[drichard]

Hi Bob,

The one thing that you wrote that I find completely indisputable is
the following:

But the nature of popular music is that it allows one to cheat on fidelity.

I defy anyone to hear differences in microphones or preamps used on
probably 75% of the recordings sold and listened to today. And even if
an audio engineer can hear it, who else can? In the Top 40 recordings
that are selling those subtleties simply aren't important. How can
they be when mastering engineers squash the final product so badly
that they intentionally create distortion? And the end product will be
converted to 128K MP3 anyway.

To some extent this forum is one of the few remaining places for those
of us who care about such things to gather. And yes, we get passionate
and intense. I consider that a good thing.

Dean