Ever since I had my empeg I've always had this issue, and I've always attempted to blame it on other things, but I guess I've now ruled everything else out, and I want to see if anyone else has the issue.

This may be a little hard to explain.

When listening to music on my empeg, through either a home amp, my car amp, or the Line-In on a computer (for the amplification), when the Bass hits I hear a high-pitched sound that sounds very similar fingernails scratching along a chalk board or metal scraping together.

I have Infinity Kappa Components on my car, and I hear the noise from the tweeters, not the sub or woofers. I have Sennheiser HD570 headphones, and no other Bassy sound makes them do it, besides if it is coming from the empeg, and at home I have Klipsch 5.1 THX Certified speakers at home.

If I turn the Loudness down to about +6.0db with my volume at -16.5db I can not hear it, however if I bump it up to +7.5 it starts to appear. If at +6.0db and I bump the volume to -15.0db it also starts to appear. I typically listen in the -20 to -5db range, and I can definately hear it throughout the entire range if the Loudness is set at +14, and at +14 it continues in volume all the way down to -29.5db.

Has anyone else experienced this issue at all? Once I get new amps an am able to turn the gains down, I'm sure when I get rid of the Loudness, it will not continue, but I'm not quite that rich right now, and am having to use the Loudness control to get some of the bass that I would like.

This happens even on softer stuff like Jack Johnson, but definately gets much more noticeable on things like Bone Thungs :P (yeah, I have a sick wide range of music I listen to)

You said this happens on any outputs? Any amplification, home, car, whatever?

Okay, question. What do your EQ settings look like?

If it's all flat, then you might be looking at a hardware issue, like a bad component on the board, or something wrong with the DSP. I mean, setting the loudness too high will normally clip the outputs when combined with maximum volume and a bassy song. But at the volume settings you're talking about, it shouldn't happen I don't think.

The following are my EQ Settings...

50Hz +6
96Hz +4
185Hz +3
356 +2
684 -1
1.32 -1
2.53 +2
4.87 +4
9.36 +4
18.0 +3

I have AutoQ set.

Let me try and redue everything so it's at 0db or - and see if it continues. Thanks Tony.

50Hz 0
96Hz -2
185Hz -3
356 -4
684 -7
1.32 -7
2.53 -4
4.87 -2
9.36 -2
18.0 -3

those are my new EQ settings. I'm testing it right now with some Eazy E

Also... Software version? There were some EQ bugs in beta 11. Best if you're using 1.03 or 2.0b13.

Wow. I can now get all the way up to 0db with no distortion.. it's just a little quieter. Thanks a lot for your help.

I'm using 2.0b13 HiJack 300. May want to add this to the FAQ just incase anyone else is over zelous like me :P

May want to add this to the FAQ just incase anyone else is over zelous like me

You mean like this?

Or I'm just an idiot and need to learn to read before wasting your time

When you said that you would try it by cutting instead of boosting, I assumed that you already had read the FAQ entry and that's why you were trying it. I was actually going to link it earlier in the thread, but gave you the benefit of the doubt.