I sold my turntable with the two 12 inch arms and MM and MC cartridge. Too much hassle to find a record that sounds passable, too much work to keep it aligned and tuned. Just archaic technology, unreliable and error prone. Can you imagine, playing your music and it sounds worse after every play? Ridiculous.
(Also sold my steam locomotive and rotary-disk phone btw)
Jan
(Also sold my steam locomotive and rotary-disk phone btw)
Jan
But you publish phono preamp designs!I sold my turntable with the two 12 inch arms and MM and MC cartridge. Too much hassle to find a record that sounds passable, too much work to keep it aligned and tuned. Just archaic technology, unreliable and error prone. Can you imagine, playing your music and it sounds worse after every play? Ridiculous.
(Also sold my steam locomotive and rotary-disk phone btw)
Jan
Hi Jan,
I thought the same until I pulled out my equipment and had it fixed. Then the first record was a surprise. It sounded great in ways a CD didn't. They are both good in their ways.
The fact that a record wears is annoying, but life is like that. All my equipment is decades old now. Time sneaks by when you aren't looking. Still, it's comfortable and better than most out there. I can't complain.
-Chris
I thought the same until I pulled out my equipment and had it fixed. Then the first record was a surprise. It sounded great in ways a CD didn't. They are both good in their ways.
The fact that a record wears is annoying, but life is like that. All my equipment is decades old now. Time sneaks by when you aren't looking. Still, it's comfortable and better than most out there. I can't complain.
-Chris
Speak for your self.For all the bantering about quantum this versus quantum that, y'all realize what "quantum" means?
The matter we interact with is all discrete steps, insofar as we know. They just happen to be really really really really close together for the system sizes we tend to observe.
In any case it's really a meaningless distinction beyond the actual methods involved, which incorporates everything from room/mic/etc on through the end. To look at it outside of its whole is silly.
I know about the jitter and sampling rate stuff. I worked in a digital audio manufacturing company all through the 90’s. True about the radio DSP except I am old enough to have heard the tune upon release when there was no DSP happening in radio stations. And right, I have heard basically dozens of different mastering takes on this and many other tunes.
So, don't the some of the mastering takes vary in width, depth, and extension? If you compare analog to digital and say analog has more width, depth, and extension, are you comparing different mastering takes, or different recording formats? And if you hear them on the radio, they may be some kind of mixed analog and digital, so how could it follow from listening to that that analog sounds better?
Maybe it would help if you could just make a clear statement of how you compared analog to digital at Kevin Gray's mastering room? Was it the same music and same mastering, only difference was played from phonograph record verses played from CD? Or what?
Record a sample, let's analyse it! The great thing about modern computer software is that there is a load of analysis that can be done which was seriously hard work 20 years ago.
Well most of those problems are fixed by the SP-10Mk3*. I know outside of radio stations being able to spin up a 7kg platter in 1/4 revolution is just a party trick, but still very impressive.
*A dislike of phase locked motor drive is understandable, but nothing to worry about.
You did see the tests George did on record wear? Basically none if you keep things clean.
Oh, sorry, I forgot you're in completely in denial about how signals work. The end result is all that matters.
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Derfy,
Should we discuss discrete time, discrete level or both. Digital can also refer to fingers.
With enough bits level steps can be well below noise.
But the discrete time is still an issue in the implementations under discussion. But you are welcome to over simplify issues and poke fun at folks, after all that seems to be the purpose of this and other threads here.
Of course some of the fools here might want to disagree based on what they hear.
Should we discuss discrete time, discrete level or both. Digital can also refer to fingers.
With enough bits level steps can be well below noise.
But the discrete time is still an issue in the implementations under discussion. But you are welcome to over simplify issues and poke fun at folks, after all that seems to be the purpose of this and other threads here.
Of course some of the fools here might want to disagree based on what they hear.
I honestly don't care if an analog or discrete time/level (or hybrids thereof) are used throughout the recording process, as long as I enjoy the end result. Both can yield excellent (and terrible) results. Whoop de doo. Take it up with Robert and John about their silly/ridiculous mindset. Because, you know, no one is interested in innovation in audio.
Derfy
I think you missed the point. You are looking at the magicians right hand. The illusion is being done with the left one.
Them vinyl thingies were slowly developed over the years with very basic test equipment. Instead they were tweaked by human senses. The history of variants is a bit on the large size. Mutual agreement of many, many folks guided the development.
The digital audio was developed at first based on limited technology. The CD sample rate was derived from reusing video tape recorders capabilities.
This required correction by increasing the sampling rate.
It is certainly possible to use perception research to specify digital audio performance. It is done for MP3s, where the design goal was to get acceptable performance at minimum data rate.
The current debate is how to produce a digital discrete level and time system that is better than the perceptual limits. The accomplishment of this has been claimed many times. Not very surprisingly some folks found flaws and the perfect systems were improved.
Now some perceptual research would indicate that 26 bits at a sampling rate of 500,000 hertz would cover all bases. Unfortunately the current level of technology cannot achieve this. So folks settle for less. This raises issues, such as bit length, sampling rate, filter and jitter effects among others.
Now some folks are happy with MP3s, others not so.
I am unaware of any recording/reproduction system that allows for perfect results.
Yes I can play a recording back in a reverberant noisy space and folks will be unable to discern that from a live performance. But there are many acoustic environments that require substantially better performance to achieve perceptual perfection.
The issue is not of ludditism, but one of "It ain't good enough yet." That brings into play are we measuring things that really correspond with perceptual quality? That depends not just on observation, but also training and experience.
I think you missed the point. You are looking at the magicians right hand. The illusion is being done with the left one.
Them vinyl thingies were slowly developed over the years with very basic test equipment. Instead they were tweaked by human senses. The history of variants is a bit on the large size. Mutual agreement of many, many folks guided the development.
The digital audio was developed at first based on limited technology. The CD sample rate was derived from reusing video tape recorders capabilities.
This required correction by increasing the sampling rate.
It is certainly possible to use perception research to specify digital audio performance. It is done for MP3s, where the design goal was to get acceptable performance at minimum data rate.
The current debate is how to produce a digital discrete level and time system that is better than the perceptual limits. The accomplishment of this has been claimed many times. Not very surprisingly some folks found flaws and the perfect systems were improved.
Now some perceptual research would indicate that 26 bits at a sampling rate of 500,000 hertz would cover all bases. Unfortunately the current level of technology cannot achieve this. So folks settle for less. This raises issues, such as bit length, sampling rate, filter and jitter effects among others.
Now some folks are happy with MP3s, others not so.
I am unaware of any recording/reproduction system that allows for perfect results.
Yes I can play a recording back in a reverberant noisy space and folks will be unable to discern that from a live performance. But there are many acoustic environments that require substantially better performance to achieve perceptual perfection.
The issue is not of ludditism, but one of "It ain't good enough yet." That brings into play are we measuring things that really correspond with perceptual quality? That depends not just on observation, but also training and experience.
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What do you exactly mean?
Different recording formats.
Today yes. In 1978 no.
A long road of listening to the same tune over the decades convinced me. The final blow was when I bought a 12" single and gave it a spin.
What is not clear about everything that was passed through digital showed a drab fingerprint plain as day to me on the three visits I have had to Kevin's mastering facility?
Never did a side by side of one source recording through two different formats while I was there. I never felt the need. I don't need to do a-b testing much anymore. I did so much comparison testing in the 80's, 90's and 00's that now I can hear past most format and masterings to get a good sense of the nature of a system and the source recording it is playing. However I was fooled once last year at a presentation that Fremer was involved in. It was a special case, as far as the recording, though.
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My understanding would be to the effect that other people in the mastering business who also have good ears and playback systems might have a slightly different view. Some people seem to think that the best digital sounds better than tape for some things, and that other things sound better having gone to tape at least at some point.
As far as mixing and mastering go, it depends. Some plugins sound worse than their analog counterparts. But, some really useful signal processing functions don't exist in analog. In other words, digital keeps getting better and the best digital does compete well against the best analog in some cases.
As far as some of the varying opinions seen here at DIYAudio, most people around here don't seems to be using the best DACs, although some may have superb TT's and other analog components. Many folks seem convinced that DACs all sound the same if a few specifications are at least pretty good. Turns out not to be that simple for many professional users.
Therefore, unless you keep upgrading and using the best DACs mastering engineers mostly agree meet their needs, you may not be keeping up with how good digital can sound at its best.
Until I got my cheapy manual vac from audio advisor I used a modified nozzle on my vac cleaner. not ideal but it worked.
Have you tried a line contact stylus, they are good for worn records?
My experience with digital is not necessarily compromised by cost. Constellation used the best digital electronics that they could put together, and we directly compared it with the all analog vinyl source. The analog clearly won the comparison, not that it was any surprise to me, it was to some others.
Of course, half the time, you analog critics are positive that an inexpensive CD player should virtually wipe out any analog comparison, but it just hasn't been so. In fact, even fairly sophisticated digital players like the OPPO 105, in stock form, are good but not great compared to good vinyl reproduction. I know this because that is what I have to compare with. Now, I am told, (by Jack Bybee of all people) that the new OPPO 205 now in his system, after being highly modified by an engineering colleague of mine, with Jack's new QM stuff as well as improved electronics where possible, sounds as good as the Vendetta Research - CTC Blowtorch playback electronics that all three of us use. We must be getting closer. The times when I heard Jack's digital playback over the last 10 years, the vinyl was always better. All that I know now, is that the OPPO 105 modified with Jacks QM stuff sounds pretty good, but not as good as the Vendetta-CTC playback. It might be worth finding out what changes they made to the OPPO 205, but most here would give me heck for even giving that away, wouldn't you?
Of course, half the time, you analog critics are positive that an inexpensive CD player should virtually wipe out any analog comparison, but it just hasn't been so. In fact, even fairly sophisticated digital players like the OPPO 105, in stock form, are good but not great compared to good vinyl reproduction. I know this because that is what I have to compare with. Now, I am told, (by Jack Bybee of all people) that the new OPPO 205 now in his system, after being highly modified by an engineering colleague of mine, with Jack's new QM stuff as well as improved electronics where possible, sounds as good as the Vendetta Research - CTC Blowtorch playback electronics that all three of us use. We must be getting closer. The times when I heard Jack's digital playback over the last 10 years, the vinyl was always better. All that I know now, is that the OPPO 105 modified with Jacks QM stuff sounds pretty good, but not as good as the Vendetta-CTC playback. It might be worth finding out what changes they made to the OPPO 205, but most here would give me heck for even giving that away, wouldn't you?
Quote please, although I somehow already know what's in this "research".
In regard to the analog verses digital sound quality discussion, so far we have mostly been talking about DACs. For best digital sound quality it is also necessary that the best ADCs are used, and with Hi-Res formats.
In particular, CD quality should probably not be expected to be better than the best analog. At least, it is not the best digital can do.
Also, for something like like an Oppo CD player, if it is limited to playing CDs then that would be expected set some limit on the best sound quality it could produce.
In particular, CD quality should probably not be expected to be better than the best analog. At least, it is not the best digital can do.
Also, for something like like an Oppo CD player, if it is limited to playing CDs then that would be expected set some limit on the best sound quality it could produce.
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