Hogwash. The grooves of a good pressing can easily hold a minimum of 4x the resolution of redbook cd.
Even high-order DSD lacks the full resolution of the best pressings.
Can digital get to vinyl sound and at what price?
- Thread starter ScottK
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Hogwash. The grooves of a good pressing can easily hold a minimum of 4x the resolution of redbook cd.
Even high-order DSD lacks the full resolution of the best pressings.
This sound like my definition of resolution which is basically amount of information, in this case the information imbedded in the grooves.
i've always found it so interesting about that recording, one of the very best, sat around not brought to market for years. and so Analog Production was able to do a first pressing for that particular tape. no accident why it sounds so good.
The AP version - issued in 1993 - sounds good (I listened to the CD version only). The liner notes are a little confusing, as they state that they used "for the first time...the original two-track master tapes" - but in the liner notes to the 1985 stereo version they also mention those stereo master tapes being "found" recently. Regardless, I don't doubt that AP did a good job at transferring those tapes - they are quieter than the 1985 version.
You would be surprised by the amount of unreleased music out there - many in the hand of individual collectors. When you hear about it, and you can't listen to it, it certainly is frustrating!
I like the term tipping point. A conversation about just where the performance of digital components no longer have that electronic taste/digital signature would be interesting. Likely there are two tipping points. One where digital artifacts largely disappear and one where digital and analog playback sound practically identical. If that is possible?
Personally I enjoy listening to vinyl more but I do appreciate how far digital playback has come. My digital setup is more modest than many I see on this forum but I do find the sound quite acceptable. My vinyl setup sounds different and like you I would say it sounds more real, more live and more complete. There is just more "meat on the bone" if you like!
I can't say I can readily identify any digital artifacts in my system at this point however I am well aware that there are better digital components out there. A good friend has an Antipodes Oladra and his digital playback sounds better than mine. When he added a Lampizator the sound went to the next level! So is it better than analog? Well it sounds closer to a high quality vinyl setup which to me is a good thing. More recently he upgraded to a Horizon and it sounds exceptional in my opinion.
As I have been playing vinyl since the 60's it's part of me and my best quality recordings sound wonderful. It's quite likely I will always be a vinyl first kind of guy. Having said that listening to some of the better digital components out there makes me wonder if we will eventually come to a tipping point where digital will sound right to all and be able to replicate that analog signature.
The day you find those 1960s recordings in typical audiophile test playlists with digital systems, you'll have your answer.
Here's a recent example, picked up on another forum, of a playlist that forum members were raving about:
Listen to the playlist Chibom by filidan-pda0 on Qobuz https://open.qobuz.com/playlist/24446985
Rather than accept it, can you tell us which distortions re intentionally put in/onto the CD?
I don't have this album and will order the 1985 CD of discogs.
Regarding the quality of issues, I do have the 1985 Carrere CD release of Sonny Rollins "Way Out West", and the AP version mastered by Doug Sax.
Some people might say that the AP version is cleaner and more detailed, but to my mind the original is just much more engaging - less hifi - and sounds very much like my friends vinyl.
I don't know that I would stump up the $100+ for the AP of Ben Webster to do the comparison again.
There is so little technical info published on the internet that counters the established digital narrative, making it a difficult challenge for any of us to find. So there is nothing that I can point you to at this time.
Thank you for the link. Having difficulty bringing it up on Roon, my lack of knowledge on doing this no doubt. Although I do see the playlist on Qobuz.com.
I don't tend to pay much attention to typical audiophile playlists as many that I have heard are hit and miss as far as sound quality in my opinion. I did recognize many enjoyable and well produced selections in the playlist that you sent me. I will endeavour to listen to it on my system.
Well I am not sure I was really looking for an answer, just postulating on whether it might be possible that we will reach a tipping point where the sonic differences between analog and digital might be mute.
My 60's and 70's vinyl recording are important to me as they connect me with many personal memories, I wouldn't expect a younger listener to connect in the same way. Although I mostly enjoy recordings that are well produced and sound great it's not just about that! People connect to music for many reasons. I don't think that many of my favourite recordings will end up on what is essentially a sample of current music so although I think I get your point I don't know that it would provide the answer or signals a tipping point.
I think this is a flawed perspective. Just remember we all hear differently. A particular type of distortion maybe acceptable to you and unbearable to me.
To be honest, I'm not sure what I was trying to say with this myself. These audiophile playlists often have tracks that are very "clean", with few instruments - but that may simply be because those are the ones that can sound impressive more easily on a wide variety of speakers.
I also often wonder whether digital audio has reached its limits or whether more can be obtained from it. I believe some progress can still be made on the playback process (music servers and DACs). The name of the game seems to be noise reduction, something which is hard to achieve with electronic circuits, by definition. Perhaps someday we will see a technological breakthrough...
On the production side, there has been a lot of progress made since the start of digital audio, and that can be heard even with re-issues of older source material.
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If you care what Bernie Grundman thinks about digital and Cds check his other videos. He openly states that digital processes are not transparent, analog processes are much better in this regard.
i think if you were in my room and we were listening together, after a time once we aligned our ways of describing what we are hearing together (not a trivial process), that we would also align in our conclusions, but maybe not our preferences.
short of that any random viewpoint is possible. and i respect that apparently at this point we disagree.
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Yes, this is true. That's why LPs from the 1950s and 1960s can still fetch very high prices, while vintage CDs can't even be given away. The limitations still rest on the playback equipment. Optical cartridge is a breakthrough, but I suspect a lot more improvement of the playback chain is possible. But the mastering adds another layer of complexity and uncertainty. That's why I have a number of master tape copies of supposedly mediocre recordings (according to reviewers who had only listened to the LPs) that sound really amazing. I have made high rez DSD transfers of those tapes for friends, and they found these transfers much superior to any commercial format.
mm
For years now I’ve suspected that if there is one performance claim containing the least amount of hype perhaps in the history of high-end audio (and its volumes of hype) it’s probably the slogan “Perfect sound forever” used when they first released Redbook CD’s. Had the slogan read “Perfect enough sound forever” I’d venture there’d be little hype realized.
For example. Both of these songs are from a CD I purchased in I think 2008 at Walmart for $5.99 in a clearance bin. I also have many other similar CD’s.
Maybe others would toss these CD’s into the trash bin (not sure why) but to my ears both songs asuredly come across as musical enough for enjoyable listening. BTW, both songs are coming from my lowly $1300 OPPO 205 cdp that I’ve actually grown rather fond of.
A few pages back you also said, “The redbook CD files should not even be considered nowadays…” and frankly I’m unsure why somebody with your experience would say that?
You got any old vinyl or newer DSD pop pieces from this same era to share? If what you say about Redbook is true, I’d love to hear your musically superior alternatives.
Interesting. Can’t even give away old CD’s? Where do you guys come up with some of this stuff?
For years now I’ve suspected that if there is one performance claim containing the least amount of hype perhaps in the history of high-end audio (and its volumes of hype) it’s probably the slogan “Perfect sound forever” used when they first released Redbook CD’s. Had the slogan read “Perfect enough sound forever” I’d venture there’d be little hype realized.
For example. Both of these songs are from a CD I purchased in I think 2008 at Walmart for $5.99 in a clearance bin. I also have many other similar CD’s.
Maybe others would toss these CD’s into the trash bin (not sure why) but to my ears both songs asuredly come across as musical enough for enjoyable listening. BTW, both songs are coming from my lowly $1300 OPPO 205 cdp that I’ve actually grown rather fond of.
A few pages back you also said, “The redbook CD files should not even be considered nowadays…” and frankly I’m unsure why somebody with your experience would say that?
You got any old vinyl or newer DSD pop pieces from this same era to share? If what you say about Redbook is true, I’d love to hear your musically superior alternatives.
For one, Redbook CD standard came from an era where the power of supercomputers is outmatched by our smart phones today. And it is commonly acknowledged that the number of bits encoding low level signals in 16/44.1K PCM is inadequate, leading to a loss of fine details in these signals. This loss is not retrievable even with the highest end playback systems, thus rendering early digital recordings obsolete. You only need to compare early digital recordings with the analogue recordings made just a few years earlier to hear the difference. Putting aside the merit of individual performances, there is no reason for buying these early digital recordings.
Of course, in systems that do not have enough resolution to show a difference, these early CDs can still sound quite good.
I have some nice, not obsolete, early digital recordings on vinyl. It's remastering them for vinyl that makes them nice to listen to.
I have all the early (pre-digital) Dire Straits albums on master tapes, as well as Brothers in Arms. Once you have made the comparison, you would lament the fact that the band chose to make that album using a digital recorder.
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