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#1
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equal=
ly well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simp= ly hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a = new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple= records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the= original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original maste= rs themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why th= ey took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited = analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the ori= ginals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use= them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made= from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion t= hat I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog m= aster has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets b= etter, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more de= tail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, som= ething is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To m= e this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about = the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same.=20 The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog ma= ster tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any t= echnical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pr= o analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines runn= ing two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintaine= d to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 K= Hz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simp= ly not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion an= d self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much l= imited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to tha= t the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studio= s (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most = of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (cause= d by the resonance of the microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output = of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact tha= t even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the regio= n of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, = then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "i= nfinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter f= requency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers t= hat this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization = "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and= irrecoverably lost.=20 Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any= other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is = plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of=20 LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if th= e LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well j= ust buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more i= nformation on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unaba= shedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire |
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#2
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Audio_Empire wrote:
.... Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Just one - I got my first CD player, the Sony CDP-101, around the beginning of the CD era, and haven't been interested in playing my extensive LP collection ever since. This includes some of the famous direct to disc original issues from Sheffield et alia. I just hate LPs. Gary Eickmeier |
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#3
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 9, 8:11=A0pm, Audio_Empire wrote:
I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equ= ally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist si= mply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing = a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that App= le records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of t= he original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original mas= ters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why = they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edite= d analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the o= riginals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to u= se them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be ma= de from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion= that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog= master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets= better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more = detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, s= omething is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To= me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part abou= t the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog = master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any= technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that = pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines ru= nning two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintai= ned to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15= KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are si= mply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion = and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much= limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to t= hat the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by stud= ios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that mos= t of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (cau= sed by the resonance of the =A0microphone's diaphragm) above which, the out= put of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact= that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the r= egion of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic ran= ge, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape ha= s "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter= frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers= that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantizatio= n "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever a= nd irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or a= ny other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone i= s plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if = the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well= just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more= information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and una= bashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire Who said that? What article? Like to see it first hand before condemning the writer. By the way claiming infinite information on the analog tape doesn't mean the person doesn't know much about digital. It means they don't know much about analog or basic quantum physics. By the way, these LPs were mastered from the 24/96 digital copies taken from the analog master tapes that had all the fixes and mastering moves built into them. They were not taken from the 16/44.1 transfers. These 24/96 transfers had all the approvals from the various estates and entities that had a say so in approving any product. That is why they were used more than any other reason. |
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#4
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Audio_Empire wrote:
I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. Yes, I read that too. A veritable train wreck of a piece. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. AFAIK this is part of whole story, but not the whole thing. The digitization process has been described at great length in several places. After each track was digitized, if necessary the azimuth was adjusted and the tape path cleaned: these are very old tapes, after all. This made the digital copies the best possible reference for all subsequent uses. If the LPs had been made by a direct analogue transfer from the master tapes they would have been worse, not better. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite I think he said "virtually infinite". amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. Indeed, but I suppose his readers like that: it's the fallacy of the appeal to emotion rather than valid logic. Maybe if he took Signal Processing 101 (and managed to pass the exam) his income from the audio press would dry up. Andrew. |
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#5
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Saturday, February 9, 2013 11:11:25 PM UTC-5, Audio_Empire wrote:
I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equ= ally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue a= bout digital sound and how it works.=20 I'm guessin' Fremer. Call it a hunch. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles album= s. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of th= e original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The exc= use given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a pro= per re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage t= o the originals.=20 Probably a wise business decision. The 16/44.1 conversions should be indist= inguishable from the analog masters, so why risk the masters? A few ignoran= t purists will complain, but most buyers will either understand that this i= s a good move, or else won't care. Mostly the latter. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amou= nt of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those maste= rs for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source,= something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result.=20 Definitely Fremer. Instead of measuring jitter to the picosecond, S-pile co= uld actually perform the far more useful service of testing and reporting o= n turntables and cartridges, which are certainly popular with its readershi= p=97and do actually sound different! Instead, they outsource the entire ana= log realm to a moron. (And he's as much a moron about analog as digital. He= sounds like he knows what he's talking about, but he just parrots what the= turntable makers tell him.) bob |
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#6
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 10, 11:38=A0am, wrote:
On Saturday, February 9, 2013 11:11:25 PM UTC-5, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an e= qually well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue= about digital sound and how it works. I'm guessin' Fremer. Call it a hunch. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles alb= ums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of = the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The e= xcuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a p= roper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage= to the originals. Probably a wise business decision. The 16/44.1 conversions should be indi= stinguishable from the analog masters, so why risk the masters? A few ignor= ant purists will complain, but most buyers will either understand that this= is a good move, or else won't care. Mostly the latter. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite am= ount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those mas= ters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog sourc= e, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. Definitely Fremer. Instead of measuring jitter to the picosecond, S-pile = could actually perform the far more useful service of testing and reporting= on turntables and cartridges, which are certainly popular with its readers= hip=97and do actually sound different! Instead, they outsource the entire a= nalog realm to a moron. (And he's as much a moron about analog as digital. = He sounds like he knows what he's talking about, but he just parrots what t= he turntable makers tell him.) bob I just read Fremer's overview of the box set. So I don't think it was him. He got the facts right for starters "Clearly the engineers feel that digitizing analog at high sampling and bit rates is essentially transparent to the source or they might not have done it. And once they had the music captured at 192/24 bit they also felt down-converting it to 44.1/24 wouldn't diminish the sonic quality." Even I had forgotten the unusual 24/44.1 conversion. (looks like he accidentally reversed the numbers) I saw no mention of the word "infinite" anywhere in his article. |
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#7
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 GMT, Audio_Empire
wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. AIUI the vinyl masters are non-peak limited versions of the 24 bit remasters...which leaves one more marketing opportunity: non-peak limited CD remasters. Sad, cynical. |
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#8
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
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#9
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sunday, February 10, 2013 6:56:55 AM UTC-8, Gary Eickmeier wrote:
Audio_Empire wrote: =20 =20 =20 .... =20 =20 =20 Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP =20 or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if =20 someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of =20 LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, =20 if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one =20 might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog =20 masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of =20 those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. =20 =20 Comments? Other points of view? =20 =20 =20 Just one - I got my first CD player, the Sony CDP-101, around the beginni= ng=20 =20 of the CD era, and haven't been interested in playing my extensive LP=20 =20 collection ever since. This includes some of the famous direct to disc=20 =20 original issues from Sheffield et alia. I just hate LPs. =20 =20 =20 Gary Eickmeier Well, you're not alone in that sentiment and you are certainly entitled to = feel that way about records. I, on the other hand, view records (LPs, stere= o or mono or 78's for that matter) the same way I view CDs, SACDs, DVD-A's,= R-to-R tapes, DAT tapes, or 24-bit so-called "high resolution downloads. I= ..E. Just another viable music source. |
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#10
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sunday, February 10, 2013 1:37:52 PM UTC-8, Scott wrote:
On Feb 10, 11:38=A0am, wrote: =20 On Saturday, February 9, 2013 11:11:25 PM UTC-5, Audio_Empire wrote: =20 I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an= equally well known audio =20 journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a cl= ue about digital sound and how it =20 works. =20 =20 I'm guessin' Fremer. Call it a hunch. =20 =20 He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles a= lbums. It seems that Apple =20 records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions o= f the original analog master =20 tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The= excuse given by an Apple =20 Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a= proper re-mastering from the =20 edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk dama= ge to the originals. =20 =20 Probably a wise business decision. The 16/44.1 conversions should be in= distinguishable from the analog masters, so why risk the masters? A few ign= orant purists will complain, but most buyers will either understand that th= is is a good move, or else won't care. Mostly the latter. I'm not arguing that point. Whatever differences one might hear between a g= iven reissue and perhaps previous reissues or the original release are like= ly not going to stem from cutting the new reissues from a digitalization of the original masters (under most circumstances). Howeve= r. I do believe that a person buying a new LP set (for a considerable amount of change, I'll wager) shoul= d get what he thinks he is paying for (in this case, analog LPs). =20 =20 This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite = amount of information on it (!) =20 and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those m= asters for more and more =20 detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog sou= rce, something is lost that can =20 never be retrieved from that digitized result. =20 =20 Definitely Fremer. Instead of measuring jitter to the picosecond, S-pil= e could actually perform the far more useful service of testing and reporti= ng on turntables and cartridges, which are certainly popular with its reade= rship=97and do actually sound different! Instead, they outsource the entire= analog realm to a moron. (And he's as much a moron about analog as digital= .. He sounds like he knows what he's talking about, but he just parrots what= the turntable makers tell him.) =20 =20 bob =20 =20 =20 I just read Fremer's overview of the box set. So I don't think it was =20 him. He got the facts right for starters =20 "Clearly the engineers feel that digitizing analog at high sampling =20 and bit rates is essentially transparent to the source or they might =20 not have done it. And once they had the music captured at 192/24 bit =20 they also felt down-converting it to 44.1/24 wouldn't diminish the =20 sonic quality." Even I had forgotten the unusual 24/44.1 conversion. =20 (looks like he accidentally reversed the numbers) I saw no mention of =20 the word "infinite" anywhere in his article. Well, no, it wasn't Fremer |
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#11
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sunday, February 10, 2013 8:34:51 AM UTC-8, Scott wrote:
On Feb 9, 8:11=A0pm, Audio_Empire wrote: =20 By the way, these LPs were mastered from the 24/96 digital copies =20 taken from the analog master tapes that had all the fixes and =20 mastering moves built into them. They were not taken from the 16/44.1 =20 transfers. These 24/96 transfers had all the approvals from the =20 various estates and entities that had a say so in approving any =20 product. That is why they were used more than any other reason. Well, all that means is that the writer in question is even more clueless o= n these matters than I thought he was |
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#12
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sunday, February 10, 2013 3:26:17 PM UTC-8, KH wrote:
On 2/10/2013 12:38 PM, wrote: =20 On Saturday, February 9, 2013 11:11:25 PM UTC-5, Audio_Empire wrote: =20 I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an = equally well known audio =20 journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clu= e about digital sound and how it =20 works. =20 =20 I'm guessin' Fremer. Call it a hunch. =20 =20 He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles al= bums. It seems that Apple =20 records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of= the original analog master =20 tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The = excuse given by an Apple =20 Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a = proper re-mastering from the =20 edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damag= e to the originals. =20 =20 Probably a wise business decision. The 16/44.1 conversions should be in= distinguishable from the analog masters, so why risk the masters? A few ign= orant purists will complain, but most buyers will either understand that th= is is a good move, or else won't care. Mostly the latter. =20 =20 This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite a= mount of information on it (!) =20 and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those ma= sters for more and more =20 detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog sour= ce, something is lost that can =20 never be retrieved from that digitized result. =20 =20 Definitely Fremer. Instead of measuring jitter to the picosecond, S-pil= e could actually perform the far more useful service of testing and reporti= ng on turntables and cartridges, which are certainly popular with its reade= rship=97and do actually sound different! Instead, they outsource the entire= analog realm to a moron. (And he's as much a moron about analog as digital= .. He sounds like he knows what he's talking about, but he just parrots what= the turntable makers tell him.) =20 =20 bob =20 =20 Nope, Dudley. And while I agree that the article is a joke, at least=20 =20 Dudley admits the whole thing may be his imagination, or that it may be= =20 =20 he just enjoys the distortion. And he's OK with that. Now, after=20 =20 admitting those caveats, one has to question why anyone should listen to= =20 =20 him? Technically wrong, and may be imagining things or enjoying=20 =20 distortion. What's not to like? =20 =20 =20 Keith I generally enjoy Dudley's column - especially when he writes about vintage= Hi-Fi. He has, in the last couple of years, written extensively about seve= ral ancient turntables that he has rescued from the dust bin, a Thorens TD-= 124, a Garrard 301/401, and most recently a Rek-O-Kut Rondine Jr. I was esp= ecially interested in the latter because I too "rebuilt" a Rondine when I w= as a teen. I did it quite differently, however. While Dudley actually resto= red his Rondine jr., I repurposed mine. I had a capstan motor out of an old= , junked Presto monaural professional tape recorder that I salvaged from a = local FM radio station. I sat down and did the math to figure out what the = capstan motor's shaft diameter needed to be to properly drive a 12" platter= through a belt. I made a drawing of the finished shaft complete with all d= imensions, and took it to a machine shop. I even thought to have the shaft = machined as an ellipse with the correct shaft diameter at the apex of the e= llipse. All I kept from my Rondine was the bearing well and the platter. I = ordered a replacement belt for an Empire 208 belt drive turntable (which us= ed the belt around the 12'' platter and not around a smaller sub-platter as= with most later designs). and made a new chassis plate out of a sheet of h= eavy gauge stainless steel, and mounted the motor on new grommets. It worke= d perfectly. The Presto capstan motor had so much torque that it could have= powered a golf cart! The result was that the table got up to playing speed= in less than one-revolution! |
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#13
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sunday, February 10, 2013 6:26:17 PM UTC-5, KH wrote:
Nope, Dudley. Good heavens, that means there's more than one of them! bob |
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#14
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote:
I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies ) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. Edmund |
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#15
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
"Audio_Empire" wrote in message
... I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. [/quote] While the amount of informationon an analog master is not infinite, even unhearable information on an analog source can be useful in ways that are audible. There are a number of processes for removing the wow and flutter (jitter) from analog masters that can produce stunningly good results. Two such methdologies are known under the brand names Plangent and Capstan. One implementation of this process is described in this document: ftp://ftp.bestweb.net/aes117.pdf . "Here we describe a system whereby analog hardware is combined with the theory of nonuniform sampling in order to correct for wow and futter effects in analog tape transfers. We show how in certain instances the medium itself can provide an accurate measurement of a recording's timing irregularities, in which case digital signal processing techniques permit a playback-rate correction of what is essentially an irregularly sampled audio waveform. Results using both real and synthetic data demonstrate the effectiveness of the method, both in cases of severe degradation as well as high-quality analog transfers heretofore considered normal" More information including demo tracks you can download and listen to can be found at: http://www.plangentprocesses.com/ and http://www.plangentprocesses.com/examples.htm There is at least one other implementation of this process using a slightly different technique. http://www.celemony.com/cms/index.php?id=capstan The general process operates as follows: (1) A signal component in the source that can be reasonbly expected to have a steady frequency is identified as a reference. The two most common examples of this are power supply hum and tape bias. Unintended recordings of other EMI sources including video displays may also be used. (2) Time base correction techniques of which several are well known and relatively easy to implement are used to remove any of the readily identified errors in the reference, which are applied to the rest of the recording. That's it! Recovering tape recording bias signals from analog tape is sometimes possible using tape heads with very narrow gaps. Ordinarily their use would serve no purpose, since the signal being recovered is known to be inaudible. While the source material does not have infinite resolution, it may contain inaudible signals that can be used to greatly improve its audible properties. |
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#16
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 11, 6:39=A0am, Edmund wrote:
On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. H= e was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums= .. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the origina= l analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on thi= s journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording an= d a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analo= g master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell yo= u that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when th= e Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rathe= r large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonanc= e of the =A0microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsu= les dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape ha= s "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between th= e samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, i= f the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http://= www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies ) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of compression. The LP box set does not. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical fact. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl they had a choice between using that master which had already been approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. |
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#17
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Monday, February 11, 2013 6:39:01 AM UTC-8, Edmund wrote:
On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html If you re-read carefully what I said about analog tape in studios back in the day was that the machines were only MAINTAINED out to 15 KHz. That maintenance did not in any way shape or form limit them to a brick-wall 15KHz upper frequency limit. When I was working at Coast Recorders in SF the machines were maintained to be flat to 15KHz round trip. That meant if you laid-down a 15 KHz tone at -20dB (based on "0" Vu = 400nW of fluxivity) through the record head, and picked it up on the playback head, it would read the same -20dB when the VU meters were switched from source to tape. This was done at 15KHz because it's very difficult to align a regular 2-track set of tape heads with a 20 KHz signal much less an 8, 16, or greater number of tracks. it really can't be done, and even if it could be done the results aren't worth the time. One simply can't get it perfect because both head blocks (record and playback) have all of the individual "heads" stacked in one head block! Each head would ideally be exactly parallel to the one below it and the one above it but due to manufacturing variations, they are not, and since one cannot adjust each head separately in such a way that adjusting one would not affect the others in the stack, a compromise was needed. 15 KHz is far less demanding and will yield far more stable results than will 20 KHz. I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies ) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. That has little to do with frequency response per-se. Many early CDs sounded terrible. It was partially the CD itself and partially the early players. SOME LPs still sound better today than the CD of the same material. Pop music is so heavily compressed in dynamic range these days (the result of the so-called "Loudness Wars") that many of them are unlistenable to anyone who cares about sound (I'm talking pop titles here). As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. Except that less is lost in an analog to digital copy/conversion than is lost in an analog to analog copy. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings in a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! Well there are reasons for not wanting to play one's precious masters. They are, after all, often irreplaceable and an analog copy is a generation worse than the master itself. Some recording companies routinely ran two tape decks in parallel when recording their session tapes. The "backup" was never played, but went directly into the vaults. Not everyone did that, though making the masters priceless. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. Uh, don't look now, but Apple Records is British company founded by the Beatles in the late '60's and is owned by EMI - Electrical and Musical Industries Ltd. who also own such labels as Parlaphone, His Master's Voice (HMV), British Columbia, Odeon, Capitol Records, etc., and has nothing whatsoever to do with Apple Computer Inc., an American company founded in the 1970's by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak ands others. Edmund |
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#18
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Monday, February 11, 2013 8:37:08 AM UTC-8, Scott wrote:
On Feb 11, 6:39=A0am, Edmund wrote: =20 On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: =20 I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an =20 equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this =20 journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works.= He =20 was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albu= ms. =20 It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 K= Hz =20 ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than goin= g =20 back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple =20 Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a =20 proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that =20 Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist =20 wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issue= s. =20 While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the origi= nal =20 analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find =20 rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master =20 has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets =20 better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and =20 more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analo= g =20 source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that =20 digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on t= his =20 journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording = and =20 a digital copy of same. =20 =20 The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an ana= log =20 master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who h= as =20 any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell = you =20 that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track =20 machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) =20 generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. wa= s =20 all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliabl= y. =20 Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over =20 biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal= 's =20 own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response o= n =20 even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response =20 characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when = the =20 Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rat= her =20 large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resona= nce =20 of the =A0microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said cap= sules =20 dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with =20 the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of =20 about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, =20 then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape = has =20 "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ =20 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, =20 flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording= , =20 one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because =20 digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between = the =20 samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. =20 =20 Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP = or =20 any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if =20 someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of =20 LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all,= if =20 the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might a= s =20 well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply =20 have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is =20 simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. =20 =20 Comments? Other points of view? =20 =20 Audio_Empire =20 =20 I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http:= //www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html =20 =20 I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies= ) =20 where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH =20 better then the CD's. =20 =20 =20 As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of =20 compression. The LP box set does not. =20 =20 =20 =20 As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything =20 he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information o= n =20 the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lo= st =20 by the AD conversion is lost forever. =20 =20 =20 The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical =20 fact. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape =20 were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? =20 It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost =20 in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the =20 digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. Yes, in a tautological way, it is "true". =20 And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to =20 keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. =20 Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! =20 =20 =20 =20 =20 this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape =20 to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I =20 mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what =20 was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of =20 approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the =20 approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl =20 they had a choice between using that master which had already been =20 approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, =20 cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results =20 they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going =20 through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical =20 for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes =20 sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. Well, of course. Record manufacturing is a business. The perfectionist mark= et for any sound sources is a tiny one. To give it more than mere lip service = would be a misallocation of resources. I certainly understand the market forces a= t work here, but OTOH, vinyl sales are a minuscule portion of that tiny market, bu= t to advocate that there are any vinyl lovers in this day and age that aren't a = part of that minuscule audiophile market would be ludicrous. Who, for instance, oth= er than an audiophile is going to shell out $350 for a set of records that are= available as CDs for for almost 1/3 the price?=20 =20 That brings me back to my original point. Anyone who would go the the expen= se=20 of buying a huge box set of LPs and then go to the trouble to maintain them= ,=20 obviously wants analog. They should get it. It doesn't matter that a digita= l=20 conversion of the original analog studio masters might benefit from modern technology, and might actually sound better than the original master tapes= =20 (especially after more than 40 years), but that's not really the point. Rec= ord=20 buyers generally buy vinyl because they like the sound of analog and they= =20 should have it. I wouldn't buy such a set even if I did have any regard the= =20 Beatles and their music (which I don't) and would go for the CD set. I have= more than 2000 LPs and I still listen to them and get a great amount of pleasure from them. But that is the sum total of my involvement in vinyl these days. I haven't bought an LP in probably 10 years. The last LP I bought was the= =20 Classic Records remastering on 200 gram vinyl, single-sided, 45 RPM of Stravinky's "The Firebird" with Antal Dorati and the London Philharmonic= =20 on Mercury. It is still the best sounding commercially released recording I've ever heard and sonically, easily tromps the Mercury CD=20 of the same performance.=20 |
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#19
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Edmund wrote:
On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording No, the journalist is absolutely 100% dead wrong in the assertion that an analog recording contains infinite information. And, to one other respondant to this thread, it does not contain "virtually infinite" information. Simply put, a system which exists for finite time and containing finite energy CANNOT hold infinite information. Infinite information rquires two very important properties: it's bandwidth MUST be infinite, and its dynamic range must be infinite. No such system exists anywhere in this universe, and to claim that an LP or analog tape meets these fundamental requirements is absurd, even from some vague "philosophic" standpoint. Stepping back from thsi absurdity and examining the assertion a bit more, it stems from the seemingly intuitive notion that a system with continuous-time and continuous-amplitude ("analog") representation must therefore be able to represent an infinite mumber of different, unqiue and USEFULLY unique states. This is not the case theorectically much less so in physical practicality. Let's examine one "intuitive" notion: since an analog wavefore is NOT discrete time sampled, then it can, in the time between what a CD can do in its sample "snapshots" do anything, indeed, the path can take on any of an infinite set of possible paths. That notion is false for several reasons: first, thwe number of paths available is struictly limited by the bandwidth of the system. the available paths between any two times is simply a parallel definition of bandwidth. Let's take a somewhat extreme example: in the 22 microseconds between the samples of a CD, a pure analog signal from a system with a 20 kHz bandwidth cannot wiggle back and forth 5 times: such a signal require sthe system to have a bandwidth 5 times higher than that, or 100 kHz. EVERY system MUST loose information because of this limited bandwidth. Secondly, while at any given instant, a continuous amplitude representation CAN, in nphyical reality, take on "any" value up to its limit, EVERY system has a non-zero amount of noise, and that noise, at any given instant, adds an inevitable ambiguity and uncertainty: EVERY system MUST loose information because of the ambiguous and uncertain nature of noise. That noise destroys information: it replaces a definite, exact value with an uncertain one. Nyquist and Shannon rigorously showed, over a half century ago, that the amount of unqiquely useful information in a system is, in essence, proportional to the product of the system's bandwidth and the system's dynamic range. If this author can, with equal rigor, proce Shannon's and Nyquist's result are incorrect, then that author should come forth with that proof. While it might seem like the notion of analog having "infinite resolution" is intuitively correct, it's yet another example of intuition being at complete odds with physical reality. As to "comment," I have but one: it comes as no suprise to this respondent that after more than 30 years attempting to debunk this kind of nonsense, that there remain people who are either unaware or simply obstinently stupid about the underlying physical principles of the subject about which they choose to hold forth. WE can thanks the likes of Absolute Sund, Positive Feedback and, to a lesser extent, Stereophile and other, for allowing this sort of b*llsh*t science to survive and thrive. It's not that they have dumbed down the science, the have replaced it wholesale with complete gobbledygook. -- +--------------------------------+ + Dick Pierce | + Professional Audio Development | +--------------------------------+ |
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#20
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote:
On Feb 11, 6:39*am, Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the *microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies ) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of compression. The LP box set does not. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical fact. Of course it is IRL. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl they had a choice between using that master which had already been approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Edmund |
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#21
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Monday, February 11, 2013 2:44:07 PM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote:
Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording No, the journalist is absolutely 100% dead wrong in the assertion that an analog recording contains infinite information. And, to one other respondant to this thread, it does not contain "virtually infinite" information. Simply put, a system which exists for finite time and containing finite energy CANNOT hold infinite information. Infinite information rquires two very important properties: it's bandwidth MUST be infinite, and its dynamic range must be infinite. No such system exists anywhere in this universe, and to claim that an LP or analog tape meets these fundamental requirements is absurd, even from some vague "philosophic" standpoint. Stepping back from thsi absurdity and examining the assertion a bit more, it stems from the seemingly intuitive notion that a system with continuous-time and continuous-amplitude ("analog") representation must therefore be able to represent an infinite mumber of different, unqiue and USEFULLY unique states. This is not the case theorectically much less so in physical practicality. I got the impression that this journalist still harbors the notion (that first raised its ugly head in the mid-eighties when CD was introduced) that digital quantization somehow throws away information that occurs "between samples". It was nonsense then, it's nonsense now. I can see how someone unfamiliar with sampling theory might think that, but an oft-published audio journalist should at least KNOW better even if he doesn't completely understand it. It has certainly been explained often enough in the ensuing years. Let's examine one "intuitive" notion: since an analog wavefore is NOT discrete time sampled, then it can, in the time between what a CD can do in its sample "snapshots" do anything, indeed, the path can take on any of an infinite set of possible paths. That seems to be a widely held misconception. That notion is false for several reasons: first, the number of paths available is struictly limited by the bandwidth of the system. the available paths between any two times is simply a parallel definition of bandwidth. Let's take a somewhat extreme example: in the 22 microseconds between the samples of a CD, a pure analog signal from a system with a 20 kHz bandwidth cannot wiggle back and forth 5 times: such a signal require sthe system to have a bandwidth 5 times higher than that, or 100 kHz. EVERY system MUST loose information because of this limited bandwidth. Nicely put! Secondly, while at any given instant, a continuous amplitude representation CAN, in nphyical reality, take on "any" value up to its limit, EVERY system has a non-zero amount of noise, and that noise, at any given instant, adds an inevitable ambiguity and uncertainty: EVERY system MUST loose information because of the ambiguous and uncertain nature of noise. That noise destroys information: it replaces a definite, exact value with an uncertain one. Nyquist and Shannon rigorously showed, over a half century ago, that the amount of unqiquely useful information in a system is, in essence, proportional to the product of the system's bandwidth and the system's dynamic range. If this author can, with equal rigor, proce Shannon's and Nyquist's result are incorrect, then that author should come forth with that proof. While it might seem like the notion of analog having "infinite resolution" is intuitively correct, it's yet another example of intuition being at complete odds with physical reality. As to "comment," I have but one: it comes as no suprise to this respondent that after more than 30 years attempting to debunk this kind of nonsense, that there remain people who are either unaware or simply obstinently stupid about the underlying physical principles of the subject about which they choose to hold forth. WE can thanks the likes of Absolute Sund, Positive Feedback and, to a lesser extent, Stereophile and other, for allowing this sort of b*llsh*t science to survive and thrive. It's not that they have dumbed down the science, the have replaced it wholesale with complete gobbledygook. And often, it's "gobbledygook" with purpose! |
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#22
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Monday, February 11, 2013 5:25:12 PM UTC-8, Edmund wrote:
On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote: snip The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Someone who knows more about this particular set of re-issues (and for that matter Beatles reissues in general) than I do has noted that the analog studio masters were digitized at 24-bit, 192 KHz, but that those digital masters weren't directly used to cut the LPs, a 16-bit, 44.1 KHz copy of the 24/192 digitization was used to cut the LPs and that is what the journalist to whom I was referring said. Even though I doubt seriously that it would make any audible difference to the LP sound once disc cutting moves were applied, still the details about the transfer was hardly my original point. I had two: 1) If a record company is going to go to the trouble to press fresh, new reissues of old analog material onto vinyl, it should be from the original analog source, not from some digital copies of same. Using CD quality masters might not be a compromise sonically, but to do so IS more than slightly dishonest (in my estimation). 2) The journalist in question seem to not have a clue about either digital quantization of analog material or the real properties of analog tape. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. I don't know about useless. I'm sure that there must be buyers for that LP set who won't know or won't care what the source material for the LPs was. But as I stated earlier, I cannot imagine that in 2013 there is any LP market except vinylphiles and believe me THEY CARE. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Neither would most people. Given the size and type of market that exists for new vinyl, it would seem like a slap in the face to those who would be in the market for any vinyl re-issues. Might as well save the extra dough and by a set of CDs. They are much cheaper than this LP set. |
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#24
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 11, 5:25*pm, Edmund wrote:
On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote: On Feb 11, 6:39*am, Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the *microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of compression. The LP box set does not. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical fact. Of course it is IRL. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl they had a choice between using that master which had already been approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Edmund They didn't. The source was the 24/44.1 masters. The fact that the LPs do not suffer from the same compression makes them well worth considering over the CDs. That they are all unique new masters makes them all worth considering on an individual basis. Many people, including MF no less, has found that certain titles offer better sound than any previous incarnation. Seems to me that would make them worth considering. What matters is the quality of the final product not the methodologies in making it. |
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#25
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 11, 7:39*pm, Audio_Empire wrote:
On Monday, February 11, 2013 5:25:12 PM UTC-8, Edmund wrote: On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote: snip The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Someone who knows more about this particular set of re-issues (and for that matter Beatles reissues in general) than I do has noted that the analog studio masters were digitized at 24-bit, 192 KHz, but that those digital masters weren't directly used to cut the LPs, a 16-bit, 44.1 KHz copy of the 24/192 digitization was used to cut the LPs and that is what the journalist to whom I was referring said. Even though I doubt seriously that it would make any audible difference to the LP sound once disc cutting moves were applied, still the details about the transfer was hardly my original point. I had two: 1) If a record company is going to go to the trouble to press fresh, new reissues of old analog material onto vinyl, it should be from the original analog source, not from some digital copies of same. Using CD quality masters might not be a compromise sonically, but to do so IS more than slightly dishonest (in my estimation). 2) The journalist in question seem to not have a clue about either digital quantization of analog material or the real properties of analog tape. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. I don't know about useless. I'm sure that there must be buyers for that LP set who won't know or won't care what the source material for the LPs was. But as I stated earlier, I cannot imagine that in 2013 there is any LP market except vinylphiles and believe me THEY CARE. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Neither would most people. Given the size and type of market that exists for new vinyl, it would seem like a slap in the face to those who would be in the market for any vinyl re-issues. Might as well save the extra dough and by a set of CDs. They are much cheaper than this LP set. The guy who actually cut these LPs has said the source was the 24/44.1 masters. I'll take his word on the subject over anybody else's word. he also explained quite clearly why that was used and why the original analog tapes could not possibly have been used. The trouble of starting from scratch and going through all the approvals would have made the project cost prohibitive. IOW it was this or nothing. There is nothing bone headed about that choice. |
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#26
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Edmund wrote:
I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't dispute that spectrogram, but I do doubt that it's an accurate copy of the master tape. What's to say that the upper harmonics aren't distortion in the vinyl replay chain? It's hard to know without the original master tape, but I'd lay a small wager on it. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. In what sense can he be right? The amount of information isn't infinite or virtually infinite. Andrew. |
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#27
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Feb 11, 7:38*pm, Audio_Empire wrote:
On Monday, February 11, 2013 2:44:07 PM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote: Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording No, the journalist is absolutely 100% dead wrong in the assertion that an analog recording contains infinite information. And, to one other respondant to this thread, it does not contain "virtually infinite" information. Simply put, a system which exists for finite time and containing finite energy CANNOT hold infinite information. Infinite information rquires two very important properties: it's bandwidth MUST be infinite, and its dynamic range must be infinite. No such system exists anywhere in this universe, and to claim that an LP or analog tape meets these fundamental requirements is absurd, even from some vague "philosophic" standpoint. Stepping back from thsi absurdity and examining the assertion a bit more, it stems from the seemingly intuitive notion that a system with continuous-time and continuous-amplitude ("analog") representation must therefore be able to represent an infinite mumber of different, unqiue and USEFULLY unique states. This is not the case theorectically much less so in physical practicality. I got the impression that this journalist still harbors the notion (that first raised its ugly head in the mid-eighties when CD was introduced) that digital quantization somehow throws away information that occurs "between samples". It was nonsense then, it's nonsense now. I can see how someone unfamiliar with sampling theory might think that, but an oft-published audio journalist should at least KNOW better even if he doesn't completely understand it. It has certainly been explained often enough in the ensuing years. Let's examine one "intuitive" notion: since an analog wavefore is NOT discrete time sampled, then it can, in the time between what a CD can do in its sample "snapshots" do anything, indeed, the path can take on any of an infinite set of possible paths. That seems to be a widely held misconception. That notion is false for several reasons: first, the number of paths available is struictly limited by the bandwidth of the system. the available paths between any two times is simply a parallel definition of bandwidth. Let's take a somewhat extreme example: in the 22 microseconds between the samples of a CD, a pure analog signal from a system with a 20 kHz bandwidth cannot wiggle back and forth 5 times: such a signal require sthe system to have a bandwidth 5 times higher than that, or 100 kHz. EVERY system MUST loose information because of this limited bandwidth. Nicely put! Secondly, while at any given instant, a continuous amplitude representation CAN, in nphyical reality, take on "any" value up to its limit, EVERY system has a non-zero amount of noise, and that noise, at any given instant, adds an inevitable ambiguity and uncertainty: EVERY system MUST loose information because of the ambiguous and uncertain nature of noise. That noise destroys information: it replaces a definite, exact value with an uncertain one. Nyquist and Shannon rigorously showed, over a half century ago, that the amount of unqiquely useful information in a system is, in essence, proportional to the product of the system's bandwidth and the system's dynamic range. If this author can, with equal rigor, proce Shannon's and Nyquist's result are incorrect, then that author should come forth with that proof. While it might seem like the notion of analog having "infinite resolution" is intuitively correct, it's yet another example of intuition being at complete odds with physical reality. As to "comment," I have but one: it comes as no suprise to this respondent that after more than 30 years attempting to debunk this kind of nonsense, that there remain people who are either unaware or simply obstinently stupid about the underlying physical principles of the subject about which they choose to hold forth. WE can thanks the likes of Absolute Sund, Positive Feedback and, to a lesser extent, Stereophile and other, for allowing this sort of b*llsh*t science to survive and thrive. It's not that they have dumbed down the science, the have replaced it wholesale with complete gobbledygook. And often, it's "gobbledygook" with purpose! I don't know what he thinks but the fact is quantization error is a reality and the fact is in any A/D conversion there is distortion and irretrievable loss of information. Whether or not it matters is another issue. But there is no point in glossing over the reality of it. |
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#28
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Audio_Empire wrote:
Someone who knows more about this particular set of re-issues (and for that matter Beatles reissues in general) than I do has noted that the analog studio masters were digitized at 24-bit, 192 KHz, but that those digital masters weren't directly used to cut the LPs, a 16-bit, 44.1 KHz copy of the 24/192 digitization was used to cut the LPs and that is what the journalist to whom I was referring said. Art Didley says 24/44.1. I don't think it makes any audible difference. Even though I doubt seriously that it would make any audible difference to the LP sound once disc cutting moves were applied, still the details about the transfer was hardly my original point. I had two: 1) If a record company is going to go to the trouble to press fresh, new reissues of old analog material onto vinyl, it should be from the original analog source, not from some digital copies of same. Using CD quality masters might not be a compromise sonically, but to do so IS more than slightly dishonest (in my estimation). What if the engineers involved wanted to do the best possible job? Maybe only a few of the recipients of these vinyl remasters will be analog hi-fi obsessives. The rest -- people who love the feel and ritual and happy memories of vinyl -- might as well have the best quality anyone can get. Andrew. |
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#29
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:49:12 +0000, Scott wrote:
On Feb 11, 5:25*pm, Edmund wrote: On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote: On Feb 11, 6:39*am, Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the *microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of compression. The LP box set does not. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical fact. Of course it is IRL. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl they had a choice between using that master which had already been approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Edmund They didn't. The source was the 24/44.1 masters. I believe you but it is not what Audio_Empire said. The fact that the LPs do not suffer from the same compression makes them well worth considering over the CDs. What "compression" 16 VS 24 bit? Give me the digital download then. That they are all unique new masters makes them all worth considering on an individual basis. Many people, including MF no less, has found that certain titles offer better sound than any previous incarnation. Seems to me that would make them worth considering. What matters is the quality of the final product not the methodologies in making it. The final quality strongly depends on the method used to produce it. There is no way in the world vinyl record produced from a 16/44.1 ( as said ) master will sound better then a CD. I can imagine "they" would leave the analog masters intact but I would say, if one must make an analog record, use the best source available. So that would be the 24/192 "master". Edmund |
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#30
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 7:33:24 AM UTC-8, Edmund wrote:
On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:49:12 +0000, Scott wrote: On Feb 11, 5:25�pm, Edmund wrote: On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 16:37:08 +0000, Scott wrote: On Feb 11, 6:39�am, Edmund wrote: On Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:11:25 +0000, Audio_Empire wrote: I was reading the monthly column in a well-known audio magazine by an equally well known audio journalist today and realized that this journalist simply hasn't a clue about digital sound and how it works. He was discussing a new box-set of stereo LPs of all of the Beatles albums. It seems that Apple records mastered these LPs from the 16-bit/44.1 KHz ADC conversions of the original analog master tapes, rather than going back to the original masters themselves. The excuse given by an Apple Records spokesperson for why they took this route rather than doing a proper re-mastering from the edited analog session masters was that Apple didn't want to risk damage to the originals. This journalist wondered why keep master tapes at all if not to use them for re-issues. While I agree with him that LP reissues should be made from the original analog source material, It is his following conclusion that I find rather clueless. This journalist went on to say that an analog master has an infinite amount of information on it (!) and as digital gets better, one can always go back and "mine" those masters for more and more detail. He went on to say that the moment one digitizes an analog source, something is lost that can never be retrieved from that digitized result. To me this shows a basic lack of understanding on this journalist's part about the basic nature of both an analog recording and a digital copy of same. The first thing that this writer gets wrong is the notion that an analog master tape has an infinite amount of information on it. Anyone who has any technical experience with professional audio recording will tell you that pro analog tape recorders, whether two track stereo or 48 track machines running two-inch wide tape at 15 ups, they are (were?) generally only maintained to 15KHz. Head alignment, EQ, bias, etc. was all set so that a clean 15 KHz can be laid-down and retrieved reliably. Frequencies above that are simply not practical and things like over biasing to maintain low distortion and self erasure due to the signal's own high-frequency content pretty much limited the top end response on even the finest studio recorders. Add to that the frequency response characteristics of most microphones used by studios (especially when the Beatles were recording) and you will find that most of them had a rather large frequency response peak at roughly 16 KHz (caused by the resonance of the �microphone's diaphragm) above which, the output of said capsules dropped off like a falling stone. Add to that the fact that even with the addition of Dolby A noise reduction, somewhere in the region of about 76 dB ( half track/15 ips) is about the limit on dynamic range, then one can start to see that the notion that an analog master tape has "infinite information" on it is simply ludicrous. 16-bit/ 44.1 KHz digital is better in every way: Lower distortion, wider, flatter frequency response, more dynamic range, etc. From his wording, one gathers that this audio journalist still believes that because digital quantization "samples" an analog signal, that music "between the samples" is forever and irrecoverably lost. Now, I don't give a hoot or a holler in Hell about the Beatles on LP or any other media, but I do agree with this article's author that if someone is plunking down a big hunk of change for a big boxed set of LPs, that he ought to be getting a pure analog experience (after all, if the LPs are just copies of Red Book digital masters, then one might as well just buy the CDs), but his notion that the analog masters simply have more information on them than a digital copy of those masters is simply and unabashedly misleading and wrong. Comments? Other points of view? Audio_Empire I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims.http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't know what to believe and what not concerning what ( frequencies) where recorded those days but when the CD arrived, my LP's sounded MUCH better then the CD's. As they should. The CD box set suffers from a substantial amount of compression. The LP box set does not. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. The information on analog tape is finite. That is a basic physical fact. Of course it is IRL. Think about it. Just consider this for a moment. If the tape were twice as long would it have infinity x 2 amount of information? It's finite. OTOH he is right that whatever information that is lost in any digital conversion remains lost anywhere down the line from the digital copy. It's kind of a tautology but it is true. And he is right again about the utter stupidity from Apple records to keep the original recordings is a vault and NOT using them. Great thinking of those bunch or idiots! this is not such a simple issue. After the original transfer from tape to 24/192 the mastering engineers did a lot of work on the material. I mean a lot. That was finished in 24/44.1 and *that* master was what was submitted to the various estates and parties with the right of approval. This was quite a process. It took over a year to get all the approvals needed to release the CD box set. So when they did the vinyl they had a choice between using that master which had already been approved by all interested parties or going back to the analog tapes, cutting all of the albums from scratch, trying to get the same results they got in the digital domain on the first go around and then going through the approval process again. This was simply too impractical for this particular project. So the thinking behind the choice makes sense even if it isn't what some of us would want. The obvious way to preserve the best possible quality is digitizing the original masters at the highest possible sample rate, after that they can always trow away quality as they like. That was done. The flat transfers on 192/24 still exist. What I understand from Audio_Empire is that an LP is made from 16bit /44.1KHz masters. Which is pretty much useless, unless someone wants to combine the worst of two worlds. But maybe Apple records is not as stupid as it seems to be, maybe they like to trow away quality right from the start! After all if there is no decent recording to be found, they can claim that there crappy apple players sounds " as good " as decent audio equipment. I think you are comparing Apples to Apples. Two different Apples. OK my bad but I don't understand why anyone would make a record from a redbook digital master. Edmund They didn't. The source was the 24/44.1 masters. I believe you but it is not what Audio_Empire said. I understand that. I am just trying to inject facts where I see misinformation. Not pointing a finger at you here. The fact that the LPs do not suffer from the same compression makes them well worth considering over the CDs. What "compression" 16 VS 24 bit? Give me the digital download then. The compression that was added to the mastering when they made the CDs. They decided they would be better off making them sound more "modern" That was not done to the LPs. It is an obvious reason why the LPs would sound better than the CDs. There are other reasons but that is a pretty obvious one. That they are all unique new masters makes them all worth considering on an individual basis. Many people, including MF no less, has found that certain titles offer better sound than any previous incarnation. Seems to me that would make them worth considering. What matters is the quality of the final product not the methodologies in making it. The final quality strongly depends on the method used to produce it. There is no way in the world vinyl record produced from a 16/44.1 ( as said ) master will sound better then a CD. Actually there are several ways in which it can happen and does happen. A lot can and often does go wrong on the way to making CDs and you also have the benefits of various euphonic distortions with the LPs depending on your system to a large degree. I can imagine "they" would leave the analog masters intact but I would say, if one must make an analog record, use the best source available. So that would be the 24/192 "master". Well imagine this for a moment. "They" run the original master 15 times trying to get the perfect cut with all the mastering moves on the fly. "They" send the test pressing to Paul, Ringo, Yoko and everyone else who has the right to refuse it's release. 3 months later you have responses from every interested party. Half of them approve of it half of them have various notes.. Some of which are next to impossible to achieve in the analog domain. You go back and do a dozen more cuts in the analog domain. You send out the new test pressings. half the parties that rejected the first pressing are now on board but you lost one who accepted the first pressing. You go back and do it again and again. Now...multiply this by the number of LPs in the box set and you have some idea what EMI was probably facing if they were to go back to the analog masters and start from scratch. Does that sound like a good project for any business to take on? Do you now see how this could be an issue with the original analog tapes? The real lesson we should take from this is that the small audiophile reissue labels that are doing these kinds of reissues from the original analog tapes and giving us SOTA sound quality are really performing miracles despite all odds. |
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#31
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:50:01 +0000, Andrew Haley wrote:
Edmund wrote: I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't dispute that spectrogram, but I do doubt that it's an accurate copy of the master tape. What's to say that the upper harmonics aren't distortion in the vinyl replay chain? It's hard to know without the original master tape, but I'd lay a small wager on it. I don't know either and I could not find more info on the internet about what is or was possible with recording in the whole chain. Some people say there is vinyl with 35 and even 50 kHz on it. What is true or not I don't know but I do know that even today I have a hard time finding even a mic that is able to record those frequencies. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. In what sense can he be right? The amount of information isn't infinite or virtually infinite. I know the information isn't infinite, it just hasn't the hard limit that a digital master has given an certain sample rate. With a "perfect" analog recording -that doesn't exist either I know that too- there is no such hard limit. Andrew. Edmund |
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#32
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Edmund wrote:
On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:50:01 +0000, Andrew Haley wrote: Edmund wrote: I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't dispute that spectrogram, but I do doubt that it's an accurate copy of the master tape. What's to say that the upper harmonics aren't distortion in the vinyl replay chain? It's hard to know without the original master tape, but I'd lay a small wager on it. I don't know either and I could not find more info on the internet about what is or was possible with recording in the whole chain. Examining the spectrogram reveals little in terms of a definite diagnosis: the extended information is clearly harmonically related to the below 20 kHz signal, so it could just as likely be due to simple non-linearity in either the recording or playback process. Phone cartridges, for example, are far from the perfect linear devices we might like to think of them as. Some people say there is vinyl with 35 and even 50 kHz on it. I can say with some certainty that there IS information at those frequencies on almost every LP I have ever examined, and I can say with equal cerainty that those signals have little if anything to do with the original signal AND they were very likely NOT present when fed to the cutter head. They consist of noise, distortion artifacts and the like. What is true or not I don't know but I do know that even today I have a hard time finding even a mic that is able to record those frequencies. Yup, that's right. But ANY nonlinearity ANYWHERE in the chain is going to produce high-frequency artifacts, that might SEEM to be correlated with the signal, but are, in fact, added by the reproduction chain and NOT present in the original suignal. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. In what sense can he be right? The amount of information isn't infinite or virtually infinite. I know the information isn't infinite, it just hasn't the hard limit that a digital master has given an certain sample rate. You are mistaking simple "bandwidth" with information. You are ignoring, it seems, the role of dynamic range. You are also, it seems, assuming that all information is useful. Noise is information, but it's arguably not useful in and of itself. With a "perfect" analog recording -that doesn't exist either I know that too- there is no such hard limit. The limit is an awful lot harder than you, and at least one other poster, might think. Yes, there might be ONE part of the change that has maybe has a 6 dB or 12 dB/octave rolloff, but you have to account for them all. And when you do, the "ugly" Nyquist limiting looks very nice and neat by comparison. Consider the typical microphone, which has a series of complex resonances and cancellations and the like. Now consider the mic preamps and the electronics associated with that. Next, let's look at the tape recorder, for which the definition for the equalization curves beyond 15-20 kHz doesn't exist, now, look at the phenomenon of head cancellation as the wavelength approaches the dimensions of the gap, and self- erasure and a similar set of issues on playback, and the forced limitation of the bandwidth being fed to the cutter head to prevent its self-immolation and the physical, limits of the cutting stylus itself, and on and on and on and on. Please, the effective "analog rolloff" is not some simple, nice 6- or 12-dB/octave, it's MUCH greater than that and VERY messy. -- +--------------------------------+ + Dick Pierce | + Professional Audio Development | +--------------------------------+ |
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#33
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Scott wrote:
I don't know what he thinks but the fact is quantization error is a reality and the fact is in any A/D conversion there is distortion and irretrievable loss of information. ALL attempts at transduction or copying that do not involve bit-for-bit copies, be they analog-to-digital converstion or analog-to-analog copies lose information, ALL of them. The microphone loses information because of its limited bandwidth and dynamic range. The electronics that follow add ambiguation through noise and thus destroy information. MOST assuredly, the original tape recorder on which the master tape is recorded loses information because of its frequency response and dynamic range lmiitations. So does subsequent mixing and mastering. So does the cutter, so does the pressing so does the playback, the speakers, the room and, just as importantly, your ears. And all of these stages, ADD information that wasn't previously there. That added information might even mimic what was previously lost, though poorly at best. But each stage does it. Including your ears (and the brain connected to them). Whether or not it matters is another issue. But there is no point in glossing over the reality of it. Correct, but there seems to be a lot of glossing over the horrid messiness of "pure" analog chains: the best of them are still pretty grotty, ignoring whether one likes the results or not. -- +--------------------------------+ + Dick Pierce | + Professional Audio Development | +--------------------------------+ |
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#34
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
snip
I would agree - his TT refit columns have been interesting. Actually "hobby-based" articles, which are quite rare. This article, OTOH wasn't his finest work... No it wasn't. But few "subjective" reviewers have any technical knowledge, and many who think they understand a concept, merely repeat the misinformation that they have been fed. |
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#35
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 10:37:14 AM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote:
Scott wrote: I don't know what he thinks but the fact is quantization error is a reality and the fact is in any A/D conversion there is distortion and irretrievable loss of information. ALL attempts at transduction or copying that do not involve bit-for-bit copies, be they analog-to-digital converstion or analog-to-analog copies lose information, ALL of them. The microphone loses information because of its limited bandwidth and dynamic range. The electronics that follow add ambiguation through noise and thus destroy information. MOST assuredly, the original tape recorder on which the master tape is recorded loses information because of its frequency response and dynamic range lmiitations. So does subsequent mixing and mastering. So does the cutter, so does the pressing so does the playback, the speakers, the room and, just as importantly, your ears. And all of these stages, ADD information that wasn't previously there. That added information might even mimic what was previously lost, though poorly at best. But each stage does it. Including your ears (and the brain connected to them). Whether or not it matters is another issue. But there is no point in glossing over the reality of it. Correct, but there seems to be a lot of glossing over the horrid messiness of "pure" analog chains: the best of them are still pretty grotty, ignoring whether one likes the results or not. Yes, if we are going to shy away from glossing over such things it certainly is worth noting when some folks paint an unrealistic picture of the virtues of any component or analog in general. They all distort and lose information. And it is just as well to note that losing information does not mean it is audible. I don't know that I see a whole lot of glossing over those other facts around here much. Maybe in some other neck of the woods. But all too often I see some folks dragging out Shannon/Nyquist and saying "see digital IS perfect." To me that shows the same level of understanding as does claims of infinite resolution of analog. All analog media are finite in their resolution and all A/D converters lose some information. No real point in rehashing the audio myths that say otherwise. The real meaningful discussion is how different real world processes audibly affect the signal. In the case of the Beatles reissues we will never be able to put that question to the test. Personally I'm not so worried about it. I prefer to just listen to them and judge them on the merits of what I hear. And as far as that goes I think they turned out to be a mixed bag. |
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#36
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 10:35:04 AM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote:
Edmund wrote: On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 14:50:01 +0000, Andrew Haley wrote: Edmund wrote: I don't know if you are wrong but there are at least other claims. http://www.channld.com/vinylanalysis1.html I don't dispute that spectrogram, but I do doubt that it's an accurate copy of the master tape. What's to say that the upper harmonics aren't distortion in the vinyl replay chain? It's hard to know without the original master tape, but I'd lay a small wager on it. I don't know either and I could not find more info on the internet about what is or was possible with recording in the whole chain. Examining the spectrogram reveals little in terms of a definite diagnosis: the extended information is clearly harmonically related to the below 20 kHz signal, so it could just as likely be due to simple non-linearity in either the recording or playback process. Phone cartridges, for example, are far from the perfect linear devices we might like to think of them as. Some people say there is vinyl with 35 and even 50 kHz on it. I can say with some certainty that there IS information at those frequencies on almost every LP I have ever examined, and I can say with equal cerainty that those signals have little if anything to do with the original signal AND they were very likely NOT present when fed to the cutter head. They consist of noise, distortion artifacts and the like. With regard to your above comment, CD-4 discs had a subcarrier that went up to 50K+ with a special CD-4 cutting head. Regular stereo Neumann and Ortofon cutters could easily do 50 KHz especially when half-speed mastering. I can almost guarantee that unless the disc is a CD-4 disc, the 50 KHz signal one can see on an LP is not any intelligence, but rather various types of high-frequency spuriae. I will also pretty much guarantee that if your cartridge isn't equipped with a Shibata or similarly shaped stylus that ultra high-frequency information won't survive many plays. Analog tape recorders are pretty much out of bandwidth (even at 15 ips) by the mid 20 KHz region and I've never seen a mike with any significant (useful) output above about 20 KHz and no output at all above 30 KHz. What is true or not I don't know but I do know that even today I have a hard time finding even a mic that is able to record those frequencies. Yup, that's right. But ANY nonlinearity ANYWHERE in the chain is going to produce high-frequency artifacts, that might SEEM to be correlated with the signal, but are, in fact, added by the reproduction chain and NOT present in the original suignal. That is quite true. It can come from just about anywhere. As for the journalist, although it is philosophic more then anything he is right about the "infinite" ( not really ) amount of information on the analog recording and he is completely right that any information lost by the AD conversion is lost forever. In what sense can he be right? The amount of information isn't infinite or virtually infinite. I know the information isn't infinite, it just hasn't the hard limit that a digital master has given an certain sample rate. You are mistaking simple "bandwidth" with information. You are ignoring, it seems, the role of dynamic range. You are also, it seems, assuming that all information is useful. Noise is information, but it's arguably not useful in and of itself. With a "perfect" analog recording -that doesn't exist either I know that too- there is no such hard limit. The limit is an awful lot harder than you, and at least one other poster, might think. Yes, there might be ONE part of the change that has maybe has a 6 dB or 12 dB/octave rolloff, but you have to account for them all. And when you do, the "ugly" Nyquist limiting looks very nice and neat by comparison. Consider the typical microphone, which has a series of complex resonances and cancellations and the like. Now consider the mic preamps and the electronics associated with that. Next, let's look at the tape recorder, for which the definition for the equalization curves beyond 15-20 kHz doesn't exist, now, look at the phenomenon of head cancellation as the wavelength approaches the dimensions of the gap, and self- erasure and a similar set of issues on playback, and the forced limitation of the bandwidth being fed to the cutter head to prevent its self-immolation and the physical, limits of the cutting stylus itself, and on and on and on and on. Please, the effective "analog rolloff" is not some simple, nice 6- or 12-dB/octave, it's MUCH greater than that and VERY messy. One thing about record cutting that I always found fascinating is how complex the system is. Modern cutting heads take hundreds of Watts just to get them going at all, and just a few more to burn 'em out! Cutting heads need such esoterica as acceleration limiter. overshoot damper circuitry (this is an electromechanically resonant system, after all). With all of the doodads a cutting system uses just to protect itself from the very signal that it is there to transcribe to disc, it seems somewhat of a miracle to me that it works at all. |
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#37
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
Scott wrote:
Maybe in some other neck of the woods. But all too often I see some folks dragging out Shannon/Nyquist and saying "see digital IS perfect." I would like to see a direct quote from someone who made this assertion. Since I am the one who used the specific phrase regarding Shannon and Nyquist in the context of the current threads, can I infer that you accusing me of saying "digital is perfect?" If so, I might suggest you review what you think you wrote before you retract that assertion. To me that shows the same level of understanding as does claims of infinite resolution of analog. It may show thatto you, but you've reached a conclusion quite different than what I was saying. All analog media are finite in their resolution AND THEREFORE LOSE INFORMATION, and all A/D converters lose some information. No real point in rehashing the audio myths that say otherwise. They are rehashed here and in the high-end audio press over and over again. -- +--------------------------------+ + Dick Pierce | + Professional Audio Development | +--------------------------------+ |
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#38
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 6:31:08 AM UTC-8, Scott wrote:
On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 10:37:14 AM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote: Scott wrote: I don't know what he thinks but the fact is quantization error is a reality and the fact is in any A/D conversion there is distortion and irretrievable loss of information. ALL attempts at transduction or copying that do not involve bit-for-bit copies, be they analog-to-digital converstion or analog-to-analog copies lose information, ALL of them. The microphone loses information because of its limited bandwidth and dynamic range. The electronics that follow add ambiguation through noise and thus destroy information. MOST assuredly, the original tape recorder on which the master tape is recorded loses information because of its frequency response and dynamic range lmiitations. So does subsequent mixing and mastering. So does the cutter, so does the pressing so does the playback, the speakers, the room and, just as importantly, your ears. And all of these stages, ADD information that wasn't previously there. That added information might even mimic what was previously lost, though poorly at best. But each stage does it. Including your ears (and the brain connected to them). Whether or not it matters is another issue. But there is no point in glossing over the reality of it. Correct, but there seems to be a lot of glossing over the horrid messiness of "pure" analog chains: the best of them are still pretty grotty, ignoring whether one likes the results or not. Yes, if we are going to shy away from glossing over such things it certainly is worth noting when some folks paint an unrealistic picture of the virtues of any component or analog in general. They all distort and lose information. And it is just as well to note that losing information does not mean it is audible. I don't know that I see a whole lot of glossing over those other facts around here much. Maybe in some other neck of the woods. But all too often I see some folks dragging out Shannon/Nyquist and saying "see digital IS perfect." To me that shows the same level of understanding as does claims of infinite resolution of analog. All analog media are finite in their resolution and all A/D converters lose some information. No real point in rehashing the audio myths that say otherwise. The real meaningful discussion is how different real world processes audibly affect the signal. Would it be fair to say that digital recording and playback affect the audibility of the processes involved less than analog (of course todays pop and jazz digital are ruined by dynamic range compression, but that's not the media's fault). |
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#39
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 8:11:20 PM UTC-8, Audio_Empire wrote:
snip I would agree - his TT refit columns have been interesting. Actually "hobby-based" articles, which are quite rare. This article, OTOH wasn't his finest work... No it wasn't. But few "subjective" reviewers have any technical knowledge, and many who think they understand a concept, merely repeat the misinformation that they have been fed. I forgot to add that even a master's degree in electronic engineering doesn't make one completely immune from the rich stew that is audio mythology 8^) |
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#40
Posted to rec.audio.high-end
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Some People Haven't a Clue
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 11:54:15 AM UTC-8, Dick Pierce wrote:
Scott wrote: Maybe in some other neck of the woods. But all too often I see some folks dragging out Shannon/Nyquist and saying "see digital IS perfect." I would like to see a direct quote from someone who made this assertion. If you are asking for one I'll just show you one from one of my favorite sources of misinformation. "The Nyquist theorem (which is mathematically proven) says that the exact waveform can be reproduced if the original signal is frequency limited to less than half the sampling frequency." http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...yquist+perfect IMO "exact" and "perfect" are synonymous as used here. I can find more but you only asked for one. Since I am the one who used the specific phrase regarding Shannon and Nyquist in the context of the current threads, can I infer that you accusing me of saying "digital is perfect?" Nope. No such inference was intended. If so, I might suggest you review what you think you wrote before you retract that assertion. But alas, it isn't so. The assertion was never made so there is nothing to retract. I did read what you wrote and it was clear that *you* are not guilty of spreading this common audio myth. To me that shows the same level of understanding as does claims of infinite resolution of analog. It may show thatto you, but you've reached a conclusion quite different than what I was saying. My conclusion is based on things other people have said. All analog media are finite in their resolution AND THEREFORE LOSE INFORMATION, Yeah I said that. Not sure why you feel the need to shout it. and all A/D converters lose some information. No real point in rehashing the audio myths that say otherwise. They are rehashed here and in the high-end audio press over and over again. Indeed they are. But if we are *not* doing it (which it appears neither of us are) then there is no need for us to rehash them in this thread. If someone decides to breach that then of course we should set them straight. |
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