SH Spotlight What sounds just like the analog master tape: CD, Vinyl, SACD or a 1:1 analog Reel tape copy?

John,

Sorry, I messed up. The disc I was thinking about was Fischer's recording of Mahler's fourth not first symphony.

 

Thanks to whoever for bringing this thread back up. Very nice perspective from Steve in the first post.

 

I've been eyeing that.

 

Interesting as it might be, the first post in the thread relates to the pre-Grimm era.

 

This arguement will run and run
Pressed vinyl will always be inferior to a well cut lacquer and lacquers can only be played a couple of times
Lacquers do sound wonderful but they are not a domestic product
A/Ds have come on significantly,mastering to the humble hi rate MP3 can now be very effective
Perhaps its time for a comparison of domestic formats , in controlled and blind conditions (am I banned ?)

 

Steve,

Thank you for taking the time to post this and to the community for all the feedback.

The only aspect of the results that surprised me is the CD being closer to the source than the SACD. While that may be true, in my living room the SACD is far more dynamic, clear and just more natural sounding to my ears than a normal CD of the same recording. I'm sure there are other factors such as mastering and such that may play in to it.

I haven't listened to vinyl in many years, although I still have all my albums. Considering I was born in 1954 and have been in to music seriously since 9-years old, you can imagine what that means. But oh my, I know there will be a ton of pops and stuff that come with the territory.

I'm struggling to figure out exactly where I'd put a turn-table and which one and needle to get; but this thread and the intuitive knowledge I have any way is inspiring me to set up a vinyl option. I have the Counterpoint 3000 pre-amp with a phono stage and tiel 3.5 speakers. Old system but still sounding good.

Peace -Zafu

 

No you are not banned. You have stumbled onto a fantastic labor saving and cost cutting idea. Since the MP3 loses about 80-90% of the recorded information, orchestras, bands, musical instrument makers now only need to play those things which will actually survive the MP3 conversion. Instrument makers also can start making instruments that sound the way they will sound after MP3 conversion. In fact we can go back and rescore all those Mahler symphonies etc with all the unnecessary instruments and notes. Orchestras can cut half their staff, people can buy less expensive instruments and no one will know the difference. Maybe we can also get rid of vocalists (very temperamental by and large) and use a synthetic voice that captures everything that will make it through the MP3 conversion. What's not to like?

 

Which you have done of course, and are therefore speaking from experience and not using "logic" to contradict someone's listening experience, right?

 

That's right - it's all in your imagination. Why bother listening to anything at all? Just imagine how your favorite music sounds, enhance your imagining experience with some of your finely tuned logic, and save a fortune on equipment and content.

 

Amazing all of the "logic" Steve's observations have generated.

There is no logic to it. You hear what you hear. Equipment produces what it produces.

You can't use logic to "prove" that something sounds different to what someone says they hear. Ludicrous, ridiculous and pathetic, especially given that Steve Hoffman forum members, who should know better, are posting these things.

Anyone who cites technical facts to explain why some format is superior doesn't get this audio stuff. The one and only thing that counts is how it sounds to you, on your equipment in your listening environment. No amount of logic and technical facts can change what you hear.

On the other hand, posting about something you haven't heard and using logic and technical facts to describe how it sounds is so logically unsound that so many people on this forum do it. How can so many forum members be here for so long and not learn anything?

 

It's exactly the POV anyone should take regarding audio.

People who view listening to music as something akin writing a methods section for a physics paper are hopelessly confused and perhaps should stick to reading books instead. Or at the least, try reading through the forum to learn something before posting their logical and technical opinions.

 

I said High Rate, that's 320 kbs.
Most cannot differentiate this from CD or even beyond
Perceptual coding has made huge advances,perhaps you are unaware of this in your watery kingdom.
A dedicated blind test in a top Mastering Suite might be informative, to both sides of the Atlantic and even the middle.

 

You are not taking credit where credit is due. I was being perfectly serious. I have seen studies claiming that 256k was indistinguishable from CD, which theory shows captures everything there is to capture. Whatever, there is a tremendous amount of musical information which you have discovered to be totally superfluous. Let's say that we were producing 5 times more food than necessary to feed the world and we discover that people are throwing away the excess and living perfectly happy on a small fraction of it. Does that make any sense? Why are composers , orchestras, bands, musicians, engineers, masterers, instrument makers being perfect idiots and generating or preserving 5 times or more the musical information that anyone can hear? It's a tremendous waste. So I would suggest that you and others show these folks how to compose, produce and preserve that small fraction of the musical content that anyone can hear. And I didn't even insult you the way you did me.

 

It wouldn't surprise me. I wonder if DSD may introduce a slight euphonic colouration, ie a distortion that people like.

Tim

 

Help me understand what you are saying. What is "musical information" if you can't hear it?

Tim

 

No insults intended Mr Bass ,just refering to your topographical Ocean residence.
Indeed, we are very profligate in our production of many useless things ,music included,where perhaps 95 % of all music is rubbish.
However it is ours brains perception and DSP that makes for its huge redundancy in listening apparant
Its quite legimate to exploit it ,but not to prostitute it with very low data rates
Losslees codecs are half the data of a cd and I believe they are undetectable by the listening majority
320 kbs downloads are half ish again,and some of these can sound very convincing when done with charm and style
Whats so bad about conducting a blind test of commercial products in a Mastering Suite, it might be very informative.

 

When you have your TT set up you can go buy some new vinyl .......................... the box version of Bryter Layter may surprise you. Easily available and as good a pressing as I have ever heard. DEAD quiet. But don't stop there ...................

 

Dear Tim,

Musical information would be anything that takes up a bit on the CD. I leave aside distortion since the specs show that is a very small proportion of the content on a CD. Since proponents of lossy MP3 or higher bit rate MP3 (you can find them on this site) say that blind tests reveal that higher bit rate MP3 is indistinguishable from CD (44.1k/16) , then it follows that there are massive amounts of bits that are recorded on the CD that no one can perceive. It is there but according to the MP3 proponents it can't be perceived. It would be like an author writing a 300 page book which has 225 pages in invisible ink. The information is there but it just can't be perceived by the eye. Therefore CD is a fraud, DVD A is a fraud and SACD is a fraud since the public is being told that there is all this musical resolution which in fact cannot be perceived. Hope that helps.

 

Its not a fraud,its wonderful perception by our cunning brain.
Its a luxury to enjoy high bit rate ( 60 kHz/24 bit is near perfect)
But its not essential.
Lacquer was the past best ,pressed vinyl the product
Times and technology move on.
The mechanical world is passing.

 

Most of you know I am an analog die-hard.

So I imagine you will be equally surprised as I was when I found out that the orchestral recording I was listening to the other day was actually 32k 16bit. I was never impressed by redbook music, didn't ever find it detailed or lively. And yet these files, not even at MP3 resolution, let alone CD resolution, sounded quite nice.
I guess it goes to show a good recording will always sound good regardless of what happens to it after the fact. Take that as you may.

 

Nice. Thanks. It's the old albums I have that I anticipate pops galore. Regardless, considering my collection goes back to the early 60's, will be so much fun to hear how they sound now after digital for 30 years.

 

I'm sorry, but your statements are becoming less coherent. 1. If CD and higher sampling rate digital media are claiming that their resolution rate is needed to hear all the music, then it would be a fraud if you believe what you say you believe about MP3; to wit, no one can hear that extra resolution. If you are right about MP3, music companies could put 4 to 7 times the amount of content on each CD that they do now. 2. Saying that something is a luxury means that it is better or even much better than the ordinary. Again this is exactly contrary to the assertions of you and other like minded people that MP3 cannot be distinguished from higher bit rate digital formats. No it is not a luxury in that circumstance, it is superfluous. 3. Tautologically, time moves on and sometimes technology changes too. That has nothing to do with the aural perception of musical information. 4. The mechanical world is passing only if you are in the process of becoming a point of light. In that case you probably won't even hear sounds except in your optical imagination.

 

Finding it pleasanter than redbook means probably that you did perceive something was lost in the conversion except that in this situation it was some unpleasant sound or distortion which was smoothed over. You may be sensitive to some aspect of CD sound which becomes less noticeable as you reduce the kbit/s rate.

 

I have heard good sounding redbook before (look no further than any of Steve's work) it's just that most examples are mastered poorly and are thus, not impressive. The music I was listening to couldn't have had any information above 16khz, but it still sounded pretty smooth, even though it was a very low resolution digital file. I guess it's all in the mastering, since the original recording was done extremely well, even this low-rez file conveyed it well without any apparent loss as far as I could tell.