Too Late For Analog?

[FrantzM]

Hi

I still find 131 dB extraordinary if not downright unlikely .. Care to show me the specs and how it was measured? It would suggest a signal to noise ratio (closely related to Dynamic Range of the same order of magnitude, I am not sure present days electronics are capable of such.
Far from me to claim I know it all and if you read my post, I added that the Crosstalk figure of CD is not sufficient to assert any overall superiority but on that parameter CD does and yes I know that 40 dB is all we need but indeed CD does more than we need ... This argument could be taken that we don't hear over 20 KHz especially those over 35 years old , a good portion of the forum members ...

Also I think I stressed that CD is the lowest in the Digital Hierarchy IMO one to which I listen at close to 99% but have stated that I am not sure it is superior to the better LP or especially to tape. I have added however that in the cases of some Mercury Living Presence I believe the CDs are at least equal and in some ways superior to their LP counterparts.
I also mentioned that HRx is the best I have heard in term of the reproduction of music. I have throughout this forum and others maintained that our current set of measurements does not seem to relate very well with perceived sound quality.
It remains however that the supreme analog medium R2R does measure very well with most of our current set of .. measurements ... R2R measures better than LP in all that matters. Tapes is inherently (objectively) better than LP, it does sound different no doubt and everyone would agree better than LP .. So measurements do explain very well why it is so ...
Now the best digital measure better than any analog medium ...

 

[silviajulieta]

Dear Franz: For now I only care of commercial format like LPs or CDs, R2R IMHO I think is not a today/current commercial format where there is almost no software.

Do you already thought which is the measure of crosstalk that we perceive in a live event like a music hall or a jazz club? maybe 30dbs? of course that depend on many factors like where are you seated and the like, because this is the important subject: what we hear and how we perceive it, it is not only measurements but very complex psycoacustic subject.

I could say that digital can measure better and the very first question that comes to my mind is: so what?

As I posted I enjoy CDs too, I'm not an analog guy not a digital one but a music lover and I use what is on hand to enjoy it.
I love some CDs like: The Thin Red Line or Memories of a Geisha or The Day After Tomorrow or Harem Sarah Brightman or Rendez Vous In-Grid and a lot more.

But when we are talking of CDs vs LPs overall quality performance I have to say that LP is a " little " better than CD and you don't need a SOTA analog rig but a decent one only.

Other digital format IMHO are different as other analog ones and not the subject here.

Btw, Franz you can't say that the Technics cartridge I refered in other post measure poor with a FR: 5hz to 120,000 Hz, IMHO for analog that is an achievment to name it in some way.

I believe in specs and measurements and I try to use them where I think can help me, example: amplifier output impedance, loudspeaker sensitivity and electrical impedance, RIAA eq. deviation, etc, etc, that help not to tell me how an audio item perform but if it is a good match or if I can find some " problems " or adding colorations/distortions because those item specs. I belive in science too because almost all that happen around us/the world has a scientific answer even if does not exist right now.

Even that you don't say it IMHO I think that we are talking and agree on almost the same subjects. I'm assuming that first than all you are a music lover too.

I forgot: +++++ " Tapes is inherently (objectively) better than LP, it does sound different no doubt and everyone would agree better than LP .. So measurements do explain very well why it is so ..." +++++

there are some factors that explain this fact better than measurements , one of those factors is that a R2R recorded music has no RIAA equalization where the signal must pass, so in R2R format there is less signal manipulation/stages/veils that can degrade the original signal As you say all people agree that R2R is better tan LP, good.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Greggad,

While I appreciate the considerable effort it must have taken to gather all of my wisdom together and present it here in a single post , it all comes from a thread that has been closed, and I don't wish to open it back up again in another place. But to summarize, the reason why I, and I assume others, have not listed specific measurements to support our contentions that good digital, even mediocre digital, exhibits flatter frequency response, lower noise and distortion, greater dynamic range, etc. than vinyl is probably because we consider it obvious, we know there is plenty of data available to support it, and we feel that, if someone wants to argue the superiority a technology that dates back to Edison and has been abandoned by all but a relatively small group of hobbyists, they bear the burden of proof.

Still, if the other thread were still open and active, I'd probably do the research for you, as I have the next couple of days off. I seriously doubt, however, that it would change any minds. It would only stir the pot that someone else has already put a lid on.

P

 

[FrantzM]

silviajulieta

We seem to agree more than we disagree. I am making sure , I am not misrepresented or misquoted.

I refuse to throw measurements out of the window when they illustrate a lot. R2R is one case

R2R also uses EQ: NAB, IEC and CCIR are the most common there are others...

 

[silviajulieta]

Dear Franz: No I don't misquoted your posts and understand your whole position.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

 

[silviajulieta]

Dear Phelonious Ponk: More than specs from digital my " worry " was that you states and speak about analog distortions with out tell us which ones and how degrade and how we perceive those " analog distortions ".

I posted here ( because the other thread was closed. ) some specs on analog audio items where at least for those specs we can think that analog has not all " those distortions " ( at least not si higher like you imply in your different posts. ) and even good things: don't you think?

I'm not " biased " I try hard not to be " biased " to CD or LP and I try to " understand " both formats and how I can take advantaje to enjoy the music. I like to " live " the music against hear/heard the music and I try it with any " tool/weapon that help me in a better way to achieve that target.

I like you use ( sometimes ) headphones to made very especial audio item tests but I don't use it for " live " and enjoy the music in its more wide meaning.

All of us belong to the AHEE ( Audio High End Establishment. ) where we grow up through all our audio/music experiences and where we learned almost all we know on the subject.
I learn that think/discern " out of the box " out of the AHEE give me very good audio/music opportunities that the AHEE preclude.

As a rule I always try to learn inside and out side the AHEE every single day. Sometimes I have success and sometimes I can't and I found that I can scale faster in my self audio/music learning ladder if I'm open mind seeing " things " with almost no bias. Certainly more easy to say that to do it but it is only a subject of " attitude " that with day by day practice is more easy to achieve.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Dear Phelonious Ponk: More than specs from digital my " worry " was that you states and speak about analog distortions with out tell us which ones and how degrade and how we perceive those " analog distortions ".

I posted here (because the other thread was closed. ) some specs on analog audio items where at least for those specs we can think that analog has not all " those distortions " ( at least not si higher like you imply in your different posts. ) and even good things: don't you think?

I'm not " biased " I try hard not to be " biased " to CD or LP and I try to " understand " both formats and how I can take advantaje to enjoy the music. I like to " live " the music against hear/heard the music and I try it with any " tool/weapon that help me in a better way to achieve that target.

I like you use ( sometimes ) headphones to made very especial audio item tests but I don't use it for " live " and enjoy the music in its more wide meaning.

All of us belong to the AHEE ( Audio High End Establishment. ) where we grow up through all our audio/music experiences and where we learned almost all we know on the subject.
I learn that think/discern " out of the box " out of the AHEE give me very good audio/music opportunities that the AHEE preclude.

As a rule I always try to learn inside and out side the AHEE every single day. Sometimes I have success and sometimes I can't and I found that I can scale faster in my self audio/music learning ladder if I'm open mind seeing " things " with almost no bias. Certainly more easy to say that to do it but it is only a subject of " attitude " that with day by day practice is more easy to achieve.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

I'm sorry Raul, I didn't follow all of that, but I can speak to how I perceive analog distortions, though I'm talking about vinyl, not professional analog recordings. I hear a high noise floor, limited dynamic peaks (especially when a lot of bass is involved), imprecise imaging and a thickness in the midrange. It doesn't matter what I hear, though. The believers will just say I haven't heard the right deck, cartridge or disc yet, and I can't argue with that; I haven't heard them all. And some of it is genuinely subjective. I prefer imaging and instrument separation that is almost surreal. Is it natural? Well you wouldn't get it in many performance venues, but if I can get it in my system, it's on the recording and that is the original event from the reproduction system's perspective.

I haven't belonged to the Audio High End Establishment for years. I prefer pro monitoring equipment to high-end. Bluntly stated, I don't really even believe in "high-end" as any more than an indication of price, and in expensive audio, the relationship between price and value got screwed up a couple of decades ago in my view.

All of the above is my opinion only. I'm asking no one to agree. Enjoy your kit, whatever it may be.

P

 

[Mike Lavigne]

It remains however that the supreme analog medium R2R does measure very well with most of our current set of .. measurements ... R2R measures better than LP in all that matters. Tapes is inherently (objectively) better than LP, it does sound different no doubt and everyone would agree better than LP .. So measurements do explain very well why it is so ...
Now the best digital measure better than any analog medium ...

Frantz,

i'll grant you that RTR tape done correctly does measure better than vinyl; and likely/probably some/most/all digital could measure better than RTR tape. however that does not prove that the measurements are meaningful in musical terms. and so what does that prove. absolutely nothing in musical terms.

some of analog's advantages are image density, low level clarity, completness, continuousness, and less or no format conversion losses from A to D and D to A. how do you measure those issues? with the best tool you have, your ears.

unfortunately science cannot define art/music. that is left for us humans. sounds/numbers verses music. and given the chance to listen; most humans choose analog based music reproduction when it is done at the highest level.

if you say that the best digitally sourced music has risen to a level equal or better than mid-level vinyl then i would not disagree with that perspective even though it might be a matter of taste. you might even say that 2X DSD mastered digital can even be better than that (although as it's not a consumer format it's not real world for today) and i would agree. digital has come a long way. someday it is destined to be better than the best analog.

but not today or tomorrow.

 

[FrantzM]

i'll grant you that RTR tape done correctly does measure better than vinyl; and likely/probably some/most/all digital could measure better than RTR tape. however that does not prove that the measurements are meaningful in musical terms.

I agree with you . I have maintained in this discussion that measurements that our current set of measurements does not seem to always correlate with our perceptions. It does not mean however that there is NO correlation. Music is physical phenomenon our response to it is much more complex but music is sound vibrations and we have the mean and technology to reproduce it moderately well .. We know how . Science has provided us with means to do so.

We often talk about discontinuities in Digital as if we are listening to samples with nothing in between, it is not so.. What we are listening following the digital treatment is analog, it may not be a absolute simile of the original but neither is the capture through analog methods. In the absolute everything matters in reality some things do not matter, One human sneeze does not affect the earth rotation or the moons of Jupiter .. Some losses do not matter to us.. Those in a 24 bits sample for example ... or a system that cut off everything beyond 364 KHz while remaining flat up to there ...

We still need to understand better what analog does .. Why it does it .. Why LP manages to sound that good at times.. That will help us designing better filters in our DACs (which by the way have gotten better the last 5 years ) or to study jitter more, one very misunderstood parameters, an anlog component in a digital world ... and much more

Simply throwing analog out as without merit is not scientificr but it has been surpassed and I don't see why I should shed a tear on it ..





=================================
P.S.I have said in this forum that my last Basis TT and Graham arm were the end of analog for me ...I have changed my mind on this seeing how relatively inexpensive a good RTR machine is with Suder 810 going for less than $2 K from time to time on eBay ... Why NOT? The problem remains the lack of software and when they are available their price...

 

[Gregadd]

I deleted the post and sent you an apolgoy. If you delete your post there will be no record of it.
Gregadd

 

[Mike Lavigne]

I agree with you . I have maintained in this discussion that measurements that our current set of measurements does not seem to always correlate with our perceptions. It does not mean however that there is NO correlation. Music is physical phenomenon our response to it is much more complex but music is sound vibrations and we have the mean and technology to reproduce it moderately well .. We know how . Science has provided us with means to do so.

We often talk about discontinuities in Digital as if we are listening to samples with nothing in between, it is not so.. What we are listening following the digital treatment is analog, it may not be a absolute simile of the original but neither is the capture through analog methods. In the absolute everything matters in reality some things do not matter, One human sneeze does not affect the earth rotation or the moons of Jupiter .. Some losses do not matter to us.. Those in a 24 bits sample for example ... or a system that cut off everything beyond 364 KHz while remaining flat up to there ...

as far as exactly what digital misses; that is hard to define. in my personal experience it was interesting when i switched from my EMM Labs SE gear to the Playback Designs. the PD was the first digital that could do space along the same lines as analog. it had a sense of depth and substance. it did not get close to how the best vinyl did it; but it did not make you want to immediately jump back to vinyl. OTOH Stereophile's John Atkinson was not happy with the PD's measurements.

at last October's RMAF i spent 2 days going from room to room. i had a couple of redbook discs that i played in almost every room. finally the second day i came to Bruce Brown's room where he had a Playback Designs MPS-5; that was the first digital that really sounded right in 2 days. during that time i listened to many tt's and RTR machines that were quite good.

those 2 stories illustrate my perspective. digital just does not sound complete to me. it does not seem to have natural outlines. there is a 'crispness' to it which does not occur in real life. this is not to say that one might not prefer it's 'spotlighted' contrasts, it's one dimentional but more prominent bass, it's ghosty but thin ambience, it's 'on the edge' shrillness......to the natural ease and life-like matter of factness of analog.

added note; SACD is much less guilty of these characterisitics than PCM in general......not that there are not very very good sounding PCM recordings. but in direct comparison to SACD or analog, PCM gets exposed.

We still need to understand better what analog does .. Why it does it .. Why LP manages to sound that good at times.. That will help us designing better filters in our DACs (which by the way have gotten better the last 5 years ) or to study jitter more, one very misunderstood parameters, an anlog component in a digital world ... and much more

Simply throwing analog out as without merit is not scientificr but it has been surpassed and I don't see why I should shed a tear on it ..

i suppose my comment would be that go ahead and enjoy digital; just don't try so hard to reduce analog's place in musical reproduction. digital does not need to be better than analog. it will own the marketplace forever if it never gets any better than it is right now. which is what our great- grandchildren will be stuck with if we don't keep the analog fires burning so people will know how great music can sound and keep pushing digital to get better.

=================================
P.S.I have said in this forum that my last Basis TT and Graham arm were the end of analog for me ...I have changed my mind on this seeing how relatively inexpensive a good RTR machine is with Suder 810 going for less than $2 K from time to time on eBay ... Why NOT? The problem remains the lack of software and when they are available their price...

i'm encouraged to read this. i hope you do it.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

however that does not prove that the measurements are meaningful in musical terms.

What do you mean by "musical terms?"

image density, low level clarity, completness, continuousness

I think I may be able to relate "low level clarity" to audio reproduction meaningfully, though I'm struggling with how a medium with an inherently higher noise floor can have it, so maybe I don't understand. I know I don't know what you mean by "image density," "completeness," and "continuousness." Can you help me with those?

P

 

[JackD201]

I'll give you a hand P.

Look up what the different distortions are and cross check those with what appears in both formats. Next crosscheck that with the scientific studies as to what are pleasing, displeasing and easily ignored.

Let us know what you come up with.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

I'll give you a hand P.

Look up what the different distortions are and cross check those with what appears in both formats. Next crosscheck that with the scientific studies as to what are pleasing, displeasing and easily ignored.

Let us know what you come up with.

You'll have to point me to the scientific studies you're referring to. All of the (blind) preference research I've seen found that both "trained" and un-trained listeners found low distortion and flat frequency response to be most pleasing.

P

 

[FrantzM]

Mike

I am glad you replied to my post ... A few things, I was thinking going to my office this morning about measurements and what we find acceptable. One of my favorite speakers the Magnepan MG 20.1 .. has what could be said to be lousy measurements, in particular, its step response is plainly bad, yet to my ears it sounds extremely real .. I am sure it errs in the side of presenting many of what make us immediately perceive a musical performance as real, not reproduced. SO we need to know more ..

i suppose my comment would be that go ahead and enjoy digital; just don't try so hard to reduce analog's place in musical reproduction. digital does not need to be better than analog. it will own the marketplace forever if it never gets any better than it is right now. which is what our great- grandchildren will be stuck with if we don't keep the analog fires burning so people will know how great music can sound and keep pushing digital to get better.

It is not matter of "going ahead" and enjoying Digital as if it is the inferior medium, for some subset of it, this debatable but for its higher incarnation it is to me superior. Why shouldn't it surpass analog, that is exactly the goal ...it is a very valid goal to surpass what was the best that is why I said that I will shed no tears on analog. I would have if we remained at the CD level (or God forbid stoop into mp3/128 forever ... the horror ..) ... Now we have at our disposal a convenient and high-performing medium, what not to like? I must say that I loved the LP record covers of yore .. the small CD or the screen of a laptop just don't have it ... Remember Sticky fingers .. Mine did have real zipper on it .. I bought it just for that .. Don't care about the Rolling Stones to this day ..

Seeing Storage prices precipitously going down, just acquired a 1.5 TB HDD for $80 and knowing it will be less than that one month from now, I can only be encouraged ... I don't think analog has any mystique to it .. It is a way to store and reproduce music ... nothing else, it has been surpassed . Our musical heritage is safe

 

[JackD201]

You'll have to point me to the scientific studies you're referring to. All of the (blind) preference research I've seen found that both "trained" and un-trained listeners found low distortion and flat frequency response to be most pleasing.

P

Now what would be the fun in that P? Besides if I did the pointing, you might think I'm leading you towards a certain direction. It's all up to you to decide which studies to accept and not accept. Dive deeper, the studies you have mentioned have scientists behind them that are doing the same.

The terms you have trouble relating to are all abstract expressions of reactions to stimuli after the brain has processed it. The same terms can be applicable to sight, touch, taste and smell. Perhaps start there.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Now what would be the fun in that P? Besides if I did the pointing, you might think I'm leading you towards a certain direction. It's all up to you to decide which studies to accept and not accept. Dive deeper, the studies you have mentioned have scientists behind them that are doing the same.

The terms you have trouble relating to are all abstract expressions of reactions to stimuli after the brain has processed it. The same terms can be applicable to sight, touch, taste and smell. Perhaps start there.

Well, I got through four pages of Google, after running three keyword searches for the best results. Four pages filled with links to audiophile discussion boards like this one, having arguments like this one. The one relevant thing I found was a reference, on a blog (take that for what it's worth), to a double blind study done by Stereophile magazine. The blogger summarized the results thusly:

The results were quite interesting: there was no discernible difference in an overwhelming majority of the test responses.

That study dates from 1985. In 1985, just a couple of years into the cd era, participants in a double blind study conducted by the world's most prominent audiophile magazine couldn't discern between CDs and vinyl (if you understand statistics you'll know that "the overwhelming majority" probably means the few who heard a difference were deep inside the margin for error). I kept searching a few more pages. I even searched "Stereophile vinyl vs. digital research" hoping to find the original article. No luck, no matter. Would I accept that there is no discernible difference? Would you? And if, in some upsidedown world we did, would we not both contend that our choice had advanced the furthest in the 25 years since the study, and that's why we prefer it? Would there be any point? Probably best to just agree to disagree.

P

 

[JackD201]

Agree to disagree about what P? I've made my views pretty clear. I'm omnivorous. I enjoy both and like other members here have/am trying to get the best out of both. Each medium has its strengths and weaknesses. I've said what I believed they are and backed up enough for my position to be validated except for a gaffe in nomenclature but not in principle. In fact since I enjoy both simply for what they are, warts and all, I feel no compunction whatsoever in getting into any other analog vs digital debate. Which do I enjoy more? The one I actually have a copy of mainly. What get's me closer to a state of euphoria? It's beside the point. That's purely subjective but if you must know it for me is heavily dependent on the genre played. This isn't about that though. That thread is closed.

This thread however is alive and has evolved but remains germane to Brian's original post. Is it too late for him to get into analog asking specifically what the cons are since he already knew the pros. If you go back to the first page, you'll find I gave a bucketful of cons.

You said you're having trouble relating to some descriptors used by folks who are recommending that Brian give LPs a whirl. The descriptors you are having trouble with are, I've already stated, not limited to hearing and thus audio much less analog which is an even smaller subset of the audio subset. They are also applicable to digital playback.

Using keywords like Distortion, Analog and Digital really would get you only as far as where you got.

How can something be abstract, arcane or even occult to one but concrete to another?

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Agree to disagree on omnivorousness, I suppose. In the end it comes down to what we hear, what we enjoy. I don't enjoy vinyl anymore; it just doesn't sound right to me. There was little left in my vinyl collection that couldn't be replaced, and i digitized the few things that I really care about that actually do sound better to me on vinyl. I found it to be genre-specific as well. The stuff that sounds better to me on vinyl was almost always old analog pop/rock recordings that had never been remastered properly. Of the genres I enjoy the most, either very little vinyl is available (pretty obscure contemporary acoustic/Alt Country) or the digital remasters or almost always excellent (50s/60s jazz).

Probably best to just let the "descriptors" discussion lie. It will just open up more debate and do nothing to help Brian embrace vinyl. Or not.

Enjoy the music.

P

 

[JackD201]

Hahahaha fair enough P. If I had a point it would be to get your music where you can get it. That's why I'm omnivorous. My collection barely intersects. Some songs I really like (e.g. grew up with) were recorded so badly in both LP and CD, I've found they are more palatable when dumbed down to 320kbps and even then I sometimes resort to eq when streaming. A lot of stuff I definitely prefer on vinyl and I get a lot of kicks from it and I mean a LOT of kicks. I have quite a few LPs that never made it to CD or any other digital format and a lot of CDs that will never see an LP pressing plant. I'd hate to have to deny myself the pleasure of any of them. So I too am inclined to be positive when folks want to give vinyl a try. Like you've witnessed though, the nudge comes with a warning. From a user's perspective it is way more difficult to get the best out of an analog format than a digital one. If one has the dedication to pursue it however and by that I mean acquiring the quietest pressings and not just messing with the hardware, the rewards can and are to me very great.