DCC Archive If you record an LP to CD format...

...then do you lose the "analogue warmth" that the vinyl brings to the party or is it all happening in the original mix?

That is to say...is it worth my while to set up to record some precious LP's to CD?

Comments, advice, or warnings welcomed!

Best to the Board!

Ben

 

well, it took some time for me to finally get it sounding the way i wanted it to, thats for sure. i bought some pre amp off ebay and it works pretty well. i think having a good preamp might be one of the keys. ive gotten some albums to come out pretty sweet though. watch out for hum. i still havent figured out how to eliminate it. on one program i have cd creator 5 platinum, theres a sound cleaning application you can use that seems to eliminate the hum and does'nt seem to take anything away from the quality. you just have to experiment, but i think it's worth it. done correctly you can keep the sweet analogue sound even on a cd. splitting tracks can be a serious pain though. i have wavelab though and that works well for that.

 

I have been doing this sort of thing for years.

Let me tell you something, when you start doing this stuff you quickly realize that the idea of vinyl being warmer, not to be confused with analog tape, is pure bunk. I make CD-Rs that are virtualy indestinguishable from the LP. And, yes, I do clean up surface noise but I don't remove all of it.

To do this you need a good 24-bit soundcard, a quality turntable, quality cartridge, a clean power supply, a good phono preamp, quality, good-sounding interconnect cables, and some good restoration software. I personally use Cool Edit Pro with various plug-ins. I wouldn't waste time with CD Creator's Spin Doctor. It is worthless.

If you do a straight transfer to digital with NO intention of doing ANY processing, even gain changing, go directly to 16-bit, 44.1. Just record as high as you can without clipping.

BTW, if I ever do record a file at 16-bit I always convert it to 32-bit floating point. I would never even consider processing a 16-bit file. But I do stay at 44.1kHz because I believe that downsampling causes degredation in sound quality. I do use noise shaping. Yes, it *can* alter the timbre or blur the transients a bit but to me it is preferable to dither noise. Hey, Steve H., this is the home user on a DAW. Most of us don't have access to tape masters.

[ November 16, 2001: Message edited by: Grant T. ]

 

Is that hum you're getting rid of from not having your turntable properly grounded?
I would also respectfully disagree with the notion that (and I use Cool Edit Pro all the time for this same thing) using a digital filter for noise leaves the music untouched. You may not hear much degredation, but any filtering will effect it some.

 

I go straight from my phono to my tube amp directly into my stand-alone burner and I have a digital clone of an LP. Can't tell the difference.

Joe

 

Yea, I've been doing this for years as well. I sure wish I had someone to help ME when I started, but I didnt...so I learned 90% of it by trial and error.

Grants comments are right on. A 24 bit soundcard is very helpful, and I've seen some as low as 250$ today. I use a GINA24, which a lot of radio stations use, and its serves me well, no problems. I highly recommend it to anyone.

My turntable is a Rotel RP900 with a Sumiko Blue Point cart. My preamp is a NAD 3140.
Cables are heavy duty gold plated generic.

My op system is Windows 2000, I use Cool Edit Pro, and like it a lot, but why cant the folks over at Digidesign make a Pro Tools Free that runs on 2000?

I also have a Niles Audio CPM-31 Switcher.
All my devices are connected to it, and it allows me to switch ANY device into any other device. So I can switch LPs, Dats,Cassettes, Reel to Reel, VHS Audio, FM, Cd, ect into my soundcard, or any other recording device. For the money (129$) I find it irreplaceable. I also have a second PC strictly for video editing, but thats another story.....

mikey

 

This thread brings up an interesting discussion. If so many of you are able to bring out the analog magic onto a cd, why can't many of the professionals do it? I have recently gotten back into vinyl and have been surprised by the wonderful sound vs many CD releases. Not to say that digital can't do justice to the music. Just listen to the wonderful DCC releases as well as the incredible JVC XRCD's. It just frustrates me that their are only a few out there willing to put in the time and expense of mastering a cd correctly. But I guess we audiophiles are a lonely bunch that don't make up the majority and therefore it's not in the best interests of the major labels to provide this attention to detail. Again, this is very disturbing to me because the investment of dollars would be minimal to the large record companies seling hundreds of thousands to millions of cd titles that could spread the invested cost minimally over all those cds sold-they just can't justify that small cost to the general public who either doesn't care or doesn't discern a difference in sound quality.

 

Depends on what you use as your "standard". Most people use the LP as their standard when comparing notes with the CD version. Well, vinyl and it's playback adds noise and other distortion, stuff the tape may not have.

I think a problem is that humans look for distortion because it's pleasing to hear. It contributes to that "analog" warmth people love so much. If I don't remove all of the noise in my digital files I can keep some of that so-called "warmth" or distortion. The noise floor is dropped to an almost undetectable level in most normal listening situations but it's stil there.