I drew vinyl groove walls maximum width and conical stylus tip in my PC for a pivoted 9" and 12" tonearm and tried to see how tangential the stylus contact surface is with both the groove walls. But its confusing.
How much difference a 12" tonearm would make compared to 9" ? I mean tracking error comparison. And if we have mono recording and use pivoted tonearm; stylus contact points would not be perpendicular to both groove walls for specific frequency modulations. Isn't it ? what effect/errors this will represent ?
Thanks and regards.
How much difference a 12" tonearm would make compared to 9" ? I mean tracking error comparison. And if we have mono recording and use pivoted tonearm; stylus contact points would not be perpendicular to both groove walls for specific frequency modulations. Isn't it ? what effect/errors this will represent ? Thanks and regards.
I have always said that. It also simplifies many other things.
I tried a crosstalk circuit for headphones. It didn't seem to work for me. I might be missing the point about crosstalk. I never seem to hear a vast difference even when only a 20 dB separation is heard against CD ( which I assume is down to how we hear ). When my nice moving coil I would swear the LP has much better stereo. That's a branchline to what's is implied here. All the same, that's how it sounds to me.
Michael Gerzon like myself found that often 78's sounded more like real music. He refered to the interplay ( in correct space ) and the tone colours that produced. He was very upset that most sound engineers thought they could dial up any sound they wanted via multi microphones. From this he invented the sound-field microphone. This will allow adjustments to be made years later that are very much like that the microphone was put in another position. Michael tried to meet them halfway. I won't insult Michael more by further wrongly describing it, it is well described in technical papers.
Benny Goodman fancied himself as a sound engineer. He would only allow one microphone. The singer had to climb up and down a box to sing. I think he had understood how it works.
Over the years the EQ of records was develloped to allow louder cuts to put it simply. The Blumlein EQ's that are very gentle are much liked. 3180 uS I read recently was a recomendation. I suspect as time went on it became a standard because all engineers listen to the cut and used the RIAA playback curves.
The nicer type of simple phono stage uses active 3180/318 and passive 75 uS. If so have a variable 25 to 100 uS. I also use 2 uS passive on the 318 uS .
One thing you might try. Build a very high grade inverse RIAA. Feed CD into your phono stage. More than the tape recorder I think there will be something more like LP heard. Could it be the final filtering of CD could be better as one possible reason? Doubtless someone said this before so sorry if so.
My ladyfriend's son is doing studio engineer at degree level. One of the questions was calculate the ideal microphone positioning for recording X from the speed of sound. What would Michael have said. Another was " can a ribbon microphones be used for loud music". I would say 100 % they can and should. I suspect the answer they wanted was no. At best a trick question.
I have never heard a digital LP that made me think I wish all LP's were digital. I always think analogue is one stage nearer the microphone. A Revox is good enough for professional work. I would estimate a Revox to have a 50 dB usuable range if with Dolby. From early digital test that I never repeated I would place 16 bit at 20 dB. Denon did a test disk that neatly showed this. One was asked to calibrate an amplifer at 20 dB points. A piano recording was played at 20 dB points. At 0dB the piano was full and nice ( a bit sharp perhaps ). At same volume - 20dB it sounded mostly the same but somehow opaque. At - 40 dB it had a buzz on every note. I was very shocked. On the Revox + 5dB should be OK, - 15 db very nice but lacking punch, -35 dB still very nice but some hiss. If that was repeated with profession Dolby it would be no contest as the hiss would be minimal. Now the rub. 16 bit is very rarely recorded at 0VU. The one time when you can is analogue to digital. That allows no end of try it again. The 20 db window on 16 bit might with skill be 40 dB. I doubt it is more. As said I haven't rerun the test and have no idea what strict 16 bit will do today. I dare say 24 bit converted to 16 bit is much better.
Put aside thoughts of harmonic distortion and tracking angle error for a moment. Consider a silent, plain groove. Friction drag force on the stylus can only be applied along the line between the stylus and the arm pivot, which is at an angle (the arm offset angle) to the tangent of the groove. This force is applied to the stylus in a direction which (in part) tries to pull it up the inner groove wall. That is no different from if the groove was at an angle and the arm was tangential, so it is as if there is already an offset in one direction in terms of the maximum groove angle that can be tracked.I drew vinyl groove walls maximum width and conical stylus tip in my PC for a pivoted 9" and 12" tonearm and tried to see how tangential the stylus contact surface is with both the groove walls. But its confusing.
Thanks and regards.
For a modulated groove, the angle changes all the time, and at some maximum angle the stylus will ride up the wall, which is mistracking. An offset arm therefore has built in asymmetry concerning this angle, and a penalty equal to the offset angle in terms of maximum angle that can be tracked versus linear arms.
Anti-skate force is an attempt to compensate, but because the friction is not constant and also changes with groove angle it's not very effective but helps.
It was 50 years ago this year, she would have been 70 now......apparently EMI did record in Kingsway Hall too, but (IME) EMI recordings do not convey the same lf ambience as Decca recordings from the same era. I do not know where the 1965 EMI Du Pre/LSO was recorded, can't seem to find out which is odd considering how well considered it is. Do listen to it - enjoy !
Focus if you will on my statement " I have never heard a digital LP that made me think I wish all LP's were digital " . Ask yourself this very simple question. How do you feel about that ? What you require instead is to ask a very simple question that may have no answer. Very stimulating no doubt. Simple experiments can be made. Digital when not the best sounds opaque. BBC Nicam less so. EQ doesn't seem to make it less opaque.
Can an inverse RIAA device make CD into a LP sound? I think very much it can. That is part of the question answered if you find the same as me.
Digital to analogue via Revox, what do we get? That seems less like LP to me .
One thing I hope you won't take as too much as off topic. Subsonics can be mistaken for ghosts I read . Please don't get me to say the how and the why of that as it was not greatly interesting to me. I took note because it would make sense. In a building you think someone is in the room. Close your eyes and you still feel that ( a local wind turbine rumble, no audibal sounds ). If someone in the room more so. More than get interested in ghosts I thought when we lived in a forest we would need that to be safe. The ghosts would be wolves. It adds excitement to music.
I am sure someone has already said mostly below 100 Hz LP records are mono.
That makes it very likely to to be important.
The way people speak on Forums would be like they liked art, but never had been to a museum. I might say " did you see the brush strokes ", you would say " not really , did you imagine it " ?
A dry as a bone technical arguement doubtless based on no real science gets us where?
Michael Gerzon I refered to was one of the weirdest people who ever walked the planet by a very big marging. People in Oxford walked the other way if they saw him. I doubt that anything in the digital world today isn't connected with him. He really tried to make it work. There were no dry as a bone discussions with Michael. He was a gentleman . I think he gave his life for Audio, he didn't look after himself and almost never had a bath.
Can an inverse RIAA device make CD into a LP sound? I think very much it can. That is part of the question answered if you find the same as me.
Digital to analogue via Revox, what do we get? That seems less like LP to me .
One thing I hope you won't take as too much as off topic. Subsonics can be mistaken for ghosts I read . Please don't get me to say the how and the why of that as it was not greatly interesting to me. I took note because it would make sense. In a building you think someone is in the room. Close your eyes and you still feel that ( a local wind turbine rumble, no audibal sounds ). If someone in the room more so. More than get interested in ghosts I thought when we lived in a forest we would need that to be safe. The ghosts would be wolves. It adds excitement to music.
I am sure someone has already said mostly below 100 Hz LP records are mono.
That makes it very likely to to be important.
The way people speak on Forums would be like they liked art, but never had been to a museum. I might say " did you see the brush strokes ", you would say " not really , did you imagine it " ?
A dry as a bone technical arguement doubtless based on no real science gets us where?
Michael Gerzon I refered to was one of the weirdest people who ever walked the planet by a very big marging. People in Oxford walked the other way if they saw him. I doubt that anything in the digital world today isn't connected with him. He really tried to make it work. There were no dry as a bone discussions with Michael. He was a gentleman . I think he gave his life for Audio, he didn't look after himself and almost never had a bath.
It was kingsway and sounds wonderful. but even with bass boosted cannot hear the underground. I'll listen again tonight on speakers and try and research on mic techniques used by the EMI mob back then.
To keep Nige happy. http://www.michaelgerzonphotos.org.uk/articles/Whither.pdf shows he was well aware of the ambience that out of phase signals gives back in 1971 when a figure of 8 mic setup was used.
This of course muddies the waters on the original premise as many of the 'classic' records people love and go for silly money would have been recorded that way.
Daft question of the day. Does audicity allow one to extract the out of phase content from a recording? I can't help wondering if some analysis of some CDs and some vinyl rips might not be helpful.
Yes, when present the underground on Decca recordings is definitely subsonic, and crops up irregularly every few minutes. I love the EMI recordings too, but just noting the lf ambience is different and it could well be down to mics and perhaps pass filters.
Audacity: invert one channel and sum to mono, now you have the difference signal ie only out of phase content. Select a chunk and look at the spectrum. About half a dozen clicks !
Yes, either by filtering to a narrow band or fft of a test tone. Not very relevant to music
Coincident microphone simulation covering three dimensional space and yielding various directional outputs
Thank you Bill for the 4phonic paper link
George
Attachments
I built an m7 Phono stage capable of taking balanced line level sources a few years ago, the RIAA really killed the sound of Cds. The sound could be improved through further equalization, but that basically undoes what I was attempting to do. It neither created a vinyl sound, it did lessen the clarity of the cds. I wasn't impressed.
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My inverse RIAA was a low grade thing. Perhaps that helped. Yours might heve been active and attenuated. Mine was passive. I used it to have it handy when repairing amps.
This one seems very easy to do. I haven't begun to ask if it is correct.
https://www.circuitlab.com/circuit/934cyq/reverse-riaa-5v-input/
This one seems very easy to do. I haven't begun to ask if it is correct.
https://www.circuitlab.com/circuit/934cyq/reverse-riaa-5v-input/
Yes. All that remains now is the façade and the hundreds of fantastic recordings made there.........
Decca had a guy who scouted for good sounding venues John Culshaw, who was also a key engineer and producer back in the day. Google him. The Decca boys, champagne Charlie stuff back in the day when SXL records sold for weeks wages for the mortal man......
I mentioned habit a while back and since this has been shown a lot here but no one seemed to notice it.
In the neurological and now popular literature there is the sad story of a fellow called Eugene. It seems he had a brain infection that left him unable to learn anything new. He could remember everything from before the illness and seemed to function normally. Now after release from the hospital he returned home with his wife to a house that was new to him.
However he had no problem with personal care even though if asked he could not tell you were the bathroom was in the new home.
The part most important for the vinyl issue is of his daughter visiting. When she first visited she would come in talk to her father in the living room and then go into the kitchen and chat with her mother and then leave. When she did this Eugene would get angry as he thought she had ignored him when she left, because he did not remember the first chat. After a few minutes he would not remember why he was angry, but he stayed angry for hours.
The solution once the problem was recognized was that the daughter would stop again to chat for a few minutes before leaving to foster his happy mood.
Now habits have a trigger, an action and a reward. In playing a record there are definite actions that trigger a reward. For example most folks are pleased when they pick out and mount the record then manage to lower the stylus with out error or damage. This probably triggers a pleasure response that colors what follows.
Now look at how folks here describe their intentions to listen to music. Far more discussion about vinyl selection and playing process. Much less about CD's. So the anticipation will color the perception.
Now the other issue about habits is they are pretty much permanent. That is why Eugene could function. The way to modify them is actually to introduce a new habit that accepts the same stimulus but follows with a different action and reward.
So it may be the lead in groove noise is a stimulus that triggers a pleasure response by itself.
Now for a simple test those of you with friends can try introducing the same CD either as "You've got to listen to this it is a really wonderful recording" or "This is sort of a disapointment..." and then inquire as to how the CD was perceived. This of course won't work for you Brits as at least your friends may be too polite to give a real response.
ES
In the neurological and now popular literature there is the sad story of a fellow called Eugene. It seems he had a brain infection that left him unable to learn anything new. He could remember everything from before the illness and seemed to function normally. Now after release from the hospital he returned home with his wife to a house that was new to him.
However he had no problem with personal care even though if asked he could not tell you were the bathroom was in the new home.
The part most important for the vinyl issue is of his daughter visiting. When she first visited she would come in talk to her father in the living room and then go into the kitchen and chat with her mother and then leave. When she did this Eugene would get angry as he thought she had ignored him when she left, because he did not remember the first chat. After a few minutes he would not remember why he was angry, but he stayed angry for hours.
The solution once the problem was recognized was that the daughter would stop again to chat for a few minutes before leaving to foster his happy mood.
Now habits have a trigger, an action and a reward. In playing a record there are definite actions that trigger a reward. For example most folks are pleased when they pick out and mount the record then manage to lower the stylus with out error or damage. This probably triggers a pleasure response that colors what follows.
Now look at how folks here describe their intentions to listen to music. Far more discussion about vinyl selection and playing process. Much less about CD's. So the anticipation will color the perception.
Now the other issue about habits is they are pretty much permanent. That is why Eugene could function. The way to modify them is actually to introduce a new habit that accepts the same stimulus but follows with a different action and reward.
So it may be the lead in groove noise is a stimulus that triggers a pleasure response by itself.
Now for a simple test those of you with friends can try introducing the same CD either as "You've got to listen to this it is a really wonderful recording" or "This is sort of a disapointment..." and then inquire as to how the CD was perceived. This of course won't work for you Brits as at least your friends may be too polite to give a real response.
ES
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Nice post Ed. This could be one of the reasons why, in Mike Uwins' test, listeners extolled about the virtues of vinyl when listening to a CD but with vinyl run-in groove noise added ahead of the music.
This all reinforces my conviction that there's so much to learn about ourselves! In all walks of life.
Jan
This all reinforces my conviction that there's so much to learn about ourselves! In all walks of life.
Jan
Again I might be odd, but I just love a near silent lead in groove. noisy ones make me worry and hope the noise will die down a few revolutions in.
The meanderings into recording technique were just to try and understand (having not read the letter to the editor) if there is a dimension related to how the 'golden age' recordings were made. (aside, I think NOW is the golden age but what do I know). But if the premise is correct then maybe you can test with just a noise source behind you, or 2 if you can generate 2 independent noise sources?
We may be just discovering 1970 all over but there are things that can be tried. I will not that certain people, like Linkwitz played with surround recovery then gave up and decided 2 speakers IF good enough were all he needed.
The meanderings into recording technique were just to try and understand (having not read the letter to the editor) if there is a dimension related to how the 'golden age' recordings were made. (aside, I think NOW is the golden age but what do I know). But if the premise is correct then maybe you can test with just a noise source behind you, or 2 if you can generate 2 independent noise sources?
We may be just discovering 1970 all over but there are things that can be tried. I will not that certain people, like Linkwitz played with surround recovery then gave up and decided 2 speakers IF good enough were all he needed.
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