I'm going to sound like a hipster, but you should only buy music on vinyl

[Turbonium]

If a few shitty Metallica and RHCP albums and a few more bad remasters = all albums, then sure

Uh ok, then I guess the legit documentary I listened to with multiple sources is totally wrong.

Not all, but certainly most CDs today are badly mastered. Compression is applied to pretty much every major label CD released today, but to different degrees. It's not tonal range that suffers - for the mos part, tonal accuracy is maintained. It's dynamic range (loudness) that suffers, and this has the net effect of sucking the life out of the music, as well as masking many of the smaller details that you would otherwise hear if everything in the mix weren't trying to achieve the same loudness.

I don't know the terms exactly, but it sounds like you're referring to what I was trying to refer to.

 

[CZroe]

Uh ok, then I guess the legit documentary I listened to with multiple sources is totally wrong.

If it says "all without exception," then: yeah.

 

[Turbonium]

If it says "all without exception," then: yeah.

It didn't. It talked about trends over the last 20+ years etc.

My bad for saying it was an absolute, all-encompassing thing, given half you guys probably take things 100% literally on here. But I somehow doubt saying "many" or "trend" would have garnered a different response.

 

[mikeford]

It will never be better than the digital source. The only way to cut vinyl with more detail than digital is to have analog vibrations from voice and instruments converted into electrical impulses or otherwise conducted to the cutting head.

What started the whole "audiophile" business as we know it was Sheffield Labs cutting some "direct to disc" records back in the 70's.

Ironically as great as those recordings sounded, it took a few more decades for people realize it was the simple and careful mastering that made the big difference, not the media.

 

[IronWing]

Millions of people disagree, I'm sure.

Rock and metal are pop. Rap is pop. Hip hop is pop. Barbara Streisand is pop. Metallica = pop. Zeppelin = pop. Miley Cyrus, Justin Beaver, Molly Hatchet, Slayer, Ramstein = pop. It's all pop. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[Cerb]

It's definitely the medium.
Radio, CD, MP3, vinyl, web, and pretty much every distribution method each gets a different master if it's in the budget.

When is that? Typically, there's one master, that's compressed all to Hell, and that's what all the others are converted from. Sometimes vinyl may not be quite as compressed, but only to what limits vinyl playback forces it, and that may be done in a lossy fashion, from a more compressed master.

Good masters are the gold flecks in the river bed.

I'm not inclined to believe that. Why would they master the album to intentionally make it sound worse?

If it has range, the low amplitude parts will not be heard over the din with open headphones or earbuds. Pay attention to how and where other people listen to music, and it will make sense. It won't make it any better, but that's why. Instead of the Walk/man/Discman/iPod/iPhone compressing, the studio does it.

More low end and affordable than a coat hanger? Just more bullshit.

Do you want to damage your equipment with coat hanger ends, or use the correct connectors and cables?

http://consumerist.com/2008/03/03/do-coat-hangers-sound-as-good-monster-cables/

http://conradhoffman.com/Low_Level_ICs.htm
No ABX, but empirical measurements showing some differences.

Low quality cables are not uncommon, and are usually the cheapest thing some OEM could buy, that wouldn't fall apart in somebody's hand. Monster is not among them, their parts are just overpriced for what they are, with misleading advertising (unlike true audiophile level cables, which outright lie, and are often actually bad cables, good for RFI pickup, and some attenuating within the audio band, all at tidy profits for the sociopaths selling them). Good 6' RCA ICs seem to cost $5-20/pr retail (based on skimming Parts Express, Amazon, and Monoprice, right now).

ever since toms hardware did that comparison of a high end 2k dac an x hundred dollar sound card and a 2 dollar realtek chip and not one person could hear the difference, i've come to the understanding that audiophiles are full of crap and have too much bloody money.

link in case you haven't read it.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/high-end-pc-audio,3733.html

They didn't use the PC, though. The test was rather silly (in that, given the parameters, the outcome was pretty obvious, except for listener A being really good), but there are plenty of fine $2 DAC chips. What makes it sound better is getting it away from the RFI of things like Speedstep, and GPUs, and making sure not enough can come in from the signal or power lines. Quality expensive DACs (not colored audiofool ones, much less with tubes--that's not high quality, but pure silliness) commonly use <$5 DAC chips. The focus is on careful PCB layouts, improved shielding, reducing the chance of picking noise up, and good low-noise power. I don't know about $2, but in large quantity, there are <$10 DACs, at least, that can perform below most good output equipment noise floors, and $2-5 ones that can really do 110dB or better on their outputs (not just in a perfect lab scenario, either, which has also given rise to digital volume controls being preferred these days). It's the PSRR and CMRR that pose problems inside a PC, and exposing that requires rapid changes in current consumption of PC components, and/or high-energy data transfers that can be modulated down (like what GSM phones make).

My onboard at home and work sounds terrible when scrolling in Firefox or Chrome, for example, moving a window, or when playing some games (the latter I don't do at work, of course...not the least reason being because I have a HD 6450 there ). If the PC sitting there with only FB2K doing any work, it might be OK, but doing so would make using the PC as a source pointless. Newer DACs are made to reject or bury as much of the noise as possible, but inside a PC, only so much can be done without going fully differential.

Anyone willing to pay for a piece of tube output gear either (a) likes the distortion and admits it, or (b) is full of it, regardless of price, though. Tubes technically can be made very accurate, but the cost is high, and it will then sound, "like solid state."

 

[irishScott]

Vinyl eats shit. Assuming it does sound better than digital when new, and I don't concede that, but am willing to consider it; that's the best it'll ever sound. It gets marginally worse every play after until it's a muddy mess. That's not even getting into the convenience aspect. The only way it could get less convenient is to play the damned music yourself...

This. About the only practical use for Vinyl is to get one of those record players that can rip it into some lossless format, and keep the original records as backup. That's assuming you have top of the line speakers to actually hear the difference.

 

[Dude111]

But the difference for the most part......

The difference my friend is ANALOGUE AND DIGITAL!!


Analog is warm and beautiful.. DIGITAL IS AN ARTIFICAL VOID.... Crap compared to analog!!

I try my very best to ONLY GET RECORDS that are 100% in the analog domain (I mostly like stuff from the early to mid 80s and older so luckily it isnt a big problem -- DIGITAL STARTED RUINING THE PURITY OF MUSIC AND VIDEO IN THE 80s AND ITS SAD)


It does limit what I will accept on records but WHEN I LISTEN TO RECORDS,I WANT ANALOG SOUND,NOT COMPROMISED GARBAGE!! (Analog is beautiful)

 

[irishScott]

The difference my friend is ANALOGUE AND DIGITAL!!


Analog is warm and beautiful.. DIGITAL IS AN ARTIFICAL VOID.... Crap compared to analog!!

I try my very best to ONLY GET RECORDS that are 100% in the analog domain (I mostly like stuff from the early to mid 80s and older so luckily it isnt a big problem -- DIGITAL STARTED RUINING THE PURITY OF MUSIC AND VIDEO IN THE 80s AND ITS SAD)


It does limit what I will accept on records but WHEN I LISTEN TO RECORDS,I WANT ANALOG SOUND,NOT COMPROMISED GARBAGE!! (Analog is beautiful)

I gather you would argue that film is a better medium than digital as well? Sounds like your problem is more psychological than anything else.

 

[gorcorps]

Technology hasn't failed us, you've just been lied to. The biggest issue with vinyl is that high frequency sound can't be easily picked up by the stylus, so the music is produced to subdue those high ends. This is what people are talking about when they say vinyl sounds "warmer" than digital. You can make digital sound exactly the same as vinyl, but you'd be losing a lot of life in the higher frequencies. Vinyl also has less bass response because the low frequencies require larger grooves. They have to limit the bass to make the album physically fit on vinyl. This can be remedied a bit if they stretch the album into multiple records so they have more space to work with.

Some people think it's a better sounding option, which is fine I guess. The physical limitations of working with vinyl make it one of the least accurate representations of the instruments. That's just how it is when dealing with a physical medium... there's always a mechanical limit, and that limit commonly gets described as "warmth".

On the flip side, most modern music is produced to be normalized, so the dynamic range of modern music sucks. This is just a function of the production though, and has nothing to do with it being digital. Some producers realize the issue and are trying to utilize more of the natural range of the instruments, it's just going to end up at a lower volume level on average to do it.
Still, I strongly believe that those who believe vinyl is a better medium simply don't understand the technology and why it sounds like it does. You can make your digital copies sound just as "warm" as vinyl, you just have to de-ess it the same as they de-ess the vinyl recording.

 

[QueBert]

I gather you would argue that film is a better medium than digital as well? Sounds like your problem is more psychological than anything else.

My 70's Olympus OM10 SLR takes better pictures than anything I've seen from a digital camera.

 

[Rinaun]

I'm still getting used to updating 50% of my music to FLAC quality. I'll play a 320kbps song and get all depressed at the background noises

 

[disappoint]

Quality expensive DACs (not colored audiofool ones, much less with tubes--that's not high quality, but pure silliness) commonly use <$5 DAC chips. The focus is on careful PCB layouts, reducing shielding, reducing the chance of picking noise up, and good low-noise power.

Reduce shielding? Wouldn't you want shielding to shield from RFI noise?

 

[disappoint]

My 70's Olympus OM10 SLR takes better pictures than anything I've seen from a digital camera.

So...you've never seen a pic taken by a medium format digital back?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Me...4/N/4259332394

There, get yourself a nice 60MP Hasselblad medium format digital camera. It's only $40,000. Free lens! Unless you're not baller enough...

 

[CZroe]

The difference my friend is ANALOGUE AND DIGITAL!!


Analog is warm and beautiful.. DIGITAL IS AN ARTIFICAL VOID.... Crap compared to analog!!

I try my very best to ONLY GET RECORDS that are 100% in the analog domain (I mostly like stuff from the early to mid 80s and older so luckily it isnt a big problem -- DIGITAL STARTED RUINING THE PURITY OF MUSIC AND VIDEO IN THE 80s AND ITS SAD)


It does limit what I will accept on records but WHEN I LISTEN TO RECORDS,I WANT ANALOG SOUND,NOT COMPROMISED GARBAGE!! (Analog is beautiful)

Modern instruments never had analog versions. How does an electronic artist like a chiptune composer or a House DJ release their work on vinyl while staying analog from end to end?

 

[Rakehellion]

Rock and metal are pop. Rap is pop. Hip hop is pop. Barbara Streisand is pop. Metallica = pop. Zeppelin = pop. Miley Cyrus, Justin Beaver, Molly Hatchet, Slayer, Ramstein = pop. It's all pop. Nothing wrong with that.

Bingo.

 

[Rakehellion]

Technology hasn't failed us, you've just been lied to. The biggest issue with vinyl is that high frequency sound can't be easily picked up by the stylus, so the music is produced to subdue those high ends. This is what people are talking about when they say vinyl sounds "warmer" than digital. You can make digital sound exactly the same as vinyl, but you'd be losing a lot of life in the higher frequencies. Vinyl also has less bass response because the low frequencies require larger grooves. They have to limit the bass to make the album physically fit on vinyl. This can be remedied a bit if they stretch the album into multiple records so they have more space to work with.

I haven't been lied to, I heard it with my own damned ears.

As far as frequency limits, FFT-based formats like MP3 and AAC have the same restriction in that by reducing the dynamic range, you improve the quality of the remaining frequencies.

 

[lxskllr]

Bingo.

I agree, but I can appreciate people disliking the term. Pop connotes useless, inartistic fluff. It trivializes the music, but it's still correct.

 

[darkswordsman17]

The difference my friend is ANALOGUE AND DIGITAL!!


Analog is warm and beautiful.. DIGITAL IS AN ARTIFICAL VOID.... Crap compared to analog!!

I try my very best to ONLY GET RECORDS that are 100% in the analog domain (I mostly like stuff from the early to mid 80s and older so luckily it isnt a big problem -- DIGITAL STARTED RUINING THE PURITY OF MUSIC AND VIDEO IN THE 80s AND ITS SAD)


It does limit what I will accept on records but WHEN I LISTEN TO RECORDS,I WANT ANALOG SOUND,NOT COMPROMISED GARBAGE!! (Analog is beautiful)

I hate to break it to you but they've been doing the original recording/mastering to digital before making the vinyl pressing for decades. I believe it goes back to the 70s. Prior to this, recording quality was all over the place (and plenty were terrible, hell even huge acts like Pink Floyd and the Beatles and others have noticeable issues due to the inherent problems of the original recordings, so even with care and all the modern capabilities they can only do so much).

Technology hasn't failed us, you've just been lied to. The biggest issue with vinyl is that high frequency sound can't be easily picked up by the stylus, so the music is produced to subdue those high ends. This is what people are talking about when they say vinyl sounds "warmer" than digital. You can make digital sound exactly the same as vinyl, but you'd be losing a lot of life in the higher frequencies. Vinyl also has less bass response because the low frequencies require larger grooves. They have to limit the bass to make the album physically fit on vinyl. This can be remedied a bit if they stretch the album into multiple records so they have more space to work with.

Some people think it's a better sounding option, which is fine I guess. The physical limitations of working with vinyl make it one of the least accurate representations of the instruments. That's just how it is when dealing with a physical medium... there's always a mechanical limit, and that limit commonly gets described as "warmth".

On the flip side, most modern music is produced to be normalized, so the dynamic range of modern music sucks. This is just a function of the production though, and has nothing to do with it being digital. Some producers realize the issue and are trying to utilize more of the natural range of the instruments, it's just going to end up at a lower volume level on average to do it.
Still, I strongly believe that those who believe vinyl is a better medium simply don't understand the technology and why it sounds like it does. You can make your digital copies sound just as "warm" as vinyl, you just have to de-ess it the same as they de-ess the vinyl recording.

This.

I'd also like to add, its not just the DRC that's the problem with modern music (although its a big part of the problem). A lot of music now features electronic versions of instruments instead of real ones, samples and pre-fabricated beats, etc. Even for bands that use real instruments, you're likely not getting what they actually sound like as they'll do a lot to "tune" the sound. If you get access to great studios then chances are you're on a label and thus are stuck with what the label wants to do as far as how things will ultimately sound (if you're not an outright puppet to begin with). In my experience indies and lesser labels have their own issues as far as recordings go, so its not like that really fixes the problem with modern recordings not being up to snuff.

My 70's Olympus OM10 SLR takes better pictures than anything I've seen from a digital camera.

And no doubt this would hold up to objective empirical testing.

 

[darkswordsman17]

Another big issue with the "OMG analog >>>>> digital" is how it ignores that the digital signal is turned into an analog signal by your equipment.

Unfortunately there's too many variables to be able to make a direct vinyl to CD comparison possible. I would be curious how similar they would end up if you took the same speakers and amp, and then good quality versions of various formats (vinyl, CD, lossy, lossless, high bitrate) taken from the same mix/master, and measured the output at the speakers.

Rock and metal are pop.



You're the one who made the bold claims, so the burden of proof is on you, homie.



I don't see anything that backs up your "99.9" claim.

So, I take it you just listen to vocal choirs, chamber music, and various recordings like that? Actually no, you claimed that even pop music was plenty free of modern recording issues.

ZaneJohnson was the first to make the claim then you chimed in that you could as well after I refuted it, and my claim that you're taking issue with was after yours. So you're the one actually making the bold claim. Hell I've actually been looking to see if anyone has proven they can hear 256k from lossless and so far have not found any.

But, I tell you what, you put up and prove you can consistently correctly identify 256kbps from lossless, and I'll find you tons of links showing various hearing/audio related issues. Then again, you clearly are not understanding, likely intentionally ignoring it, that I'm speaking of much more than hearing 256kbps from lossless. Watch the video I linked, it covers a variety of such topics, and why the problem goes back to the flaws in the human mind.

By the way here's one study done on the high frequency audio which is what I was referring to about studies where its known humans can't hear.
http://www.nhk.or.jp/strl/publica/labnote/lab486.html

All the surround mixes I own are vast improvements to the stereo mixes. Perhaps a surround mix of a recording done 30 years prior with just a handful of original tracks could come off as cheesy, but I've never had that experience with anything modern.

Any specific examples that you think are good?

I'm not really saying they're bad, but I am saying they're gimmicky. To be fair, stereo pretty much is as well (since they're just taking the single channel from each instrument and then mixing them to respective channels, sometimes blending them, and that's ignoring all the other things they do in mixing). Don't get me wrong, they can be fun, but they don't really offer any more immersion for me, and its more about seeing what they do with the surround panning. If you prefer that, that's fine. I tend to prefer more coherency and blending, especially since I listen on headphones a lot and a lot of panning between channels tends to distract and make you focus on specific instruments/channels, and most of the surround mixes I've experienced were all about that aspect.

Surround would suit live recordings well, assuming you wanted that experience (and hopefully they would maybe mix in the sound from the soundboard and have good mic placement for anything else).

I'd actually prefer them to come up with an entirely new aspect, effectively dimensionality. We have the computing power now, even in phones, to be able to basically make recordings have spatial data, where then your system could automatically determine placement based on what you're listening on. So it'd adjust for headphones (which should help both the channel separation issues many have with headphones, as well as offer the sound field aspects of binaural recordings), car (where speaker placement relative to your position is generally offset), surround, etc. Not only that, but it would enable more ability to adjust the mix later, so it should better preserve recordings as its more data from which to work with. Plus it could offer other aspects (for instance better systems should be able to use data such as it could track your position within the sound space and adjust on the fly, and better auto-equalization for speaker placement).

There's actually a lot more stuff that modern technology could enable to really push audio further, but the RIAA have become such total shitheads.

I haven't been lied to, I heard it with my own damned ears.

As far as frequency limits, FFT-based formats like MP3 and AAC have the same restriction in that by reducing the dynamic range, you improve the quality of the remaining frequencies.

Your (human) ears and mind are quite easy to trick, and in fact, the manner in which they work is a bit of a trick itself. Your mind will readily fill in gaps in your hearing for instance if not outright trick you (as an example, in that video I linked where they note the "satanic message" from records playing backwards that some people heard even though its gibberish; as an aside, there's the well known "misheard lyrics" phenomenon where different people hear different words in songs), and your hearing can trick your mind (i.e. a sound similar to another sound that might trigger an emotional response, for instance certain loud noises and its affect on people who were in war zones).

Which depends on the bitrate and encoding. If you care about quality go for higher bitrates or even better lossless. But again, that matters less than what is being done before you have any say so.

 

[motsm]

I'm not really saying they're bad, but I am saying they're gimmicky. To be fair, stereo pretty much is as well (since they're just taking the single channel from each instrument and then mixing them to respective channels, sometimes blending them, and that's ignoring all the other things they do in mixing).

If you think stereo mixes are gimmicky, than we just have very different views on audio engineering and mixing. Which is fine, but no examples I would come up with are going to change your mind, that's for sure. If I were to throw something out there anyway, I'd say Storm Corrosion on Blu Ray, or Anathema - We're here because we're here on DVD-A.

I'd actually prefer them to come up with an entirely new aspect, effectively dimensionality. We have the computing power now, even in phones, to be able to basically make recordings have spatial data, where then your system could automatically determine placement based on what you're listening on. So it'd adjust for headphones (which should help both the channel separation issues many have with headphones, as well as offer the sound field aspects of binaural recordings), car (where speaker placement relative to your position is generally offset), surround, etc. Not only that, but it would enable more ability to adjust the mix later, so it should better preserve recordings as its more data from which to work with. Plus it could offer other aspects (for instance better systems should be able to use data such as it could track your position within the sound space and adjust on the fly, and better auto-equalization for speaker placement).

If I am understanding you correctly, most of this could be done by recording with a soundfield microphone, which essentially records spatial information in 360° but is saved to only 4 channels. Making use of phase, and an omnidirectional channel, you can pretty accurately recreate an amazing number of microphone setups that never actually existed in the studio. So if the listening equipment was outfitted with a B-Format decoder, it could decode those 4 channels depending on user preference, or on speaker count or headphones. Of course this would likely result in some really unpredictable listening experiences.

 

[destrekor]

I gather you would argue that film is a better medium than digital as well? Sounds like your problem is more psychological than anything else.

Well shit, you opened a can of worms with that one.

And yes, film is, in fact, still better than digital. Sorry to disappoint.

You can make a cleaner image with digital, and many will be happy with the noise-free clarity of digital. But in the end, you MUST CORRECT digital to produce an image we want to see. You must artificially sharpen the image by adjusting micro-contrast, and you typically need to bump up the total dynamic range in post-production or it will feel too flat.

The very nature of how digital sensors capture light data, as we have it today, makes this the fact that it is.

Yes, film still undergoes post-production, too; these days there are certain aspects of visual trickery we still demand in the final product.

Quality film stock is unreal in its range, color production, and sharpness. There is a reason many directors still use film and just secured production contracts with Kodak to ensure film sticks around awhile yet, and for the most part, it is not because of film grain; although film grain actually does help, I'll ignore that point because grain and noise and the entire concept of film is not for this thread.

 

[Rakehellion]

So, I take it you just listen to vocal choirs, chamber music, and various recordings like that?

I listen to whatever the hell I want. What does that have to do with anything?

So you're the one actually making the bold claim.

No, YOU'RE the one who said that "99.9" people can't tell the difference and they've been able to prove it from testing. Post links to these tests or shut up.

By the way here's one study done on the high frequency audio which is what I was referring to about studies where its known humans can't hear.
http://www.nhk.or.jp/strl/publica/labnote/lab486.html

Which has jack shit to do with AAC or vinyl and has no relevance to this thread.

Watch the video I linked, it covers a variety of such topics, and why the problem goes back to the flaws in the human mind.

I'm not watching an hour long video because you're too lazy to find your sources. You're making nothing but very generalized claims that have nothing to do with the matter at hand. Congrats on going to Wikipedia University but try to stay on topic.

 

[Raduque]

The best audiophiles are those that say they can tell the differences in their not so quiet cars, lol.

I don't claim to be an audiophile and i have a modest system in my truck, but I can definitely hear a difference between a lousy encode MP3 and something bought from say Amazon.

Also, I can hear that same compression artifacting on music broadcast on the radio, too. It's terrible. At least I found a station here in Bryan/College Station that doesn't boost the bass excessively.

 

[alkemyst]

I don't claim to be an audiophile and i have a modest system in my truck, but I can definitely hear a difference between a lousy encode MP3 and something bought from say Amazon.

Also, I can hear that same compression artifacting on music broadcast on the radio, too. It's terrible. At least I found a station here in Bryan/College Station that doesn't boost the bass excessively.

"LOUSY" is not the debate.

It's saying high bit MP3 vs WAV and the like.