[Arny Krueger]

"Codifus" wrote in message


That's the problem with most comparisons of LP and CD.
The reference is always relative to the other recording,
not the original master recording.

Those of us who do live recording on an authorized basis (not bootlegs!)
have access to as many origional masters as we want.

Sure, LP may sound
better than CD or SACD, but how do you really know how
good it is unless you've heard the original master
recording?

There's only one way that a LP can sound better than a CD, DVD-A, SACD, Blu
Ray or HDDVD is if someone screwed up the mastering.

The LP could have made the original recording
sound more pleasant with less dynamics and a less harsh
top end.

Give your music the MuzaK treatment by putting it on LPs?

I'll admit that LP recordings tend to sound
more plaeasant to me than alot of CDs I have.

Not everybody can record, mix and master well. Or, perhaps some people have
a different vision for the recording than you do. Not everybody who does
things that we don't prefer is screwing up.

But that,
to me has alot to do with CD having a way superior
dynamic range, so dynamics hit you harder, and probably
harsher, than LP.

LPs can't comfortably handle really spectacular music without a lot of sonic
shoehorning. It might be just one of my foibles, but I don't like to wear
my shoes with the shoehorns still in. In fact, any shoe that needs
shoehorning is too tight for me!

CD has no limit in its high frequency
response compared to that of LP,

Arguable. If you said high frequency dynamic range, then you'd be right on.

whereas LP has to roll
off the high frequencies because the medium just can't
handle it.

LPs can hold waves at up to 30 KHz, well beyond the brick wall filter of the
CD. Thing is, those grooves aren't durable and they can't be very loud.

Therefore, any unpleasantness or hardshness in
higher frewquencies is presented to you, full blown from
the CD.

I have it on good authority that equalizers don't know what's downstream,
either CD or LP. If it sounds harsh and you roll it off, that is that.

The mastering engineer has to work much hard to
make a pleasant CD because it deliver's everything to
you, warts and all.

Actually, the inverse is true. Because the medium is so limited, getting a
really nice sound on a LP generally takes a lot more work.

In the LP, some mistakes are
swallowed up or pleasantly washed over due to its
limitations.

Not really. Overcut LPs don't sound good and they don't last.

I know 2 people who have access to master tapes, and they
say when CD is done right, no question. LP does not even
come close.

True.

The issue lies with duplication and mass production.

Nonsense. Making a CD that is a bit-for-bit duplicate of the master is
something that anybody can do in their living room.

Now, with SACD, I gather that Sony made a considerable
effort to make sure it sounds great, so they employed
some great mastering engineers in their productions.

They were trying to do something weird - sell remastering on the back of a
purported better sounding technology that in fact didn't sound different at
all.

Also, SACD is inferior to even CD in technical ability in
terms of high frequency noise above 10 Khz.

Nope. The turnover point for the SACD is wherever the engineers choose to
put it, and they always put it above 20 Kz. SACD has to look up hill to
DVD-A, which does not necessarily use such agressive noise shaping. Thing
is, one can obtain very good dynamic range where the ear is most sensitive
by using noise shaping to master CDs. This methodology costs nothing to
implment, but also has negligable audible benefits because the CD medium is
not the practical limit to the dynamic range of recordings - live venues,
studios and mics are.

I get the
feeling that the noise shaping algorythms used in SACD
that tranfer the noise to the upper frequencies tend to
make a performance sound more pleasant.

DBTs say otherwise, and I've already explained why.

A loose analogy I
would make is with the audio cassette. When you make a
cassette recording with no noise reduction, the resulting
recording has alot of hiss. When playing that recordning,
the hiss makes the recording seem to have a higher
frequency response than it actually does during playback.

What you're saying is that a little added noise and distortion can fool the
unsophisticated ear into believing that there is more dynamic range, and
high frequencies then there really are.

I get the vague notion that the noise shaping circuits in
SACD have a somewhat similarly pleasant effect on a
recording.

No audible effect at all. The noise floor was set in the master by the mics
and the rooms.