel. The center channel was definately buzzing a bit on some of the loud trumpet flourishes. Now I've heard blown speakers before, and this didn't sound like that. It sounded more like if you were to hold a piece of paper up against a speaker cone while playing. It's quite noticable when Frank bellows out a line.
I tripple checked the receiver, all speakers set to small with a crossover at 80hz. The cones on the Vp150 don't appear to be bottoming out. My first thought was that it's just in the music, as this *is* a recording from the 40's that we're listening to. But it does do the same thing on other recordings, but not to the same level. For instance, Norah Jones' Come Away With Me (tried both SACD and CD), if we run it at high volume using one of the soundfields that forces a lot of center, it's present too. It's quite faint too, and you have to be listening at near reference levels (I.E. damn loud) to hear it. Hooking up my old Energy Take 5 Center did not produce the same noise. Running on normal 2-channel mode, the m22's do not seem to be producing this szzhht noise either.
So now I'm trying to figure out what this is. All of screws seem tight on the VP150, and the cones certainly feel solid in their mounts. It only shows up when using a DSP soundfield that forces a lot of the music into the center. Playing LOTR at reference levels, the center sounds perfectly fine, at least until my ears begin to bleed.
So what is it?
Good= So is this just distortion produced by the receiver using the DSP that's enhanced from the less-than-stellar recording that's showing up because the VP150 reveals so much detail.
Bad= Defective VP150?
Anyone own this CD want to check it out and see if I have a defective speaker or am just being paranoid? Heck, if anyone's willing I'd even rip 20 or 30 seconds of it onto a high-quality mp3 for you.
