Why the objectivists will never win!

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#244
“Geoff. I won't argue what you've said about potential problems in error correction and other small? factors, but are you not overlooking the issues with record playback, like muck in the tracks, static charging, relative humidity of record and playing room, vibrations from traffic, wear of both stylus and record, wharped records, scratches etc? Record playback is a contact sport with all that it entails, I would have thought that together those factors would influence sound quality much more than any CD reading errors.”

>>>All formats have there issues, no doubt. But what I’m saying is at the end of the day, considering everything, tape generally sounds better than digital. Even digitally remastered cassettes have all the attributes I ascribe to LPs and analog cassettes. Cassettes went through a series of improvements both to mastering techniques and to the cassettes themselves. I realize there are exceptions to everything, that’s why I use the word generally. You say they (problems) are small, I say they’re big. Small things have big consequences.
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#246
Mobile Fidelity did some tests. To make high quality vinyl, sometimes they have to piece together and or level match different tracks from different tapes that were originally used to make an album. They tried recording the patched together tapes to a new tape, which could then be used to drive the record disk lathe. They also tried the best digital systems available to today. They ending up finding that a Merging Technologies Horus system at DSD256 sounded clearly better than a making a new tape. They also found that vinyl made from DSD256 digital copies sounded better than direct DSD256 playback. IOW, some of the magic of vinyl occurs at playback. It can even make digital sources sound better, somehow or other. So, they decided the best they could do was to add a step of very high quality DSD256.

Interestingly or not, DSD256 is what I settled on long before it came out that MoFi was using it. For me it was because AK4499EQ sounded best at DSD256.

Anyway, my point is that its not so simple what's better. Sometimes 'best' can be really good digital, and other times it can be really good analog.
 
#247
geoffkait said:
Myth 4. “Analogue sounds better than digital (LP vs. CD)”

No, that‘s actually not a myth. Cassette tape also sounds better than CD, generally speaking, depending on sound characteristics you most cherish. CDs often sound thin, dry, wimpy, threadbare, airless, maddening, clunky, generic, unfulfilling, honky, discombobulated, boomy, congealed, metallic, compressed,, synthetic, two dimensional and like papier-mâché.
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Indeed, it's not a myth as such. It's pure personal preference and has no factual value.

Jan
 
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#248
geoffkait said:
The problems I’m taking about can and do occur in practice.
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They certainly don't occur if using 'Exact Audio Copy' to rip a CD. The reading is over and done with, the CD data is identified from an online database, and a checksum shows that it matches every other copy in the world of the same CD, and with zero bit errors.

>>>I already said there are exceptions to everything. And I already said I’m only considering CD playback on CD transports.
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#250
rayma said:
Jitter and filtering are the actual issues.
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And a good DAC will deal with this.


>>The DAC gets whatever Is fed to it by the Transport. Garbage in, garbage out. You can’t go back and correct what the DAC is getting. Only Superman can go back in time. law of maximization: No matter how much you have in the end you would have had even more if you had started out with more.
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#256
geoffkait said:
How do you do these raised text platforms, that prevent someone from easily quoting you?
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geoffkait said:
Anyway when you said "And I already said I’m only considering CD playback on CD transports" is that still even relevant? I thought a significant step was to eliminate that particular source of error these days, as "CD playback on CD transports" is so '80s or whatever. I was around then in a forum where folks were doing all kind of mechanical / electrical POOGE to their Phillips players, because there was no alternative. The forum was in ASCII, so you couldnt see oscilloscope traces of improved power supply rails... Or pictures of how they modelling-clay loaded the player chassis...different parts of the transport. One theory was the servos controlling the laser focus and aiming caused less effect on the power supply, if they didnt have to do as much work keeping on-track due to transport vibration.
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geoffkait said:
One guy caused an uproar when he claimed he could hear the difference after inserting RS 90 deg RCA adapters - temporarily, while waiting for good ones - into his line outs, so the player could be pushed further backward on a shelf. Oh, the carnage of people's feelings that one left in that forum! That particular fellow wouldnt back down about it, regardless of what anyone said. That was the week I learned it's simply not useful the challenge what another person claims to hear in audio.
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Edit; sorry I couldnt get out of those boxes, so I just kept on typing anyway. It's me, not Geoff.
 
#257
Click on the symbol in the red box to turn the quotes into text so you can edit/fix them:

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You can also use <ctrl-z> repeatedly to step-by-step undo a sequence of changes to text.
 
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