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Topic: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry (Read 173532 times) previous topic - next topic
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Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #50 –
Quote from: Sunzu on
Quote from: greynol on
You mean the DAC. Transparent DACs have been a commodity item for many many years now.
I'm referring to clear audio. It is a proprietary sound field developed by Sony.
Which obviously isn’t necessary for an mp3 to sound as good as or better than vinyl.

Quote from: Sunzu on
I prefer AAD.
Painting with a rather broad brush, don’t you think?

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #51 –
I'm going back over 20 years. The first DDD I know of was Judas Priest Live and it sounded flat and lifeless. I don't know why they released it. Present day digital recording hardly resembles the tech of those days. Death Angel recorded their new album in analog, you can hear a slight hiss. I grew up on vinyl, recording to chrome tapes on my dad's Nakamichi. I can see where vinyl 'sounded' better than the early digital and the myth started but tech has evolved as I proved to my audiophile 'vinyl, flac supporting' friends.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #52 –
I don’t really know where to start. Whether vinyl subjectively sounded better than CD 20 years ago (you can go back another 10 years before that) had as much to do with anything else as it had to do with improvements in technology.  And that’s an understatement. Same for releases with different SPARS codes. Considering you’re comparing apples to oranges in all cases you can’t be sure what is the source of your preferences.  Your preconceptions/expectation bias notwithstanding.

Here’s something to chew on:
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=116482.0

Thanks for your anecdotes.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #53 –
Quote from: cliveb on
Quote from: Sunzu on
My friend who owned a record store for many years explained to me that the vibration of a stylus is an exact representation of the soundwave imprinted on a record that drives a speaker. It is a full frequency analog wave that creates the sound where digital recording is a sample of the wave. You can take high frequency samples but it will never be a continuous wave like analog.
If you (and your record store owning friend) want to really understand how digital audio works, you need to watch this video:
https://xiph.org/video/vid2.shtml

That video is awesome. No way to refute it. I can't wait to show him, thanks.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #54 –
https://www.hifiengine.com/manual_library/nakamichi/600.shtml  This is the deck we used in the late 70s early 80s to record records on their first play to Sony chrome tapes. This deck let you manually adjust the bias for each tape by recording a signal which you played back and then use a small screwdriver to adjust till the input matched the output on the vue meter. It made pretty good if not the best recordings you could make at the time. Everyone used to bring their new records to me to record back then, that's how we saved our records.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #55 –
Quote from: Sunzu on
The first DDD I know of was Judas Priest Live and it sounded flat and lifeless.
That can't be attributed to DDD unless you eliminated all other variables like studio moronism, etc, etc.
How did you eliminate those variables?
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #57 –
Quote from: ajinfla on
Quote from: Sunzu on
The first DDD I know of was Judas Priest Live and it sounded flat and lifeless.
That can't be attributed to DDD unless you eliminated all other variables like studio moronism, etc, etc.
How did you eliminate those variables?
Yeah, that's what made it so hard to believe they released it. At the time it was touted as the next big thing, Priest was promoting the fact they were using cutting edge technology on their new release because they were such a powerhouse and it was so expensive, then it sounded like that. It made us skeptical of the new process at the time.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #58 –
In I think it was in '84 my friend and I went to the stereo shop to see the first CD player available in our area. It was an AIWA vertical loading player. We got the disc to turn but couldn't figure out how to make it play. When we got back in the car I  said "that's already obsolete, soon they will put the music on a chip." The first time I heard a CD was the helicopter part from The Wall through a Sansui amp and Klipsch speakers. Still gives me goosebumps thinking about it. Never heard anything like that before.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #59 –
Quote from: Sunzu on
Present day digital recording hardly resembles the tech of those days.

Yeah, that's what made it so hard to believe they released it. At the time it was touted as the next big thing, Priest was promoting the fact they were using cutting edge technology on their new release because they were such a powerhouse and it was so expensive, then it sounded like that. It made us skeptical of the new process at the time.
Us?? Projecting there.
One more time, how did you account for all variables other than DDD "tech"? Now or then.
Never mind Judas Priest being used to determine tech/SQ...
Loudspeaker manufacturer

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #61 –
Quote from: ajinfla on
Quote from: Sunzu on
Present day digital recording hardly resembles the tech of those days.
Quote from: ajinfla on
Quote from: Sunzu on
Present day digital recording hardly resembles the tech of those days.

Yeah, that's what made it so hard to believe they released it. At the time it was touted as the next big thing, Priest was promoting the fact they were using cutting edge technology on their new release because they were such a powerhouse and it was so expensive, then it sounded like that. It made us


Us?? Projecting there.
One more time, how did you account for all variables other than DDD "tech"? Now or then.
Never mind Judas Priest being used to determine tech/SQ...
I believe this thread is about the origins of the vinyl 'analog' myth. I am relating the thinking of myself and my peers who were using state of the art analog recording and playback equipment at the very time that the medium was changing. We got one of the first DAT machines, blank tapes were $20 and we thought at the time that VHS tapes sounded better for live recordings. Being a person who lived through it, I am just trying to explain our attitudes at the time and what shaped them. Nowadays I'm quite satisfied with MP3 vbr V0 😁

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #62 –
Lots of bluster about Nakamichi et. al; zero acknowledgement that your assertion of DDD being the reason priest...live! is sub-par is without merit.

This is germane to the topic because you used the argument to intimate that, at a minimum, digital recording and mixing were technologically inferior to their analog counterparts back then. At least that’s my impression.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #63 –
Quote from: greynol on
Lots of bluster about Nakamichi et. al; zero acknowledgement that your assertion of DDD being the reason priest...live! is sub-par is without merit.

This is germane to the topic because you used the argument to intimate that, at a minimum, digital recording and mixing were technologically inferior to their analog counterparts back then. At least that’s my impression.

There are plenty of digital recording "back then" that sounded amazing.  Mixing and mastering is a subjective process, because a human being at a console decides what's good and what's bad, and the end results sounds best to their subjective opinion on the speakers they have in front of them.

SPARS codes were a marketing device only and provided little to no indication of actual record quality.  Though teenage me was all about the DDD back then.  So, the marketing worked, at least on me.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #64 –
Quote from: apastuszak on
Quote from: greynol on
Lots of bluster about Nakamichi et. al; zero acknowledgement that your assertion of DDD being the reason priest...live! is sub-par is without merit.

This is germane to the topic because you used the argument to intimate that, at a minimum, digital recording and mixing were technologically inferior to their analog counterparts back then. At least that’s my impression.

There are plenty of digital recording "back then" that sounded amazing.  Mixing and mastering is a subjective process, because a human being at a console decides what's good and what's bad, and the end results sounds best to their subjective opinion on the speakers they have in front of them.

SPARS codes were a marketing device only and provided little to no indication of actual record quality.  Though teenage me was all about the DDD back then.  So, the marketing worked, at least on me.


THere are whole forums (*cough*stevehoffman*cough) full of people who seek out 'target CDs' from the 1980s on the premise that they are the best sounding ones out there.

Not to mention the reverence shown on many audiophool forums for the nirvana-inspirring sound of such early CD releases as Dire Straits Brothers In Arms
 
The irony couldn't weigh more.  Audiophools constantly spreading the myth (started by douchebags like Michael Fremer at Stereophile, btw) that early digital tech was garbage , while simultaneously fetishizing old CDs. 

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #65 –
I seek out Target CDs, but not because they sound superior.  I just buy them because I think they look nice.  I just bought Yes' album 90125 on CD.  The Target CD was a whole 50 cents more than the non-target.  50 cents to get a better looking CD was subjectively better to me.  I totally get that once it's in the CD player, you can't see the target.  But at least I am not claiming I am buying them because they somehow sound better.

The Steve Hoffman Forums are a mix of snake oil and truth.  It's difficult to separate one from the other when you read the forums.  But when I'm buying an album that has been remastered any number of times, it's one of the tools I use to help make a purchasing decision.

I find it funny that Stereophile claims early digital tech was garbage, while, in the same breath, praising new, very expensive, R2R Multibit DACs.  I know at one point, they were signing the high prasies of some Japanese made DAC that used a Phlllips TDA1541 DAC, which is the same DAC used in early 80s Magnavox CD players that they trashed.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #66 –
I lost myself in their rabbithole and some also claim that a CD sounds better than a WAV-PCM rip of that CD, which in turn sounds better than a FLAC of that CD. Of course without any evidence.

Maybe they used just the wrong cable when they listen to it  ::)

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #67 –
Quote from: greynol on
Lots of bluster about Nakamichi et. al; zero acknowledgement that your assertion of DDD being the reason priest...live! is sub-par is without merit.

This is germane to the topic because you used the argument to intimate that, at a minimum, digital recording and mixing were technologically inferior to their analog counterparts back then. At least that’s my impression.
What I said is that was the only DDD example we had at the time and it sounded awful, we didn't know why but reasonably attributed it to the method. DAT recorders weren't available until 1987. Judas Priest Live was released 5/27/87. We had no way at the time to make a comparison on our own recordings or any others. We couldn't get our first DAT machine until1989, let alone digital mixers or even decent computers. It was way too early and hella expensive ($20 blank DAT tapes, that's almost $45 today)That's why we used a PCM that used VHS tapes for live recordings  and it worked quite well for the time. We were all pro-digital. My buddy even paid $1700 in 1989 for an Ensoniq keyboard that could play samples from a floppy disc. They were exciting times. Here, read for yourself https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Audio_Tape.  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ensoniq_VFX

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #68 –
By the way UPS left that keyboard in the driveway.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #69 –
Quote from: tehabe on
I lost myself in their rabbithole and some also claim that a CD sounds better than a WAV-PCM rip of that CD, which in turn sounds better than a FLAC of that CD. Of course without any evidence.

Maybe they used just the wrong cable when they listen to it  ::)

There's a video on YouTube from some audiophile convention where some panelist claims he can hear a huge difference between a WAV file and a FLAC file.  And he goes on about for longer than he should.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #70 –
I don’t agree that it was a reasonable assumption to blame the technology and I don’t see the point in discussing hardware as it relates to your stated preference for AAD. There are humans involved in the process. They make subjective decisions and are fallible.

As for releases, Dire Straits Brothers in Arms was DDD if I’m not mistaken.  Rush Power Windows and Hold Your Fire both are superb.
EDIT: Wikipedia has some examples of DDD releases.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARS_code
Apparently Brothers in Arms was technically DAD. It lists Scorpions Love at First Sting as DDD.

Sometime in the mid-80s I bought an Alexis Quadraverb. It demonsted to me that digital sampling and playback could be done transparently. This is merely an anecdote, however. It does nothing to shoot down any myths about the superiority of vinyl.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #72 –
It's a shame that SPARS codes never made it to analog media eg. ADA/DDA, so that people would realize that some analog sound was digitally processed.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?  ;~)

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #73 –
Quote from: 2tec on
It's a shame that SPARS codes never made it to analog media eg. ADA/DDA, so that people would realize that some analog sound was digitally processed.

This would probably destroy some, recently I found some guy who is all about analog sound and processing as being better (for him). He made some nice tipps for good music but otherwise it was just sad. I think he wouldn't believe one word on the Vinyl myths page.

Re: How accurate is the Vinyl Myths wiki entry

Reply #74 –
Quote from: 2tec on
It's a shame that SPARS codes never made it to analog media eg. ADA/DDA, so that people would realize that some analog sound was digitally processed.

Quote from: greynol on
Here’s something to chew on:
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=116482.0

TL;DR-
Since the early '80s many vinyl releases were/are in fact AAD/ADD/DAD/DDD.  IOW there was a digital process immediately prior to cutting the 1st gen master used for the pressing, or whatever is the correct term for what came directly after the digital delay line which became commonly used and, by definition, part of the mastering process.
 
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