"Robert Peirce" wrote in message
...
The first letter in the May/June Absolute Sound claims his LPs sound
significantly better than the same albums downloaded from HDtracks.
Ignoring for a moment that this might be true, I wonder how much depends
on equipment?
If a LP sounds different from the same album downloaded from HDTracks there
are two bonafide more-or-less technical reasons:
(1) The audible distortion and noise that are inherent in the LP format.
(2) The real possibility that we're comparing two different jobs of
mastering.
IME while digital transcriptions of LPs often sound very much like the LP
itself, they are always easy to distinguish from the commercial digital
releases of the same musical work.
There is also a well-known situation where many people have a strong
emotional connection with various aspects of listening to LPs.
I have just begun to convert some LPs to 192/24 digital files using
PureVinyl and a TC Impact Twin.
What a cornucopia of highly audible software and hardware EFX processors!
My first thought is that you must really dislike the sound of vinyl to feel
the need for signal-massaging power on the scale encouraged by these
products.
Marketing-wise these products seem to be tearing themselves apart. One part
hypes super-accurate processing with zillions of bits and samples, and
another part is designed to bend sound like a pretzel.
It happens the Impact Twin actually
plays the LP in order to convert it, and it is no problem whatsoever to
play the LP and the digital file through the same device. When I do
that I don't hear any difference.
Please explain to me how the Impact Twin "plays" the LP in a unique,
exceptional, or unusual way as compared to traditional DAW editing/mixing
tools.
I suspect, if I played the LP, or the file, through a top of the line
device and the other through something much poorer, I would hear a
difference.
Depends which knobs you turn on that Impact Twin. Controls like "De Esser",
Reverb" and "Comp" (IOW, compressor I think) paint a picture of inherently
audible signal processing that any producer of hyper-processed musical
tracks could appreciate and use to practice his "art".
http://www.tcelectronic.com/media/tc_near_small.jpg
However, it would be the equipment, not the source. How
often do you think that might be the case? Maybe my hearing is just
shot.
With equipment that has this kind of power to bend signals, it is a matter
of your gun, your bullet, and your foot. We're talking .44 Magnum!