[Andrew Haley]

Audio Empire wrote:

I know a local photographer who uses a 4 X 5 sheet-film camera that
is fitted with a scanning digital back (from Leaf, I believe)
connected directly to a laptop to capture the gigapixels of raw data
that the camera produces. While his finished landscape photos are
spectacular, they look "different" from the same shot on sheet
Ektachrome or Fujichrome (he always makes a film exposure of the
same shot - it's easy, just swap the digital back for a film
holder). The film has more contrast and richer, more saturated
colors.

Indeed it does, and there's a parallel with audio here. That
contrasty highly-saturated look is a bit like the "smiley EQ" and
compression loved by record producers -- pretty it may be, but
accurate it ain't. I remember one wag who on seeing Michael Fatali's
photographs said "That's not God's own light, that's Fujichrome's own
Velvia!" Digital, on the other hand, is linear, or can be once you
find all the curves and filters in the workflow and turn them off.
Once you've done that it's regular, stable, and repeatable, and
*accurate*, just like digital audio can be. (I am rather sensitive to
this issue, because one of my jobs is copying paintings for
reproduction. If you want to be able to compare an original and a
print side-by-side on a wall under bright lights, the last thing you
want is a contrast and saturation boost.)

Andrew.

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2011 18:14:18 -0800, Ed Seedhouse wrote
(in article ):


[ excess quotation snipped -- dsr ]




I was alive at the time with access to magazines that discussed the
differences between 78's and 33's. And it is just a fact that there
were plenty of letters in magazines extolling the virtues of the
former and the deficiencies of the latter.

Yes, I'm aware of that. There were also live vs recorded "shootouts" using
acoustical gramophones back in the early decades of the 20th century that
showed conclusively that there was no difference between a record of the time
and a live performance. This particular bias has followed every advance in
sound reproduction since Edison. Acoustic to electrical transcription, 78 to
LP, mono to stereo, and analog to digital.

The debate went on issue
after issue in, if I recall rightly, the pages of "Wireless world",
the premier British electronics magazine and every time I come across
today's "CD's suck and tubes sound ever so much better" tirades in
today's fashionable rags, I am reminded afresh of the 78 vs 33 debates
from all those years ago. In fact, allowing for changes in english
usage over the years many of these early letters could be published
today by just substituting "digital" and "analogue" as appropriate.
Although you don't see too many letters in today's magazines extolling
the virtues of thorn needles over steel ones, or the "real sound" of
the completely sound driven horn gramophones vs the "fake" sound
produced with electronics. And these were tube electronics, mind you.

Ah, the debates of yesteryear.

It says more about human nature than it does about recorded sound.

[Arny Krueger]

"Ed Seedhouse" wrote in message


I was alive at the time with access to magazines that
discussed the differences between 78's and 33's.

As was I. Admittedly I found most of those magazines in storage or used book
stores.

Then there were the controversies of triode versus pentode, transformer
coupling versus capacitor coupling, bass reflex versus acoustic suspension,
Ultra linear taps on output transformers, horns versus direct radiators,
mono versus stereo, tubes versus transistors, etc.

And it is just a fact that there were plenty of letters in
magazines extolling the virtues of the former and the
deficiencies of the latter. The debate went on issue
after issue in, if I recall rightly, the pages of
"Wireless world", the premier British electronics
magazine and every time I come across today's "CD's suck
and tubes sound ever so much better" tirades in today's
fashionable rags, I am reminded afresh of the 78 vs 33
debates from all those years ago.

I still remember the first time I ran into someone who had assidiously
avoided the conversion from mono to stereo.

In fact, allowing for
changes in english usage over the years many of these
early letters could be published today by just
substituting "digital" and "analogue" as appropriate.

Pretty much.

Although you don't see too many letters in today's
magazines extolling the virtues of thorn needles over
steel ones, or the "real sound" of the completely sound
driven horn gramophones vs the "fake" sound produced with
electronics. And these were tube electronics, mind you.

Ah, the debates of yesteryear.

With every sea change there are those who pull their boats up onto the shore
of some desert island, and just stay there forever.

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2011 16:57:18 -0800, Rockinghorse Winner wrote
(in article ):

* It may have been the liquor talking, but
bob wrote:

On Jan 25, 10:15=A0am, Audio Empire wrote:

Since it is so easy to make great-sounding CDs, and I would think that it
would take more time and effort to screw one up, my only conclusion would
have to be that for some reason, this (seemingly) industry-wide practice =
of
giving us less than they can and calling it more must be on purpose. OTOH=
, I
can't think of a single reason why this should be so, can you?

One reason that's been suggested is that they are optimizing for the
earbud listener, not the owner of a good in-room audio system.

Of course, it could also just be simple incompetence.

bob

Unless you are in the possession of evidence to the contrary, never
attribute to maliciousness what is most likely incompetence.

You can also add the low quality of popular music itself. Remember when
the ability to play instruments was a cause for pride among fans?

Unfortunately, care put into playing and recording is the province of
eccentrics and old farts these days. I am limited to listening to a very
small sample of modern commercial pop and unsigned acts. I don't expect the
situation to change until 'quality' becomes a musical value again.



*R* *H*


Well put - mostly- but keep in mind that "old farts" are likely to be the
ones who remember when quality was a virtue to covet and aspire to. Young
people today have little concept of what constitutes quality because there is
so little of it in their iPod/MacDonalds/Twilight Saga worlds. Especially
when it comes to the SOUND of music.

[Scott[_6_]]

On Jan 27, 6:14=A0pm, bob wrote:
On Jan 27, 8:45=3DA0pm, Audio Empire wrote:







I don't really understand your seeming fascination with the relevance o=
f
market size. The average "Joe" doesn't care about quality at all (in mu=
ch=3D
=A0of
anything) beyond the concept of "adequate". Therefore any product which
caters to a market where quality (real or imagined) is important, is go=
in=3D
g to
be, by definition, a niche market. Ferrari and Porsche occupy a niche m=
ar=3D
ket
in the automobile world. Laphroiag and Aberlore, as well as Woodford Re=
se=3D
rve
and VanWinkle's occupy a niche market in the whisky world. More people =
dr=3D
ink
Budwieser than drink Pilsn Urquell, and more people own Panasonic recei=
ve=3D
rs
than own Audio Research equipment. These are all catering to niche mark=
et=3D
s.
It really doesn't matter what the hoi polloi are doing or buying, or
otherwise consuming. High-end audio is supposed to be about getting the=
b=3D
est
sound from recorded music that's possible. And if vinyl, SACD, DVD-A or
hi-res downloads provide that and the commercial CD, aimed at the mass =
ma=3D
rket
doesn't because their marketing priorities are different, then that in =
no=3D
=A0way
diminishes the importance of these "niche" products that you seem to so
offhandedly dismiss. =3DA0

I think you're responding to both Arny and me here. I would say that
yes, indeed, this is a niche market we are talking about, and there's
nothing wrong with that. It's only a small subset of consumers who
will care about recording quality. My point--and I think it's
consistent with your initial post here--is that this small market has
been asking for the wrong thing.

In my alternative universe, the high-end rags would have embraced the
potential of CD, and then demanded that it live up to that potential,
rather than insisting that the answer lay in either higher resolution
or retro technology. Also, Michael Fremer would have wound up in a
dead-end job at Best Buy, where he could have made a greater
contribution to the social good than he has in reality.

You don't need an alternative universe for that. The underground rags
did exactly that. They embraced the potential but were critical of the
poor results. But at the same time the "retro technology" offered
better sound. So what are the rags supposed to do? They did what they
wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2011 18:14:25 -0800, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 27, 8:45=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:

I don't really understand your seeming fascination with the relevance of
market size. The average "Joe" doesn't care about quality at all (in much=
of
anything) beyond the concept of "adequate". Therefore any product which
caters to a market where quality (real or imagined) is important, is goin=
g to
be, by definition, a niche market. Ferrari and Porsche occupy a niche mar=
ket
in the automobile world. Laphroiag and Aberlore, as well as Woodford Rese=
rve
and VanWinkle's occupy a niche market in the whisky world. More people dr=
ink
Budwieser than drink Pilsn Urquell, and more people own Panasonic receive=
rs
than own Audio Research equipment. These are all catering to niche market=
s.
It really doesn't matter what the hoi polloi are doing or buying, or
otherwise consuming. High-end audio is supposed to be about getting the b=
est
sound from recorded music that's possible. And if vinyl, SACD, DVD-A or
hi-res downloads provide that and the commercial CD, aimed at the mass ma=
rket
doesn't because their marketing priorities are different, then that in no=
way
diminishes the importance of these "niche" products that you seem to so
offhandedly dismiss. =A0

I think you're responding to both Arny and me here. I would say that
yes, indeed, this is a niche market we are talking about, and there's
nothing wrong with that. It's only a small subset of consumers who
will care about recording quality. My point--and I think it's
consistent with your initial post here--is that this small market has
been asking for the wrong thing.

In my alternative universe, the high-end rags would have embraced the
potential of CD, and then demanded that it live up to that potential,
rather than insisting that the answer lay in either higher resolution
or retro technology. Also, Michael Fremer would have wound up in a
dead-end job at Best Buy, where he could have made a greater
contribution to the social good than he has in reality.

bob


Oh yes, that's quite true. Instead of setting the bar so low that mediocre
sounding CDs get high marks for sound quality, they should be saying that
most CDs fall woefully short of their potential and they need to be better.
Pushing us toward hi-res versions of the same lousy production standards is
not the answer.

On Fremer. I'll admit that his one-note-samba is a bit tiresome, but on the
other hand, he or someone like him is needed to keep their fingers on the
pulse of all things vinyl because most reviewers and audio journalists don't
want to. I say read his stuff for the information therein, and take his
"vinyl is IT" philosophy with a grain of salt.

[Arny Krueger]

"Audio Empire" wrote in message


I don't really understand your seeming fascination with
the relevance of market size. The average "Joe" doesn't
care about quality at all (in much of anything) beyond
the concept of "adequate". Therefore any product which
caters to a market where quality (real or imagined) is
important, is going to be, by definition, a niche market.
Ferrari and Porsche occupy a niche market in the
automobile world. Laphroiag and Aberlore, as well as
Woodford Reserve and VanWinkle's occupy a niche market in
the whisky world. More people drink Budwieser than drink
Pilsn Urquell, and more people own Panasonic receivers
than own Audio Research equipment. These are all catering
to niche markets. It really doesn't matter what the hoi
polloi are doing or buying, or otherwise consuming.

I understand why someone wants to pay the big bucks to own a Porsche, or a
Ferrari. They are wonderful cars with great handing and performance. Their
cost is justified by the advanced technology that it takes to makes them do
what they do. 12 cylinders cost more than 6. Dual clutch drive trains cost
more than mass-produced lightweight automatics. All wheel drive costs more
than FWD. Turbochargers and superchargers cost more than natural
aspiration. Ultra wide 200 mph tires cost more than average width 120 mph
tires.

I don't understand why someone would want to pay big bucks for retro
technology with vastly reduced performance and built-in inconvenience,
except for reasons of pure emotion such as sentimentality. So much for Audio
Research electronics and Linn turntables. My Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs (total cost: less than 60 dollars) sounds as good if not better, and
does so both in a campsite on Lake Superior or in my listening room.
Excellent sound with utter convenience is hard to beat, especially at one
100th or one 1,000th of the price. The big downside to the Sansa: no
bragging rights, just good music. I could show it to you in my hand and you
might not notice it!

High-end audio is supposed to be about getting the best
sound from recorded music that's possible.

Those days passed several decades ago when the high end audio business
turned into a freak show of non-sonic so-called improvements and expensive
gear that any honest technical analysis would say is either vastly
overpriced, mediocre or even abject failures.

And if vinyl,
SACD, DVD-A or hi-res downloads provide that and the
commercial CD, aimed at the mass market doesn't because
their marketing priorities are different, then that in no
way diminishes the importance of these "niche" products
that you seem to so offhandedly dismiss.

That's just it, vinyl, performs more poorly while SACD and DVD-A perform at
the same subjective level as the humble CD. They are like Porsches and
Ferraris that are matched or outperformed on a road course by my Mercury
Milan. Of course in the real world of cars, Porsches and Ferraris can easily
walk away from my humble Milan. No Porsches and Ferraris that get their
doors blown off my a 6-cylinder FWD mass-market sedan exist except as
classic cars and that gets back to sentimentality. That much reason still
rules the world of automobiles.

[Scott[_6_]]

On Jan 28, 7:13=A0am, Andrew Haley
wrote:
Audio Empire wrote:
I know a local photographer who uses a 4 X 5 sheet-film camera that
is fitted with a scanning digital back (from Leaf, I believe)
connected directly to a laptop to capture the gigapixels of raw data
that the camera produces. =A0While his finished landscape photos are
spectacular, they look "different" from the same shot on sheet
Ektachrome or Fujichrome (he always makes a film exposure of the
same shot - it's easy, just swap the digital back for a film
holder). =A0The film has more contrast and richer, more saturated
colors.

Indeed it does, and there's a parallel with audio here. =A0That
contrasty highly-saturated look is a bit like the "smiley EQ" and
compression loved by record producers -- pretty it may be, but
accurate it ain't. =A0I remember one wag who on seeing Michael Fatali's
photographs said "That's not God's own light, that's Fujichrome's own
Velvia!" =A0Digital, on the other hand, is linear, or can be once you
find all the curves and filters in the workflow and turn them off.
Once you've done that it's regular, stable, and repeatable, and
*accurate*, just like digital audio can be. =A0(I am rather sensitive to
this issue, because one of my jobs is copying paintings for
reproduction. =A0If you want to be able to compare an original and a
print side-by-side on a wall under bright lights, the last thing you
want is a contrast and saturation boost.)


I know this is off topic but this is simply a load of misinformation
about color and contrast accuracy. Velvia is hardly the only film
stock in the world of film. And digital is anything but color
accurate. There is yet to be adigital color profile that begins to
represent the color palette of the real world. Neither film nor
digital imaging can match the contrast or color range of real life but
film still covers more of it.

[Scott[_6_]]

On Jan 28, 7:16=A0am, "Arny Krueger" wrote:
"Audio Empire" wrote in message



I don't really understand your seeming fascination with
the relevance of market size. The average "Joe" doesn't
care about quality at all (in much of anything) beyond
the concept of "adequate". Therefore any product which
caters to a market where quality (real or imagined) is
important, is going to be, by definition, a niche market.
Ferrari and Porsche occupy a niche market in the
automobile world. Laphroiag and Aberlore, as well as
Woodford Reserve and VanWinkle's occupy a niche market in
the whisky world. More people drink Budwieser than drink
Pilsn Urquell, and more people own Panasonic receivers
than own Audio Research equipment. These are all catering
to niche markets. It really doesn't matter what the hoi
polloi are doing or buying, or otherwise consuming.

I understand why someone wants to pay the big bucks to own a Porsche, or =
a
Ferrari. They are wonderful cars with great handing and performance. Thei=
r
cost is justified by the advanced technology that it takes to makes them =
do
what they do. 12 cylinders cost more than 6. Dual clutch drive trains cos=
t
more than mass-produced lightweight automatics. All wheel drive costs mor=
e
than FWD. =A0Turbochargers and superchargers cost more than natural
aspiration. Ultra wide 200 mph tires cost more than average width 120 mph
tires.

I don't understand why someone would want to pay big bucks for retro
technology with vastly reduced performance and built-in inconvenience,
except for reasons of pure emotion such as sentimentality.

I don't understand why you don't understand since it has been
explained to you numerous times on numerous threads including this
one. If you don't understand the value of better subjective sound
through better mastering and euphonic colorations then I don't know
what more to tell you. You don't get it. that is fine. there are
people who never get the better experience one gets with a Kolbe steak
over a Big Mac. But the *idea* is, in my opinion, pretty easy to
understand even if you haven't personally experienced it.


So much for Audio
Research electronics and Linn turntables. My Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansin=
g
IEMs (total cost: less than 60 dollars) =A0sounds as good if not better, =
and
does so both in a campsite on Lake Superior or in my listening room.


Previously in this thread you challenged my ability to make any kind
of judgment on digital audio based on the incorrect belief that i had
no digital player in my system. Well back at you. I'm pretty sure you
don't have any ARC amplification nor a Linn TT so It's kinda hard to
take this claim seriously. Besides that, "AL IEMs?" Really? If that is
your standard of excellence then I don't know what to say. You are
using a system that has such extreme inherent limitations in it's
ability to create an illusion of an original live acoustic performance
that I can not see how you can form any meaningful opinions about the
quality of various components or masterings available on CD or vinyl
as they pertain to creating an illusion of live acoustic music in
playback. If that really is your standard of excellence then any
discussion between us on such matters will be saddled with a complete
lack of common ground. With my system I can go to Disney Hall, listen
to the L.A Phil and come home and listen to well recorded orchestral
works on vinyl and hear a great deal of common ground and then make
meaningful evaluations of the various components, recordings,
masterings etc in terms of how close they come to creating an illusion
of live music in my listening room. With AL IEMs or any other such
transducer the sound is so far removed from any sort of convincing
illusion of live music that the differences between the sort of things
we are discussing here (LPs v, CDs, different masterings, Tubes v.SS
etc) simply don't have the same frame work. Using the analogy of cars
that we find in this post. It would be akin to trying to evaluate
different racing tires using a tractor.


Excellent sound with utter convenience is hard to beat, especially at one
100th =A0or one 1,000th of the price.


Indeed it is but one can not get excellent sound with what you are
using compared to the ARC/Linn equipment driving high end loud
speakers correctly set up in a good listening room if one is using
live acoustic music as a reference. You can't even get in the ball
park. You can't even get in the same state the ball park is located
in.


The big downside to the Sansa: no
bragging rights, just good music. I could show it to you in my hand and y=
ou
might not notice it!

High-end audio is supposed to be about getting the best
sound from recorded music that's possible.

Those days passed several decades ago when the high end audio business
turned into a freak show of non-sonic so-called improvements and expensiv=
e
gear that any honest technical analysis would say is either vastly
overpriced, mediocre or even abject failures.


Depends on how one measures success or failure. If one is measuring
success by the ability of the equipment to create an aural illusion of
live music the high end gear wins hands down and the Sansa clip with
the IEMs is the abject failure.



And if vinyl,
SACD, DVD-A or hi-res downloads provide that and the
commercial CD, aimed at the mass market doesn't because
their marketing priorities are different, then that in no
way diminishes the importance of these "niche" products
that you seem to so offhandedly dismiss.

That's just it, vinyl, performs more poorly while SACD and DVD-A perform =
at
the same subjective level as the humble CD.

Unfortunately this is something that matters on an academic level at
best but in real world application using real world CDs and LPs and
SACDs this simply is not true with the vast majority of commercial
titles that are avialable on multiple formats. so if we want to talk
about the real world this claim is simply incorrect. Of course this
may not be easily discernable using s Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs


They are like Porsches and
Ferraris that are matched or outperformed on a road course by my Mercury
Milan. Of course in the real world of cars, Porsches and Ferraris can eas=
ily
walk away from my humble Milan. No Porsches and Ferraris that get their
doors blown off my a 6-cylinder FWD mass-market sedan exist except as
classic cars and that gets back to sentimentality. =A0That much reason st=
ill
rules the world of automobiles.

In the real world of audio my Forsell/Koetsu/ARC/Soundlabs with my
collection of LPs walks away from your Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs If one is looking for an illusion of live music in their
playback. I am looking for that. I am all about the aesthetic
experience. That is why I spend the extra money on the stuff I have.

[Robert Peirce]

In article ,
Andrew Haley wrote:

Velvia!" Digital, on the other hand, is linear, or can be once you
find all the curves and filters in the workflow and turn them off.
Once you've done that it's regular, stable, and repeatable, and
*accurate*,

I don't know what digital sensors you are using but the ones I have seen
are no more accurate than film when it comes to being able to match
color, and they have a much smaller dynamic range. I suspect highly
specialized equipment might improve on this but I don't know that. The
advantage digital has over film is it is easily manipulated on a
computer.

The problem with digital vs. film is the same as CD vs. LP. In order to
match the smoothness of analog, you need a very high sample rate. In
theory, 44.1/16 is enough for audio, but the trend now seems to be to
96/24 or higher. Frankly, with my old ears, 44.1 is enough if done
right.

I'm not sure if anybody has concluded on large format photography. 80
Mp seems to be getting pretty close for 645. I have a 6 Mp DX camera
that satisfies me in comparison to 35 mm negative film, but slide film
seems to need more. I suspect the current 20 Mp range cameras are
enough, although I don't know about sharpness issues. People might
argue over color but not over the ability to resolve detail. School is
still out on that in the larger formats.

[bob]

On Jan 28, 10:15=A0am, Scott wrote:
On Jan 27, 6:14=3DA0pm, bob wrote:

In my alternative universe, the high-end rags would have embraced the
potential of CD, and then demanded that it live up to that potential,
rather than insisting that the answer lay in either higher resolution
or retro technology. Also, Michael Fremer would have wound up in a
dead-end job at Best Buy, where he could have made a greater
contribution to the social good than he has in reality.

You don't need an alternative universe for that. The underground rags
did exactly that. They embraced the potential but were critical of the
poor results. But at the same time the "retro technology" offered
better sound. So what are the rags supposed to do?

What they should have done is told the truth to their readers about
*why* CD sound quality was sub-par. But that would have been very bad
for business.

bob

[bob]

On Jan 28, 10:15=A0am, Audio Empire wrote:

On Fremer. I'll admit that his one-note-samba is a bit tiresome, but on t=
he
other hand, he or someone like him is needed to keep their fingers on the
pulse of all things vinyl because most reviewers and audio journalists do=
n't
want to. I say read his stuff for the information therein, and take his
"vinyl is IT" philosophy with a grain of salt. =A0

But he doesn't know anything about vinyl, except for the pricetags on
the gear. Everything he writes derives from that. How could you regard
someone who insists that vinyl has higher resolution than CD as even
marginally informative? He doesn't appear to even know what wow &
flutter is--and he certainly doesn't care how bad it is, as long as
the price is high enough.

Look, I would love to see some effort to evaluate analog gear in a
semi-objective manner. The ravings of a dimwitted nutjob are no
substitute.

bob

[vlad]

On Jan 28, 7:15=A0am, Scott wrote:

[ Quotation cleanup. Please be a little more careful,
everyone, we don't like doing this -- dsr ]


wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of audio. He
wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound because they have
"infinite resolution". I cancelled my subscription to this rag
immediately. It was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not worth reading.

vlad

[Andrew Haley]

Scott wrote:
On Jan 28, 7:13am, Andrew Haley
wrote:
Audio Empire wrote:
I know a local photographer who uses a 4 X 5 sheet-film camera that
is fitted with a scanning digital back (from Leaf, I believe)
connected directly to a laptop to capture the gigapixels of raw data
that the camera produces. While his finished landscape photos are
spectacular, they look "different" from the same shot on sheet
Ektachrome or Fujichrome (he always makes a film exposure of the
same shot - it's easy, just swap the digital back for a film
holder). The film has more contrast and richer, more saturated
colors.

Indeed it does, and there's a parallel with audio here. That
contrasty highly-saturated look is a bit like the "smiley EQ" and
compression loved by record producers -- pretty it may be, but
accurate it ain't. I remember one wag who on seeing Michael Fatali's
photographs said "That's not God's own light, that's Fujichrome's own
Velvia!" Digital, on the other hand, is linear, or can be once you
find all the curves and filters in the workflow and turn them off.
Once you've done that it's regular, stable, and repeatable, and
*accurate*, just like digital audio can be. (I am rather sensitive to
this issue, because one of my jobs is copying paintings for
reproduction. If you want to be able to compare an original and a
print side-by-side on a wall under bright lights, the last thing you
want is a contrast and saturation boost.)

I know this is off topic but this is simply a load of misinformation
about color and contrast accuracy. Velvia is hardly the only film
stock in the world of film. And digital is anything but color
accurate. There is yet to be a digital color profile that begins to
represent the color palette of the real world. Neither film nor
digital imaging can match the contrast or color range of real life
but film still covers more of it.

Hold on one moment: I didn't suggest that any imaging device could
represent the entire visible gamut. I didn't suggest that any digital
imaging device had a larger gamut or contrast range than any film. I
disagree that "digital is anything but color accurate": it's not
perfect, of course, but from the point of view of repro work it's
linear and repeatable, and can be accurate if done right. Also,
digital (is there any other kind?) colour profiles certainly can
represent all visible colours, even though no physical device can.

My point was that the films popular for landscape photography are not
accurate *because they are not designed to be*. Very much like CD
mastering, in other words.

Andrew.

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 10:59:30 -0800, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 10:15=A0am, Scott wrote:
On Jan 27, 6:14=3DA0pm, bob wrote:

In my alternative universe, the high-end rags would have embraced the
potential of CD, and then demanded that it live up to that potential,
rather than insisting that the answer lay in either higher resolution
or retro technology. Also, Michael Fremer would have wound up in a
dead-end job at Best Buy, where he could have made a greater
contribution to the social good than he has in reality.

You don't need an alternative universe for that. The underground rags
did exactly that. They embraced the potential but were critical of the
poor results. But at the same time the "retro technology" offered
better sound. So what are the rags supposed to do?

What they should have done is told the truth to their readers about
*why* CD sound quality was sub-par. But that would have been very bad
for business.

bob


They might not know any better. For instance, I only realized how good CD
could sound after actually MAKING CDs from material that I recorded and KNEW
what the original sounds like. Before that, I assumed that CDs sounded as bad
as most do because the of the limitations of the medium itself. Now I realize
that it's not the medium. Maybe the people in the "underground media", not
having dome the experiment, don't know that CD quality is sub-par because
they were made that way, not because they have to be that way.

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:13:24 -0800, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 10:15=A0am, Audio Empire wrote:

On Fremer. I'll admit that his one-note-samba is a bit tiresome, but on t=
he
other hand, he or someone like him is needed to keep their fingers on the
pulse of all things vinyl because most reviewers and audio journalists do=
n't
want to. I say read his stuff for the information therein, and take his
"vinyl is IT" philosophy with a grain of salt. =A0

But he doesn't know anything about vinyl, except for the pricetags on
the gear. Everything he writes derives from that. How could you regard
someone who insists that vinyl has higher resolution than CD as even
marginally informative? He doesn't appear to even know what wow &
flutter is--and he certainly doesn't care how bad it is, as long as
the price is high enough.

He shows me what's available out there. Stuff that I might not ever hear
about were it not for his (or someone like his) efforts. I agree that he
speaks with a certain technical naivete, but Like I said, I take those
comments with a grain of salt.

Look, I would love to see some effort to evaluate analog gear in a
semi-objective manner. The ravings of a dimwitted nutjob are no
substitute.

I don't disagree. I'm merely saying that Fremer seems to be the only US audio
writer who has picked up the cudgels of analog audio. IOW, without him, we'd
have nothing, as far as I can see.

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 7:15=A0am, Scott wrote:

[ Quotation cleanup. Please be a little more careful,
everyone, we don't like doing this -- dsr ]


wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of audio. He
wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound because they have
"infinite resolution". I cancelled my subscription to this rag
immediately. It was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not worth reading.

vlad


In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is not confined by a
fixed word length and sample rate, it does, indeed, have infinite resolution.
Where he errs here is that his comparison is flawed. Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz. In the overall scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that
portion of it that we call sound is very finite indeed.

But to expand on Fremer's comment, look at digital as a container, a box if
you will, and let's look at the analog music signal as a book. Now, if you
try to put the book in a box that's too small, it won't fit without trimming
away some of the book (and losing some of the information therein), but if
you you get a larger box, the book will fit perfectly. Larger still, and the
box can still contain the complete book, but all you actually need is a box
in which the book will fit perfectly. Now here's what I believe Michael
Fremer is trying to say. Let's say that you've a warehouse full of boxes that
are all the same size (that's the 16-bit/44.1 KHz or CD digital format). It
is clear that that box has a finite capacity, On the other hand, the books
can be any size, any number of pages. Some will fit in your boxes and others
won't fit without cutting away some of the book. IOW, the books can be an
infinite variety of sizes, with an infinite number of pages in them -
restricted only by the practicality of the printing and binding technologies.
But the box is finite in that it is only so wide, so long, and so deep. Now
the error here is in not realizing that there a number of different box sizes
and you can find one in which almost any size book will fit. There is
8-bit/32 KHz (a very small box), there is 16-bit/44.1 KHz (a bigger box,
adequate for most books), 16-bit/ 48 KHz (a bit bigger) 16-bit/88.2 Khz,
24-bit/88.2 Khz, 24-bit/96 KHz, 24-bit/176.4 KHz, and the biggest box
commonly in use, 24-bit/192 KHz.

I realize that this analogy too is flawed, but I think it gets the idea
across that while one could say that analog (in a manner of speaking), has an
infinite number of "samples", and that the capacity of the standard CD
digital system is fixed and at a rate that is considerably short of infinite,
it is nonetheless ample in its "finite-ness" to adequately contain the music
that humans can hear.

[bob]

On Jan 28, 3:30=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 10:59:30 -0800, bob wrote
(in article ):

What they should have done is told the truth to their readers about
*why* CD sound quality was sub-par. But that would have been very bad
for business.

bob

They might not know any better.

Then they are in the wrong line of work. And obviously no one should
take them seriously, unless they're into fantasy as a genre.

bob

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 07:14:42 -0800, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Ed Seedhouse" wrote in message


I was alive at the time with access to magazines that
discussed the differences between 78's and 33's.

As was I. Admittedly I found most of those magazines in storage or used book
stores.

Then there were the controversies of triode versus pentode, transformer
coupling versus capacitor coupling, bass reflex versus acoustic suspension,
Ultra linear taps on output transformers, horns versus direct radiators,
mono versus stereo, tubes versus transistors, etc.

And it is just a fact that there were plenty of letters in
magazines extolling the virtues of the former and the
deficiencies of the latter. The debate went on issue
after issue in, if I recall rightly, the pages of
"Wireless world", the premier British electronics
magazine and every time I come across today's "CD's suck
and tubes sound ever so much better" tirades in today's
fashionable rags, I am reminded afresh of the 78 vs 33
debates from all those years ago.

I still remember the first time I ran into someone who had assidiously
avoided the conversion from mono to stereo.

Funny story. When I was 17, I worked as a stereo salesman one summer in a
prestigious audio "salon" (we didn't call them high-end stores in those days.
Component audio WAS high end. Period.) in Washington DC called MyerEmco. One
afternoon, a large blustery fellow came storming into the store. It was
obvious that he was head-up about something and I approached him cautiously.
When I asked him what I could help him with, he launched into a tirade about
how MeyerEmco and all other audio shops were bilking the public by selling
them two of everything for this obvious boondoggle called "stereo". I tried
to explain how stereo worked and why it was "a good thing", but he would have
none of it. I even sat him down and played one of those gimmicky "ping-pong"
stereo recordings that were fashionable then. It clearly had two sets of
latin drums on either side of the "soundstage" that called and answered one
another. A left channel drum would speak and the right channel drum would
answer. Nobody could have missed the obvious separation between them. But
even though I could see this guy's eyes shift from left to right and back
again in response to the drums, he insisted that EXACTLY the same thing was
coming from both speakers. He then threatened to sue and to get the Federal
Trade Commission involved in stopping this "obvious fraud". I wandered away
as he continued to rail against stereo and eventually, realizing that nobody
in the store was listening to him any more, he left. To this day, I still
have NO idea what the bee in his bonnet was about.

[bob]

On Jan 28, 5:37=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:

I don't disagree. I'm merely saying that Fremer seems to be the only US a=
udio
writer who has picked up the cudgels of analog audio. IOW, without him, w=
e'd
have nothing, as far as I can see.

If you want to know what's out there, all you've got to do is go to
needledoctor or lpgear. And you'll be better informed than Fremer's
readers. His marginal utility is negative.

bob

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 07:16:17 -0800, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message


I don't really understand your seeming fascination with
the relevance of market size. The average "Joe" doesn't
care about quality at all (in much of anything) beyond
the concept of "adequate". Therefore any product which
caters to a market where quality (real or imagined) is
important, is going to be, by definition, a niche market.
Ferrari and Porsche occupy a niche market in the
automobile world. Laphroiag and Aberlore, as well as
Woodford Reserve and VanWinkle's occupy a niche market in
the whisky world. More people drink Budwieser than drink
Pilsn Urquell, and more people own Panasonic receivers
than own Audio Research equipment. These are all catering
to niche markets. It really doesn't matter what the hoi
polloi are doing or buying, or otherwise consuming.

I understand why someone wants to pay the big bucks to own a Porsche, or a
Ferrari. They are wonderful cars with great handing and performance. Their
cost is justified by the advanced technology that it takes to makes them do
what they do. 12 cylinders cost more than 6. Dual clutch drive trains cost
more than mass-produced lightweight automatics. All wheel drive costs more
than FWD. Turbochargers and superchargers cost more than natural
aspiration. Ultra wide 200 mph tires cost more than average width 120 mph
tires.

I don't understand why someone would want to pay big bucks for retro
technology with vastly reduced performance and built-in inconvenience,
except for reasons of pure emotion such as sentimentality.

That's clear, but beside the point. The point is that these niche markets
exist because there are people who want those products. For the sake of this
discussion, it doesn't really matter why. Someone found a "need" in the
marketplace and filled it. That this "need" existed and continues to exist is
witnessed by the fact that the market thrives. The fact that it is
overshadowed by some other, similar technology, is really neither here nor
there.

So much for Audio
Research electronics and Linn turntables. My Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs (total cost: less than 60 dollars) sounds as good if not better, and
does so both in a campsite on Lake Superior or in my listening room.

Again, that's fine for you, but since you aren't the center of the known
universe (at least I don't THINK that you are), complaining about how other
people view these subjects or what they choose to believe about the
technology that leads them to niche markets within the overall marketplace,
is really irrelevant. I realize that the temptation to be my brothers' keeper
is strong in most of us. I, myself, often find myself preaching to others
about "wire sound" (or rather, the lack of it). I feel somewhat compelled to
tell people to save their money for things that do make a difference, such as
speakers or room treatments, but in the end, I usually find myself butting my
head against a concrete wall. The people who are convinced that cables have a
"sound" continue to be so convinced, and all I have accomplished is to ****
somebody off.

Excellent sound with utter convenience is hard to beat, especially at one
100th or one 1,000th of the price. The big downside to the Sansa: no
bragging rights, just good music. I could show it to you in my hand and you
might not notice it!

But what relevance does this have to your penchant for rather vocally (and
arrogantly, I might add) dismissing niche markets that give others so much
pleasure on so many levels?

High-end audio is supposed to be about getting the best
sound from recorded music that's possible.

Those days passed several decades ago when the high end audio business
turned into a freak show of non-sonic so-called improvements and expensive
gear that any honest technical analysis would say is either vastly
overpriced, mediocre or even abject failures.

Even were that true (and I don't see that it is), the stated purpose of the
hobby remains the same (at least with SOME of us).

And if vinyl,
SACD, DVD-A or hi-res downloads provide that and the
commercial CD, aimed at the mass market doesn't because
their marketing priorities are different, then that in no
way diminishes the importance of these "niche" products
that you seem to so offhandedly dismiss.

That's just it, vinyl, performs more poorly while SACD and DVD-A perform at
the same subjective level as the humble CD.

I disagree about SACD and other high-resolution formats. They do not perform
at the same subjective level as the "humble CD". Just because you don't
notice any difference,doesn't mean that others don't as well.

They are like Porsches and
Ferraris that are matched or outperformed on a road course by my Mercury
Milan. Of course in the real world of cars, Porsches and Ferraris can easily
walk away from my humble Milan. No Porsches and Ferraris that get their
doors blown off my a 6-cylinder FWD mass-market sedan exist except as
classic cars and that gets back to sentimentality. That much reason still
rules the world of automobiles.

But that's OK too. See, I appreciate the performance of modern super cars,
but frankly, I'd rather have a 1938 Mille Miglia Alfa Romeo roadster or a
1955 Jaguar D-Type than the latest Ferrari. Likewise, FLAC or ALC compressed
music on a server might be more convenient and might have higher potential
technical performance than an LP, but sometimes I'd rather listen to the LP
or the CD and hold the cover or jewelbox in my hands.

Your opinions are just that, Arny, your opinions. While on some level, they
might be more informed than my opinions or someone else's opinions, they are
yours and I believe that at least some of your opinions are based upon
personal biases of yours that others here (including me) don't share, as well
as some that simply aren't even true (like that all modern solid-state
amplifiers, regardless of price, sound the same).

You find LP worthless. Others don't.
You see no merit to most high-end components. Others see lots of merit in
many of them.
You seem to think that CD is perfect because it has been adopted by the whole
music-buying world. I say that in its current commercial form, its FAR from
perfect. It's been adopted universally because Its WHAT WE'VE GOT, and not
for any technological reason (although, it is TECHNOLOGICALLY superior to
analog, in practice it, more often than not, falls far short of the mark).

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 14:37:05 -0800, ScottW wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 9:07=A0am, Scott wrote:

In the real world of audio my Forsell/Koetsu/ARC/Soundlabs with my
collection of LPs walks away from your Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs If one is looking for an illusion of live music in their
playback.

Only in placement of the image to be in front of you which you
obviously require for the illusion to be complete.
Many people can be quite satisfied with the illusion headphones (or
IEMs) can create. Not too mention that they are typically more
revealing with better FR, imaging resolution, and noise level than
speakers.

I am looking for that. I am all about the aesthetic
experience. That is why I spend the extra money on the stuff I have.

That's fine. It's your subjective preference and that's all that
matters to you.
Someone else may prefer the Sansa and as far as I can tell, you have
no meaningful basis for rejecting their preference.
Your preference alone does not define the "real world of audio".

ScottW


It's basically a function of one's involvement with the music. Many people
just want to hear the tunes. Others want to hear the music in all its glory.
They want to either transport themselves to the concert hall, or bring the
concert hall into their living rooms. Either way, they need a more immersive
experience than just hearing the tunes. Some like to feel music impact on
their bodies, others don't care about that. Neither is right, neither is
wrong, but the latter seems more indicative of what being an audio enthusiast
is all about.

[vlad]

On Jan 28, 8:47=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 7:15=3DA0am, Scott wrote:

wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of audio. He
wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound because they have
"infinite resolution". I cancelled my subscription to this rag
immediately. It was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not worth reading.

vlad

In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is not confined by a
fixed word length and sample rate, it does, indeed, have infinite resolution.
Where he errs =A0here is that his comparison is flawed. Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz. In the overall scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that
portion of it that we call sound is very finite indeed.

But to expand on Fremer's comment, look at digital as a container, a box if
you will, and let's look at the analog music signal as a book. Now, if you
try to put the book in a box that's too small, it won't fit without trimming
away some of the book (and losing some of the information therein), but if
you you get a larger box, the book will fit perfectly. Larger still, and the
box can still contain the complete book, but all you actually need is a box
in which the book will fit perfectly. Now here's what I believe Michael
Fremer is trying to say. Let's say that you've a warehouse full of boxes that
are all the same size (that's the 16-bit/44.1 KHz or CD digital format). It
is clear that that box has a finite capacity, On the other hand, the books
can be any size, any number of pages. Some will fit in your boxes and others
won't fit without cutting away some of the book. IOW, the books can be an
infinite variety of sizes, with an infinite number of pages in them -
restricted only by the practicality of the printing and binding technologies.
But the box is finite in that it is only so wide, so long, and so deep. Now
the error here is in not realizing that there a number of different box sizes
and you can find one in which almost any size book will fit. There is
8-bit/32 KHz (a very small box), there is 16-bit/44.1 KHz (a bigger box,
adequate for most books), 16-bit/ 48 KHz (a bit bigger) 16-bit/88.2 Khz,
24-bit/88.2 Khz, 24-bit/96 KHz, 24-bit/176.4 KHz, and the biggest box
commonly in use, 24-bit/192 KHz.

I realize that this analogy too is flawed,

It is not flawed , it is grossly incorrect, making this analogy
worthless. CD is not a container and analog is not a book. So all you
poetic waxing has no meaning. If you will take a text book on theory
of information/digital audio you will learn from there that signal
always has a limited amount of information in it. The resolution of
the analog signal is defined by a noise level in it. Transmission
channel (LP in this case) adds its own noise, lowering resolution of
the signal.

vlad

[quoted text deleted -- deb]

[Scott[_6_]]

On Jan 28, 2:37=A0pm, ScottW wrote:
On Jan 28, 9:07=3DA0am, Scott wrote:



In the real world of audio my Forsell/Koetsu/ARC/Soundlabs with my
collection of LPs walks away from your Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing
IEMs If one is looking for an illusion of live music in their
playback.

=A0Only in placement of the image to be in front of you

No, not only imaging.

which you
obviously require for the illusion to be complete.

Absolutely.


=A0Many people can be quite satisfied with the illusion headphones (or
IEMs) can create.

Sure, so what?


=A0Not too mention that they are typically more
revealing with better FR, imaging resolution, and noise level than
speakers.

"Imaging resolution?" "noise level?"


I am looking for that. I am all about the aesthetic
experience. That is why I spend the extra money on the stuff I have.

=A0That's fine. It's your subjective preference and that's all that
matters to you.
Someone else may prefer the Sansa and as far as I can tell, you have
no meaningful basis for rejecting their preference.

I am not rejecting their preference. I am simply stating the fact that
it is too far removed from an illusion of live acoustic music to allow
meaningful evaluations of things such as mastering in so far as they
convey an illusion of live acoustic music in playback.


Your preference alone does not define the "real world of audio".


Never said it did. But I am quite certain that my preferences favor an
objectively better illusion of live acoustic music than what one gets
from Arny's Sansa Clip+ and Altec-Lansing IEMs

[Andrew Haley]

Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 7:15=A0am, Scott wrote:

I guess because of [Fremer's] ignorance in technical matters of
audio. He wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound
because they have "infinite resolution". I cancelled my
subscription to this rag immediately. It was obvious to me that if
this kind of ignorance is allowed on pages of this mag, the mag
itself is not worth reading.

In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is not confined
by a fixed word length and sample rate, it does, indeed, have
infinite resolution. Where he errs here is that his comparison is
flawed. Analog IS finite, in that the sounds that human beings are
sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz to ~20 KHz. In the overall
scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that portion of it that we
call sound is very finite indeed.

But analogue audio doesn't have infinite resolution within the audio
band either: apart from anything else, the materials on which it is
recorded are not uniformly smooth but are formed of particles of
finite size, either vinyl molecules or magnetic domains.

Ultimately, noise limits resolution, and digital audio recording often
has less noise and higher resolution. There's a popular notion that
because digital audio operates in fixed steps it cannot represent fine
detail below the size of a single bit. This myth should have
destroyed by Vanderkooy and Lip****z's classic paper from 1989 [1] but
refuses to die among audiophile groups.

Andrew.


[1] J. Vanderkooy and S.P. Lip****z. 1989. Digital dither: Signal
processing with resolution far below the least significant
bit. Proc. AES 7th International Conference "Audio in Digital Times",
Toronto, Canada, May 14-17, 1989.

[Scott[_6_]]

On Jan 28, 11:13=A0am, bob wrote:
On Jan 28, 10:15=3DA0am, Audio Empire wrote:



On Fremer. I'll admit that his one-note-samba is a bit tiresome, but on=
t=3D
he
other hand, he or someone like him is needed to keep their fingers on t=
he
pulse of all things vinyl because most reviewers and audio journalists =
do=3D
n't
want to. I say read his stuff for the information therein, and take his
"vinyl is IT" philosophy with a grain of salt. =3DA0

But he doesn't know anything about vinyl, except for the pricetags on
the gear.

Really? Honestly this is kinda irresponsible posting. Michael Fremer
produced an instructional DVD on turntable set up. http://www.musicdirect.c=
om/product/79961
Is it your position that since Fremer "doesn't know anything about
viny" that this DVD is loaded with nothing but misinformation and
would lead to thosewho purchase this DVD and use it to incorrectly set
up their turntables? If he doesn't know anything he could hardly make
such a DVD without it being pure misinformation. Have you ever visited
his website? Have you ever read any of his record reviews?
http://www.musicangle.com/ Not sure how one can look at this website
and not see it's value just for the reporting on new releases and the
in depth coverage he gives those releases. But alas the man knows
nothing but price tags so those in depth reviews must be filled with
make believe and mis information and has no value to audiophiles.


Everything he writes derives from that.

Really everything? So everything he wrote in this in depth review that
gives a history of the music, the artist, the venues and many other
things is all derived from the idea that" vinyl is it" and has no real
information that could be of interest to audiophiles? Really?

How could you regard
someone who insists that vinyl has higher resolution than CD as even
marginally informative?


Oh I don't know maybe this stuff is marginally informative

"Completed in 1956, the thirteen-story circular monument to Nat =93King=94
Cole=92s success known as the Capitol Records building still stands near
the corner of Hollywood and Vine, probably on firmer ground than the
company for which it=92s named=97and that=92s in an earthquake zone
(rimshot)!

It=92s referred to as =93the house that Nat built=94 because much of the
money came from Cole=92s phenomenal success as a recording artist. It
was Nat=92s house though some of the other artists on the label at that
time included Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Judy Garland, Tennessee
Ernie Ford, Louis Prima and Keely Smith and of course Mickey Katz and
Stan Freeberg, whose parodies of hit songs and television shows were
wildly popular. That=92s how big Nat =93King=94 Cole was.

Cole=92s Capitol recording career began at 78rpm and ended in 33 1/3
stereo, with 10=94 and then 12=94 mono LPs in between. This two decade-
spanning set originally issued in 1961 featured 36 Cole favorites re-
recorded in stereo using then (and now IMO) state of the art gear in
Capitol=92s legendary Studios.

Though Cole began as a jazz pianist in a unique guitar, bass, piano
trio he created, he also occasionally sang. Over time his velvety, yet
somehow simultaneously gritty baritone vocalizing became more popular
with the public than his piano playing.

This set covers all of Cole=92s musical interests and accomplishments,
beginning, appropriately, with =93Straighten Up and Fly Right,=94 a cool,
self-penned number that was his Capitol debut and a big hit and
followed by Nat=92s equally cool cover of Bobby Troup=92s enduring =93(Get
Your Kicks on) Route 66."

He doesn't appear to even know what wow &
flutter is--and he certainly doesn't care how bad it is, as long as
the price is high enough.

Really? Fremer doesn't know what wow and flutter is? Sorry that is
absurd.


Look, I would love to see some effort to evaluate analog gear in a
semi-objective manner. The ravings of a dimwitted nutjob are no
substitute.

It's one thing to take issue with some of his claims. It's another to
dismiss the man completely as a journalist because you disagree with
him on certain beliefs. When one takes your assertions about what he
knows and does not know and then check the facts (I offered a small
sampling) it becomes pretty clear that you are completely
mischaracterizing Fremer's knowledge and his work as a journalist. Me
thinks you might want to check yourself before throwing insults like
dimwitted nutjob who knows nothing about vinyl playback other than
price tags. When you say these things about a guy who clearly writes
very informative reviews of records and CDs and has a very useful DVD
on how to set up your turntable...well....such claims look a bit like
ravings.

[Robert Peirce]

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

It's basically a function of one's involvement with the music. Many people
just want to hear the tunes. Others want to hear the music in all its glory.
They want to either transport themselves to the concert hall, or bring the
concert hall into their living rooms. Either way, they need a more immersive
experience than just hearing the tunes. Some like to feel music impact on
their bodies, others don't care about that. Neither is right, neither is
wrong, but the latter seems more indicative of what being an audio enthusiast
is all about.

I noticed years go that I could listen through the most god-awful
reproduction to get the music underneath. Think scratchy 78s played
through an AM radio. I didn't really care all that much about the
sound; I liked the music. Years later I discovered that a proper stereo
system had the capability to put all the players in a fixed spot,
side-to-side and front-to-back, and could deliver some of the impact of
a live performance. I liked that, too.

Today I still don't care all that much whether the signal is perfectly
flat and the noise is 90db down, as long as it is not boomy or hollow or
terribly noisy. For one thing, I discovered every hall sounds
different, so what is the absolute sound to which I should compare my
system? For me it is enough if it sounds right and the artists are
positioned properly. I spent a fair amount of money to achieve that. I
don't see the sense in spending a lot more to eek out a small
improvement from a deficient source, whether AM, FM, XM, tape, CD or LP.
I can enjoy them all for what they are.

[Arny Krueger]

"Scott" wrote in message


On Jan 28, 11:13 am, bob wrote:

On Jan 28, 10:15=A0am, Audio Empire
wrote:

On Fremer. I'll admit that his one-note-samba is a bit
tiresome, but on t=
he
other hand, he or someone like him is needed to keep
their fingers on the pulse of all things vinyl because
most reviewers and audio journalists do=
n't
want to. I say read his stuff for the information
therein, and take his "vinyl is IT" philosophy with a
grain of salt. =A0

But he doesn't know anything about vinyl, except for the
pricetags on the gear.

Really? Honestly this is kinda irresponsible posting.
Michael Fremer
produced an instructional DVD on turntable set up.
http://www.musicdirect.com/product/79961

Since this is not a public source, we have no idea about the contents of the
DVD.

Is it your position that since Fremer "doesn't know
anything about
viny" that this DVD is loaded with nothing but
misinformation and
would lead to thosewho purchase this DVD and use it to
incorrectly set up their turntables?

Given all of the other faulty information that can be traced to Fremer, the
contents of the DVD need to be checked out by a non-fanboy.

If he doesn't know anything he could hardly make
such a DVD without it being pure misinformation.

Excluded middle argument. I don't think that anybody seriously means that
Fremer knows absolutely and totally nothing. "doesn't know anything about
vinyl" relates to the fact that some or much of the information he promotes
about vinyl is completely and totally wrong.

Have you ever visited his website?

Yes, it barely has one month of material.

Have you ever read any of his record reviews?

He seems to affect hyperbole.

[Robert Peirce]

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz. In the overall scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that
portion of it that we call sound is very finite indeed.

I don't think I go much over 10-12K anymore!

[Arny Krueger]

"Audio Empire" wrote in message

On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 7:15=A0am, Scott wrote:

[ Quotation cleanup. Please be a little more careful,
everyone, we don't like doing this -- dsr
]


wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not
sure why you decided to end with some irrelevant
personal attack on Michael Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of
audio. He wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better
sound because they have "infinite resolution". I
cancelled my subscription to this rag immediately. It
was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not
worth reading.

In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is
not confined by a fixed word length and sample rate, it
does, indeed, have infinite resolution.

The resolution of *either* a digital or an analog channel is limited by its
dynamic range. Shannon's Information Theory applies here.

According to Shannon, the dynamic range of an analog signal is establ;ished
by its residual noise(s) which is always there.
The dynamic range of a digital channel is limited by its residual noise,
which is indirectly set by the number of bits. The number of bits determines
the amount of dither that has to be added. The noise that is added due to
dither is essentially the irreducible residual noise of the digital channel.

Since LP playback has far more residual noise (usually no more than 65 dB
down) than 16 bits properly dithered (about 93 dB down), the LP always has
far poorer dynamic range. Therefore, the LP's resolution is always less
than that of a well-made CD. A similar argument applies to anything that is
analog whether its an analog tape recorder or a microphone.

The dynamic range of a signal from a LP is also limited by a different kind
of residual noise known as spurious responses, which are due to nonlinear
distortion, either harmonic distortion (AM distortion) or flutter and wow
(FM distortion). Those are usually on the order of only 40 or 50 dB down.

Thus a CD has about twice the resolution of a LP using a logarithmic scale,
or about 100 times the resolution using a linear scale.

[Audio Empire]

On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 06:22:53 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 8:47=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 7:15=3DA0am, Scott wrote:

wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of audio. He
wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound because they have
"infinite resolution". I cancelled my subscription to this rag
immediately. It was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not worth reading.

vlad

In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is not confined by a
fixed word length and sample rate, it does, indeed, have infinite
resolution.
Where he errs =A0here is that his comparison is flawed. Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz. In the overall scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that
portion of it that we call sound is very finite indeed.

But to expand on Fremer's comment, look at digital as a container, a box if
you will, and let's look at the analog music signal as a book. Now, if you
try to put the book in a box that's too small, it won't fit without trimming
away some of the book (and losing some of the information therein), but if
you you get a larger box, the book will fit perfectly. Larger still, and the
box can still contain the complete book, but all you actually need is a box
in which the book will fit perfectly. Now here's what I believe Michael
Fremer is trying to say. Let's say that you've a warehouse full of boxes
that
are all the same size (that's the 16-bit/44.1 KHz or CD digital format). It
is clear that that box has a finite capacity, On the other hand, the books
can be any size, any number of pages. Some will fit in your boxes and others
won't fit without cutting away some of the book. IOW, the books can be an
infinite variety of sizes, with an infinite number of pages in them -
restricted only by the practicality of the printing and binding
technologies.
But the box is finite in that it is only so wide, so long, and so deep. Now
the error here is in not realizing that there a number of different box
sizes
and you can find one in which almost any size book will fit. There is
8-bit/32 KHz (a very small box), there is 16-bit/44.1 KHz (a bigger box,
adequate for most books), 16-bit/ 48 KHz (a bit bigger) 16-bit/88.2 Khz,
24-bit/88.2 Khz, 24-bit/96 KHz, 24-bit/176.4 KHz, and the biggest box
commonly in use, 24-bit/192 KHz.

I realize that this analogy too is flawed,

It is not flawed , it is grossly incorrect, making this analogy
worthless. CD is not a container and analog is not a book. So all you
poetic waxing has no meaning. If you will take a text book on theory
of information/digital audio you will learn from there that signal
always has a limited amount of information in it. The resolution of
the analog signal is defined by a noise level in it. Transmission
channel (LP in this case) adds its own noise, lowering resolution of
the signal.

vlad

[quoted text deleted -- deb]


It was an analogy, have you never heard of an analogy, a simplified way of
describing a very complex situation or process by using another, more
familiar point of reference? It was not supposed to be literal.

[Audio Empire]

On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 10:36:22 -0800, Robert Peirce wrote
(in article ):

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

It's basically a function of one's involvement with the music. Many people
just want to hear the tunes. Others want to hear the music in all its
glory.
They want to either transport themselves to the concert hall, or bring the
concert hall into their living rooms. Either way, they need a more
immersive
experience than just hearing the tunes. Some like to feel music impact on
their bodies, others don't care about that. Neither is right, neither is
wrong, but the latter seems more indicative of what being an audio
enthusiast
is all about.

I noticed years go that I could listen through the most god-awful
reproduction to get the music underneath. Think scratchy 78s played
through an AM radio. I didn't really care all that much about the
sound; I liked the music. Years later I discovered that a proper stereo
system had the capability to put all the players in a fixed spot,
side-to-side and front-to-back, and could deliver some of the impact of
a live performance. I liked that, too.

Today I still don't care all that much whether the signal is perfectly
flat and the noise is 90db down, as long as it is not boomy or hollow or
terribly noisy. For one thing, I discovered every hall sounds
different, so what is the absolute sound to which I should compare my
system? For me it is enough if it sounds right and the artists are
positioned properly. I spent a fair amount of money to achieve that. I
don't see the sense in spending a lot more to eek out a small
improvement from a deficient source, whether AM, FM, XM, tape, CD or LP.
I can enjoy them all for what they are.

I think your experience is pretty common to a lot of audio enthusiasts. Now,
in my case, on the other hand, I was nuts about electronics when I was a kid.
This led me in two directions at once HAM radio and Hi-Fi. I am still, all
these years later, extremely interested in audio, but somewhere along the
way, amateur radio lost it's grip on me. The difference, I think, is the
music. Music held my interest in a way that communication over long
distances, via radio, never could.

[Robert Peirce]

In article , bob
wrote:

What they should have done is told the truth to their readers about
*why* CD sound quality was sub-par. But that would have been very bad
for business.

I have been reading Stereophile and The Absolute Sound for years. It
took them a long time to figure out what the truth was, assuming they
know for sure today. All they knew was that it wasn't right, something
even I could hear early on. As they have learned more they have
expounded on what they thought was the problem. They may still not be
telling the truth, but if so, it is because they don't know it not
because they are dishonest.

[Arny Krueger]

"Scott" wrote in message


Depends on how one measures success or failure.

Which in turn depends on the criteria used to judge success or failure.

If one is measuring success by the ability of the equipment to
create an aural illusion of live music the high end gear
wins hands down and the Sansa clip with the IEMs is the
abject failure.

What criteria is being used here - some reliable standard or something
completely subjective?

[Audio Empire]

On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 09:11:01 -0800, Dick Pierce wrote
(in article ):

Audio Empire wrote:
On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 11:25:52 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):


On Jan 28, 7:15=A0am, Scott wrote:

wers supposed to do. They reported what they heard. Not sure why you
decided to end with some irrelevant personal attack on Michael
Fremer.

I guess because of his ignorance in technical matters of audio. He
wrote once in Stereophile that LP has better sound because they have
"infinite resolution". I cancelled my subscription to this rag
immediately. It was obvious to me that if this kind of ignorance is
allowed on pages of this mag, the mag itself is not worth reading.


In the way he meant it - that unlike digital, analog is not confined by a
fixed word length and sample rate, it does, indeed, have infinite
resolution.

NO, IT DOES NOT HAVE INFINITE RESOLUTION. This is totally, utterly,
completely false.

While an analog system can output ANY signal level at any instant,
It CANNOT EVER encode any signal level at any instant and return it
without loss. It cannot "resolve" any arbitrary signal with infinite
precision. (And, of ny the way, this is also exactly true of AMY
properly implemented discrete time sampled system as well).

The total resolutin of ANY system, be it analo digital or
whatever, is set by two limits: bandwidth and dynamic range.
Period.

If you or anyone else wants to challenge this, go for it. But
be prepared to defend that rather extraordinary precision with
the same scientific and mathematical rigor that people such
as Nyquist and Shannon and many others have done extending
back over the last 75 years or so.

The statement that analog has "infinite resolution" is simply
wrong.

Where he errs here is that his comparison is flawed. Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz.

And you have the ambiguation of the noise floor which kills
the ability to resolve below a certain quite definable level at
one end, and you have the ceiling set by the maximum encodable
signal at the top end limiting it as well.

Both bandwidth AND the dynamic rqange between that noise floor
and the maximum output limit the resolving power of the system.

But to expand on Fremer's comment, look at digital as a container, a box if
you will, and let's look at the analog music signal as a book.

Already the analogy is flawed from the get-go.

To spare moderator's quoting angst, I will leave the
details out.

I realize that this analogy too is flawed, but I think it gets the idea
across that while one could say that analog (in a manner of speaking), has
an
infinite number of "samples",

Your analogy is fatally flawed. You're ignoring the analogous
effect of noise that EVERY system inevitably and intrinsically
has: the effect is to smear the printing, cause pages to go
missing, adding mispelling and so on.

Regardless, NO system has an infinite amount of anything.
For ANY system to have infinite resolution, if would have
to have infinite bandwidth and infinite dynamic range. That
leads to some physical absurdities. Taking simply the time-
frequency uincertainty principle, for it to have infinite
bandwidth, it must exist for infinite time. For it to be
able to change its state in an infinitesimal period of
time requires infinite energy. It must have NO noise at
all, which means that it's temperature must be at absolute
zero, and it must be able to convey infinitely large
signal states, which, again, requires infinite energy.

You put ANY constraints on all those infinities, and the
system, no longer has infite resolution.

Nyquist and Shannon showed, in 1927 and 1950 respectively,
that ANY system's resolution, or unambiguous informatiuon
capacity, is is essentially a fairly simple function of
the bandwidth and the dynamic range of the system.

Again, if you or anyone want to dispute that, you had
better be prepared to dispute it with the same rigor that
these and other practitioners mad etheir formulations.

and that the capacity of the standard CD
digital system is fixed and at a rate that is
considerably short of infinite,

JUST LIKE ANY AND EVERY ANALOG SYSTEM.

it is nonetheless ample in its "finite-ness" to
adequately contain the music that humans can hear.



Yes Mr. Pierce, we all realize how much you know about this subject, but is
your zeal to show-off, you have managed to TOTALLY miss the point here. My
analogy was just that. An attempt to explain the idea that I think Fremer was
trying to get across when he said that analog is infinite. I was neither
trying to explain how digital worked nor making any odious comparisons. Yes,
it was simplistic (as is Fremer's statement) but that's what I was describing
- Fremer's simplistic idea of the difference between analog and digital and
why he might see it that way. Sheesh, doesn't anybody read these posts for
MEANING any more?

[Audio Empire]

On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 13:48:00 -0800, Robert Peirce wrote
(in article ):

In article ,
Audio Empire wrote:

Analog IS finite, in
that the sounds that human beings are sensitive to are confined from ~20 Hz
to ~20 KHz. In the overall scheme of the electromagnetic spectrum, that
portion of it that we call sound is very finite indeed.

I don't think I go much over 10-12K anymore!


Me either 8^(

I was just talking about what is generally considered to be the (ideal?)
limits of human hearing.

[Rockinghorse Winner[_6_]]

* It may have been the liquor talking, but
Andrew Haley wrote:

Scott wrote:
On Jan 25, 4:09=A0am, Andrew Haley
wrote:
Audio Empire wrote:
Surely, [passion for vinyl] has some root. We can't put it all down
to luddite-ism. Interest in LP is growing - even among the young who
weren't even around in LP's heyday. I recently got a newly released
integrated amplifier from a respected hi-end source which sports
both MM and MC cartridge inputs as well as a built-in 24-bit/192 KHz
dual differential DAC and an ADC (for record out)! So why is LP
still seen as a viable alternative to CD?

I don't think that we have to come up with any magical explanations
for some people liking or preferring vinyl, just as some people prefer
film to digital photography. =A0Vinyl is a pleasing little bit of
retro-technology, with attendant cleaning rituals and nice-looking
turntables;

This looks like a case of cherry picking a few reasons held by a few
people out of the many reasons held by many people to put a slant on
other peoples' preferneces. Indeed we do not need to look for
"magical" explanations. We can find many explanations that are
strictly due to sound quality and have nothing to do with nostolgia or
rituals. The large body of better mastered LPs is a very good and
common reason for such a preference along with the now well documented
euphonic distortions that can lead to a more convincing sense of
spaciousness, richness and realism.

I did allow for that preference when I wrote "And, just as vinyl has a
certain sound, film has a certain look, if you like that kind of
thing." I'm not really sure we even disagree. Vinyl has a certain
sound, and some people like it.

people like to use their beautiful old Pentaxes and Leicas
and Hasselblads too.

Of course they do. They still are the best tools and allow us to take
the best pictures in their respective areas of use.


And, just as vinyl has a certain sound, film has a certain look, if
you like that kind of thing.

This is a hasty generalization at best. The implication here seems to
be that digital imaging has surpassed film. This certainly is not the
case with motion picture film which still has greater resolution and a
superior dynamic range by two stops.

I disagree, but that's getting us way off-topic, so I'm going to leave
it at that. I don't want to try the moderator's patience with a
digression into the film-vs-digital flame war. We've had quite enough
of those in the photo groups. Suffice it to say that some people like
file cameras because they like the cameras and they like the look of
film, regardless of technical issues, and there's nothing wrong with
that.

Absolutely. It depends on the producers. I worked on a popular action TV
show. It was shot on film, because the producers preferred the look. Of
course, it was digitized in post-production, and digital effects added.
I think digital video has a certain look that may or may not appeal to
different folks. There is a definite 'graininess' to film that varies
depending on the film and developing lab.


When it gets serious, though, people are not so keen on the retro: if
you have a life-threatening infection you're not so likely to reject
antibiotics and insist on sulfonamides.

But it never gets "serious" in audio because we are talking aesthetic
preferences not life threatening illness. And with aesthetic
preferences subjective impressions are the rule. So your point has no
merit.

Well, perhaps. You're assuming that what really matters in audio is
aesthetic preferences, and technical issues such as measurable
accuracy are of no great consequence. But not everyone agrees with
that.

Andrew.


*R* *H*
--
Powered by Linux |/ 2.6.32.26-175 Fedora 12
"No spyware. No viruses. No nags." |/ 2.6.31.12-0.2 OpenSUSE 11.2
http://www.jamendo.com |/
"Preach the gospel always; when necessary use words." St. Francis

[Rockinghorse Winner[_6_]]

* It may have been the liquor talking, but
Kele wrote:

I agree with you; the rips (WAVs) I make from vinyl album to CD-R
sound better than store bought CDs to me. I don't have new music on
album so I can't say that the base on albums can go as low as store
bought late model CDs. I'm curious about that with recent music on a
good vynal playback system. I can hear that my CD-R rips are a little
compressed sounding compared to the album itself, but most store
boughts still fall short of as punchy live sounding. My guess is that
too much compression is applied to current CD music, or the media/
playback is doing it - not sure.


I think the difference is definitely in production. Some CD's I own, like
Buena Vista Social Club, are just spectacular. It seems when the producers
want to make a great sounding CD, they can.

*R* *H*
--
Powered by Linux |/ 2.6.32.26-175 Fedora 12
"No spyware. No viruses. No nags." |/ 2.6.31.12-0.2 OpenSUSE 11.2
http://www.jamendo.com |/
"Preach the gospel always; when necessary use words." St. Francis

[Rockinghorse Winner[_6_]]

* It may have been the liquor talking, but
Arny Krueger wrote:

I still remember the first time I ran into someone who had assidiously
avoided the conversion from mono to stereo.

I know someone who maintains that mono is the better sounding mode.

*R* *H*
--
Powered by Linux |/ 2.6.32.26-175 Fedora 12
"No spyware. No viruses. No nags." |/ 2.6.31.12-0.2 OpenSUSE 11.2
http://www.jamendo.com |/
"Preach the gospel always; when necessary use words." St. Francis

[Audio Empire]

On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 17:17:12 -0800, ScottW wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 29, 1:49 pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Sat, 29 Jan 2011 06:22:53 -0800, vlad wrote
(in article ):

On Jan 28, 8:47 pm, Audio Empire wrote:



It was an analogy, have you never heard of an analogy, a simplified way of
describing a very complex situation or process by using another, more
familiar point of reference? It was not supposed to be literal.

Words have meaning and there is a technical meaning for the word
resolution. All I get from this analogy is that some people don't know
the meaning of the word and start making stuff up rather than doing
just a little bit of homework on the subject.

ScottW

I'm not sure which of us you are addressing here, me or Vlad, but if you read
what I wrote, you will see that I didn't use the term resolution except to
repeat Fremer's assertion. Also, I was attempting to explain what I believe
that Fremer meant when he said that analog has "infinite resolution". I'm
not trying to explain digital audio, just explain where Fremer's simplistic
attitude might be coming from and where he might have come-up with it. I also
don't agree with his choice of words or his explanation, but I do at least
SEE where he's coming from. I'm sorry if my attempt to communicate that to
this forum has resulted in so much derision. I'll remember that in the
future.