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Will, that is interesting what you say about the VT-2's. I own some SuperZ's, and have only listened extensively to the 2.5's and 3.3's, so I admit I do not know squat about the revised NHT line.

I also am in the first half of my 40's (to put a positive spin on it), and I think listener age is much overlooked in these discussions. I doubt someone my age with normal hearing has near the ability to discriminate as someone 20 years younger. Never trust anyone over age 30 is sage advice, especially in audio concerns
While most people in their 40's can't hear 20 khz tones and many can't hear 16 khz or 14 khz tones, I think most in their 40's can hear differences in speakers and electronics, and that includes the area of harshness. Some frequencies where harshness (or shrillness or fatique) is apparent is in the hearing range of most people in their 40's. Also sometimes fatique manifests itself as an ultra-small "sweet spot", where anything outside of that sweet spot sounds fatiquing.

As a point of reference, the NHT 2.9 suffers from an ultra-small sweet spot, leading to harshness, more than the NHT VT-2 does, in my own personal opinion.