[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 16 Sep 2010 16:58:09 -0700, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Sep 15, 6:30=3DA0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
=20

Actually, there's no evidence presented to support that assertion.
=20
You presented your private experience of experiencing "fatigue"
after listening of couple of CD's. I presented results of my own
analysis why CD takes more efforts from me to listen. So we are even,
so far - each of us presented his own opinion.
=20
Logically speaking, if you're going to go down that path, the
record noise and
especially the "horrible distortion" of LP playback should cause
far more
listening fatigue than the clean purity of CD.
=20
It is not obvious, it is just your strawman :-) It is possible,
that some forms of distortion are pleasing to the ear/brain ( is it
what they call 'euphonic'?)

No doubt. Many will say that why LPs sound better than CD to some people.=
LPs=20
have euphonic colorations that that please the ear. It's certainly possib=
le.=20
But here's the rub. Euphonic colorations are not PERCEIVED by the listene=
r as=20
distortion but rather as something that, for some reason, puts the liste=
ner=20
in mind of real instruments playing in a real space. Would these cause=20
listener fatigue? It seems not. But if ticks and pops and other record no=
ises=20
DO bother a listener, then those LP artifacts, would, IMHO, indeed, cause=
=20
listener fatigue in that person but probably not in someone who finds tha=
t he=20
or she can easily and handily listen "around" thos artifacts. This might=20
explain a number of things. For instance, someone who was brought-up on L=
P=20
learned early-on to ignore ticks and pops. I find that I can do so handil=
y,=20
for instance. Today's generation, OTOH, seem to mostly listen to MP3s, of=
ten=20
at really low data rates (to fit more music on their MP3 players) and see=
m=20
not to mind the compression artifacts. Now whether they actually have tra=
ined=20
their ears to listen around these artifacts, or whether it's because the=20
nature of pop music effectively masks these artifacts, I can't say. What =
I=20
can say is that even though I can listen around ticks and pops an vinyl r=
ush,=20
and tape hiss, and all of the other noises that can intrude on LP playbac=
k, I=20
simply cannot abide MP3, especially at low data rates. (although, I can=20
listen to compressed internet radio as background as long as the data rat=
e is=20
higher than 128 KB/s=20


at the same time reduce flow of
information making it easier and more pleasant for the ear/brain to
process. May be, LP distortions fall into this category. Sorry, but I
have no scientific evidence for that :-). Just my guess. I personally,
prefer CD's.

That's fine. I do 90% of my listening via the little silver disc too (in =
all=20
it's guises =AD CD, DVD-A, SACD, Blu-Ray) and haven't bought an LP in at =
least=20
decade. I mean, CD is what we've got, right? Very little new music is=20
released on LP these days, but if one reads the audio press, one would ge=
t=20
the impression that this is changing. For instance, mastering legend Stan=
=20
Ricker closed down his mastering lab in the early 1990's and put his lath=
es=20
and cutters in storage. Recently, he has set his lab up again, and is bac=
k to=20
mastering LP, and apparently, is swamped with work. It seems that the LP=20
medium is undergoing a bit of a renaissance. How big this resurgence of=20
interest in vinyl will ultimately be is anyone's guess, but for the here =
and=20
now, it's getting healthier and healthier and, apparently, the interest i=
s=20
coming from young people who don't even remember the halcyon days of viny=
l,=20
before the CD! There are some on this forum who believe that the=20
"disc-jocky"/disco market is the only market for LP outside of the "lunat=
ic=20
fringe" LP luddites and old fogies. This seems not to be true. Ricker say=
s=20
that he believes that LP will outlive CD as he sees an eventual demise of=
the=20
physical digital medium. I'm not sure that I agree and I'll tell you why.=
=20
Even though nobody can argue that downloading music via the internet is q=
uick=20
(given today's wide-band connections) and easy and even cheap, the idea o=
f=20
archiving a music collection on a hard drive is NOT a great solution. Sev=
eral=20
years ago, I read where some research institution (Gartner?) found that l=
ess=20
than one percent of all computer users bother to back-up their HDDs on a=20
regular basis. If true, this means that 99% of all computer music collect=
ions=20
are in serious danger of being completely destroyed by a hard disc failur=
e. I=20
know of at least two people who have had this happen fairly recently. The=
se=20
people now back their libraries up to CD or DVD, because these media are =
more=20
permanent (how permanent? The jury is out on that as well).=20