Crackling sound from speakers

Some time ago I ripped all my cd's to mp3 at 128 Kbps so I can play them without my cd-player.
I stream them by VLC to my stereo , with a cable.

Now when I turn up the volume and listen to, say Andrea Bocelli, the sound has a disturbing crackling or sizzeling around it.
The stereo is rather old, so I took my even older Pioneer sx8500 from the storage, and used it to play.

The sound was a little better for sure !. but even then ther was some distortion in it.

When I listen by headphone, still the same. So I doubt if the amplifier is the problem here, althoug it has influence on the sound.

For years now I am using linux, so I used it also to rip my music...

Before buying a new stereoset, I was thinking of the Panasonic SC-PMX70B, which has also a DAB tuner, for what it is worth, but at least you have one then. Internet in the reciever is not realy wanted, because you also need some app then to navigate. I still use some PC for that job. Yes also linux.

Does anybody has encounter such problems also? and what can be the source of those problems.

Could it even be the age of the speakers ? now around 22 years ( visaton selbtsbau ) which were always very good.
When for example listen to some internet station with organ music, say "the orgen experiance" I have nothing to complain.
Also piano music sounds wonderfull, realy, no joke!

So I am a bit puzzled why voices sound bad when the volume gets up ...

But voice is something total different then organ music.

Any help or explanation or link to some answer is very welcome.

EDIT: to shortcut some discussion.. It is not a problem with cables, connection and so. It is about the music or codes or ?

 

Try another source first.
I had a similar problem with a new dac. It was putting out too many volts (too strong signal) and causing clipping. I cured it by attenuating the signal with a potentiometer.

 

Okay, clipping? well, I am not sure about that, but it is possible to recode the cd to a new mp3 or better flac, and try again. I even will try to play the cd direct and see if the problem arises too.
I am even thinking the cd is coded with some anti copy coding. but then only for the loud passages.

Hm, A few tests for the coming days.

 

Update 1 : Did a test playing the disc itself, uncoded. And yes it is also bad.

Maybe I now run into bad recordings ? If someone outthere has also this disc,
Andrea Bocelli, title, Romanza, and play it a little louder as usual, does it become also screamy sounding ? ( Screamy of scharp is maby the better word for it then crackling )
It happens the most when Bocelli sings a bit stronger/louder...
Almost hurts the ears... If you know what I mean.

This is only one disc, but before buying a new stereo or boxes, I want to know what is the problem.
Strange I have never been so picky about it before ? Maby always taken it for granted , or never realy listened...

 

I don't know computer audio, but I do know a bit about CDs. And I have encountered problems with so-called "enhanced" CDs, which caused problems in playback on normal (hell, expensive!) playback systems (transport & DAC). After exchanging a particular CD four times, I gave up. But a woman went up to the customer service counter at the CD shop with the exact same CD while I was there, and the same complaint.

I have also encountered problems when playing back CDs with the DAC accidentally set to the wrong sampling rate, i.e. a sampling rate that was not either 44.1 kHz or 88.2 kHz.

As for computers, I have found that older CD drives can have a problem with Red Book.

 

CD problems, strange to hear about such problems while there are standards.
Whell, as far as I can test my system and cd's, there are some disc producing indeed more trouble then others.
( Just not the best recordings, or not so good manufacturing/quality of the disc. Or even enforced errors. )
Even played direct by some audioplayer. The biggest problem arose when I started to port my discs to a memstick so I could play them from the stick on the stereo-reciever-set. Not all disc manufactures allow you to do so and encode the disc in a bad way. The average man want hear it, but you will hear it when you realy want to enjoy your music. Very sad, I payed for it ! ( b.t.w. I will NEVER-NEVER-NEVER buy any cd again )
Then second I know for sure my speakers have a problem! Not sure if I will repair them or go for a new pair...
I must do still some test with the one(two) I own now...

[The first thing I can tell, piano music sounds rather well because the most music then is played by the woofer.
When the mid and high dome have to be louder, the troubles begin. So I could ditch those domes and replace a mid/high dome.
It is still not clear to me what I will do....]

Thanks anyway for all your reactions

 

No. Just no. There is nothing wrong with CDs. I referred to enhanced CDs, which haven't been made, to my knowledge, for years. They gave Red Book players fits sometimes, but that says nothing about normal CDs. I only listen to CDs (and some radio to stay current and to see whose CDs I should buy!).

People want to stream, fine. I don't care to. I also have no use for MP3s. And downloading 16/44 albums at higher prices than I pay in the store holds no attraction. (The silliest thing is vinyl - I saw an album on Amazon yesterday: $20 for CD, $25 for the deluxe edition, and $35 for vinyl! Oh no, give me the crap media, please! I'll pay to hear less!)

I also believe artists should be paid fairly. Streaming services don't do that. (A friend of mine who sells his music on Spotify once told me he has to sell thousands of downloads to even see one quid.) Artists used to tour to support their latest CDs. Now they release CDs to support their tours, and touring gets old really fast. Ever since at least Napster, people have adopted the remarkable idea that all art should be free. There is a reason David Byrne and others have described the Internet in angry and disgusted words.

There is no dearth of badly recorded CDs, but that has nothing to do with the medium. CDs are actually capable of producing as good sound as we're going to get, and doing it well. And there has been no deterioration in the quality of CDs - if there had been, we'd be hearing about it. I go to my local CD store about once every two weeks. They have no shortage of customers - in fact, you always have to wait in line to pay.

I don't understand the problem you're having, but you're the only one I know who's having it.

 

Well, thanks for the reaction, but this is going a but off-topic... Anyway, to be clear I want to give my "opinion"

I do agree with most of your post but for cd's. ( I still think the bandwith is in fact too small, however I will not here it anymore at my age )

I have a problem with some of my dome-tweeters, but there are also bad cd's , maby depending on the player to be capable of playing them. But if you need an expensive player to correct the errors in the disc, then I say it is a bad disc.
Then also there are a lot of disc being manufactured with a buildin error so you cannot copy them to mp3 or flac os what else you want to use. If you listen to those discs directly you can hear the hissing and other sharp sounds. They are just shit ! I realy mean this. Maby you never run into it. Those disc's are a kind of disguised CDS200 discs.

I had a thread about this : https://www.audio-forums.com/threads/how-do-you-play-your-copycontroled-cd.112060

 

You ought to suspect that crackling/fizzling sound is a bad connection, usually a bad solder joint. If your equipment is quite ancient, then you ought to clean the potentiometers with compressed air and then afterwards DeOxit. After that period in time mass production had less importance on quality. Gel Flux was available until Radio Shack failed. But, it was a combination of petroleum jelly with rosin flux. This could be painted on suspect (or all) solder joints and then re-heated to flow the solder (quite cleanly) so that it could work. For me, after that stuff runs out, either soldering will be a horror of bad connections or a spot of alchemy will be my next hobby only so far as re-manufacturing the lost recipe of Gel Flux. I'm in an awful bad fix so far as crackling/fizzling sound if I can't manage the Gel Flux for the repair jobs (and, admittedly, most of the new stuff as well).

In other language. . .
The sound is an "Arc Fault" so far as electrician's language is concerned. It is how to burn your house with electricity or how to make your audio sound compromised. That connection is not perfectly tight.
I live in a 50's era house and it sure is pretty; however, same problem that you said is just awful news because then I have to scamper in the attic with extension cord to run the drill, new roll of copper wire, more tools, and I'm too freakin old to enjoy doing that! Anyhow I'm just here to say that if your electric thing is doing that one, your connection is crap! That will make the electrics angry, or at least unimpressed.

 

Try putting a vacumn cleaner over the top of the amp - it could be dust in the volume control. I have a Cyrus 2 that would do this taking the case off the amp vacuuming and cleaning would cure it for acouple of years

 

When a 2-way speaker reaches fidelity capacity during vocals, that takes about 20 watts or so, whatever is enough to cause the woofer to move. Some of the voice band is going to come out of the woofer, and if the voice band is physically shaken by a moving woofer (happens in 2-way and full range speakers), then it can sound coarse or roughed up. They're not for arena concerts.

or

When you pass more current than weak solder or post-type speaker connections can handle, the result is a very similar distortion of the voice band. To fix the solder connections, you apply Gel Flux (petroleum+Rosin combo) and heat. To fix the speaker connections, you just tighten them (perhaps clean wire also helps). This also why I think that oversize spring clip connections, which are 50 cents (each channel), are as high end as speaker connections will ever get (this fit up to 12ga and the bigger size has more nonstop spring force, which never gets loose). Well, I, for one, am too clumsy to own post type speaker connections. Those are like a test for clumsy, and I sure fail that one! So have some reviewers. Also possible for a loose contact inside the speaker cabinet although it is quite unlikely that both speakers would do it the same.

Other cutting-out(chopping/rough)when-you-crank-it-up errors have similar causes so far as either loose connection or insufficient current carrying capacity.

so then

First step, swap speakers to see if it may be a physical speaker flaw. After that, swap amplifiers to see if there may be an internal flaw, such as a weak solder joint inside. Those two steps can provide some clues to narrow down the area to search for the problem.