As compared to vinyl, CD/FLAC/MP3/AAC are extremely handicapped when it comes to producing inner groove distortion.

In other words, if distortion is your thing, vinyl cannot be beat; nor can said distortion be eliminated from the format.

Inner groove distortion and wobbling pitch were always annoyances to me.

You are incorrect on both counts. Early on I owned the usual substandard Gerard phonographs that young kids tended to have. Later on I owned top shelf model (and highly regarded during their era) turntables from the likes of Dual and Linn. Without a doubt those tables were big improvements, and while they can help tremendously to minimize the inherent shortcomings of the format, they certainly cannot eliminate them.

Yes, I do know how to set up a turntable properly, thank you. That was a necessary acquired skill at the time for anyone desirous of decent vinyl playback.

…linear tracking tables in theory work to minimize inner groove distortion

Quote from: Pepzhez on 2010-09-09 16:35:14

…linear tracking tables in theory work to minimize inner groove distortion

No. The so-called "inner groove distortion" has nothing to do with neither tone-arm type (pivoting or linear tracking) nor cartridge alignment adjustment. Even with the best cartridge alignment adjustment, the "tracing distortion" will be present, as not depending on it.

The distortion that increases as the stylus passes from the “outer” to the “inner” grooves, is not an “inner groove distortion”, the so-called "inner groove distortion" is the "tracing distortion", non-linear distortion proper fundamentally to the mechanical reproduction of any groove (and not only "inner") of a gramophone record, and by any stylus, due to the difference between the shapes of the cutter chisel and the stylus. But to a variable degree, depending, at equal signal frequency and amplitude, on the radius of the groove. And in the same groove, on the shape of the stylus' surface in contact with the groove.

The only way to reduce it very considerably with "mechanical" cartridges: the use of styli types designed and manufactured for CD-4 discrete quadraphonic reproduction (“Shibata”, “Pramanic” etc.), or their modern analogues (“Fine-line”, “Line contact” etc.) having the finest possible radius of contact with the groove sides.

http://www.answers.com/topic/tracing-distortion

Good illustrations:
http://www.speakerbits.com/speaker-repairs...article-24.aspx

A general link:
http://www.google.ru/search?hl=ru&neww...q=&gs_rfai=

Quote from: Pepzhez on 2010-09-09 13:08:28

As compared to vinyl, CD/FLAC/MP3/AAC are extremely handicapped when it comes to producing inner groove distortion.

In other words, if distortion is your thing, vinyl cannot be beat; nor can said distortion be eliminated from the format.

Not that simple.  Some sides are cut a 10 minutes, and why people use linear trackers.

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape. Not new concepts, and often addressed by today's designers.

And then admit something like an Optimized Contour Contact Line diamond will function great.

Sure, you may have to match up a linear tracker more carefully to cart., and worry about lateral effective mass, but do it right, and you can achieve more than acceptable fidelity.

Sure vinyl has it's limits, but there are some damn good implementations these days.

Tracking and tracing distortion are rather similar mathematically, so I strongly suspect that what most people refer to as "mistracking" really is mistracing or tracing distortion. Mistracking only happens when the stylus physically loses contact ("tracking") with one or both sides of the groove. That's usually not what's going on with IGD.

Quote from: doctorcilantro on 2010-09-11 03:17:19

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape. Not new concepts, and often addressed by today's designers.

What he's saying is that inner groove distortion has two major causes, only one of which is addressed by linear tracking tone arms. This is fact. You can't play divide and conquer unless you actually conquer both of them.

Quote

And then admit something like an Optimized Contour Contact Line diamond will function great.

Great compared to what? Compared to less-optimal styli, they trade reduced but not vanishing tracing distortion for other problems, including a need for increased mounting precision.

Quote

Sure, you may have to match up a linear tracker more carefully to cart., and worry about lateral effective mass, but do it right, and you can achieve more than acceptable fidelity.

I don't think that anybody is saying that vinyl can't have acceptable fidelity if you are tolerant enough of audible noise and distortion. Some of us happen to not be so tolerant, and will only find it to be acceptable when other generally superior alternatives fail, mostly for non-technical reasons like disagreeable mastering or the simple fact that much great music was recorded before digital.

Quote

Sure vinyl has it's limits, but there are some damn good implementations these days.

I have yet to see any significant improvements in basic vinyl playback in the past 20 or 30 years.  Just different trade-offs or more often, just a lot of hype.

Quote from: Fedot L on 2010-09-10 14:58:54

Quote from: Pepzhez on 2010-09-09 16:35:14

…linear tracking tables in theory work to minimize inner groove distortion

No. The so-called "inner groove distortion" has nothing to do with neither tone-arm type (pivoting or linear tracking) nor cartridge alignment adjustment. Even with the best cartridge alignment adjustment, the "tracing distortion" will be present, as not depending on it.

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape.

And then admit something like an Optimized Contour Contact Line diamond will function great.
Sure, you may have to match up a linear tracker more carefully to cart., and worry about lateral effective mass, but do it right, and you can achieve more than acceptable fidelity.

Quote from: doctorcilantro on 2010-09-11 03:17:19

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape. Not new concepts, and often addressed by today's designers.

What he's saying is that inner groove distortion has two major causes…

Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on 2010-09-11 10:02:58

Quote from: doctorcilantro on 2010-09-11 03:17:19

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape. Not new concepts, and often addressed by today's designers.

What he's saying is that inner groove distortion has two major causes…

Who is that “he”?
As for me, I never said this. Once more, I’ve repeated in this post above that what is popularly called “inner groove distortion” is not “inner groove distortion”, but the distortion proper to the playing of ANY groove by a stylus that has not, and cannot have, the profile of the cutting chisel, but aggravating on the shorter radii of the record. Thus having ONE cause.

What he's saying is that…

Who is that “he”?

I see you are playing with personalities rather than deal with the question...

…the question that I asked.
Here it is again:
"Inner groove distortion has two major causes, only one of which is addressed by linear tracking tone arms. This is fact. You can't play divide and conquer unless you actually conquer both of them."

The two causes of inner groove distortion are:
(1) Cartridge not being held tangent to the groove

(2) Wavelengths on disk shortened by smaller groove radius

Quote from: Fedot L on 2010-09-12 18:39:19

Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on 2010-09-11 10:02:58

Quote from: doctorcilantro on 2010-09-11 03:17:19

So now you're suddenly equivocating 'inner groove distortion' with 'tracing distortion'? One being a function of tonearm alignment, and the other due to stylus shape. Not new concepts, and often addressed by today's designers.

What he's saying is that inner groove distortion has two major causes…

Who is that “he”?
As for me, I never said this. Once more, I’ve repeated in this post above that what is popularly called “inner groove distortion” is not “inner groove distortion”, but the distortion proper to the playing of ANY groove by a stylus that has not, and cannot have, the profile of the cutting chisel, but aggravating on the shorter radii of the record. Thus having ONE cause.

That "he" is me, Arnold B. Krueger.

I see you are playing with personalities rather than deal with the question that I asked.

Here it is again:

"Inner groove distortion has two major causes, only one of which is addressed by linear tracking tone arms. This is fact. You can't play divide and conquer unless you actually conquer both of them."

The two causes of inner groove distortion are:

(1) Cartrdige not being held tangent to the groove

(2) Wavelengths on disk shortened by smaller groove radius

Linear tracking can address (1) but not (2).

Pinch effect is only part of (2).

The two causes of inner groove distortion are:

(1) Cartrdige not being held tangent to the groove

(2) Wavelengths on disk shortened by smaller groove radius

Linear tracking can address (1) but not (2).

Pinch effect is only part of (2).

The top two rows of values in Table 1 are taken from Shure literature and some of the reviews that were published when the V15/III was released. Shure used to publish ‘trackability’ graphs, etc, that showed the peak modulation velocities their cartridges could track. The data shown is for a playing weigh of 1 gram. Knowing the velocity and frequency we can calculate the acceleration required. Then use this to work out the maximum allowed stylus curvature and tip mass which would allow the stylus to perform as specified. Shure themselves claimed that their V15/III stylii had a tip mass of no more than 0·4 milligrams. Their chief engineer of the time also wrote an article that appeared in Hi Fi News[1]. This said that they had surveyed a number of LPs and that the highest accelerations they could find were around 1500g, so they designed the V15 series to track these discs. From the values in the above table we can see that the requirements include a tip mass of less than or equal to 0·6 milligrams and a minor radius of less than or equal to 3·5 microns. If the V15/III stylus had a higher mass or radius it would be unable to perform as specified across the frequency range and right to the end of an LP side.

In fact although the Shure VN35MR stylus for the V15/III had a ‘Micro Ridge’ with a claimed radius of 3·5 microns, earlier stylii had larger contact radius values. For example the VN35E was an elliptical shape with a minor radius of 5 microns. The measurements Shure quoted were often obtained using 45 rpm test discs, and using test tones recorded well away from the end-of-side region. Increasing the rotation rate from 33 to 45 rpm stretches the modulation out along the groove, reducing the curvature of the bends. At the end of an LP side it means that a stylus contact radius of 4·7 microns would allow the V15/III to fully meet its specifications.

And as you can see from Figure 5, if we keep away from the end of the LP side we don’t need such a small tip radius. So although the VM35MR shape might have coped with 1500g accelerations right up to the end of side, the VN35E and some of the earlier shapes may not.

Overall, the above tells us that if we wish to be able to play real-world LPs without mistracking we really need a tip mass of around half a milligram or less, and a minor radius of curvature (or equivalent) of around 3-4 microns or less. Larger values may be fine for most of the playing time of most discs, but could run into trouble in extreme cases. In theory, even lower masses and curvatures may seem desirable, but in practice they may only be needed for test tones, not music. Indeed, the cutter used to create the groove shape may have had an effective contact radius of a few microns, so it simply makes no sense to try to reach a stylus radius smaller than this. More extreme modulation may simple never appear on real-world discs of music. Although who knows, maybe it does – at least up until it is played for the first time!...

So although theory tells us we’d need to cope with 6000g and very tight curves to obtain a 0dB 20kHz test tone, the reality seems to be that practical LPs of music don’t normally have modulations which reach such extreme levels. This agrees with the results in the previous article and explains the difference between the theoretical requirements and reality!

As you approach the end of an LP side you have all that musical information squished into a smaller amount of groove length. It is difficult if not impossible to have the same amount of fidelity in the last song on a side compared to the first.

Quote from: Leigh on 2010-09-13 15:24:23

As you approach the end of an LP side you have all that musical information squished into a smaller amount of groove length. It is difficult if not impossible to have the same amount of fidelity in the last song on a side compared to the first.

Does anyone know if there have ever been experimental LPs that were cut "inside out" - starting at the centre and moving towards to outer edge. For some classical music, where the beginning is quiet and the climax has all-guns-blazing, I'd have thought that might help.

I can't find the link, but there was an early phonograph design where constant linear velocity was maintained. Obviously, the record would spin faster and faster as the needle made its way to the center (or slower as it moved away from the center if it were designed that way), and the record would have to be cut this way also. However this would obviously lead to much less program time per side. I would imagine getting the speed/pitch right would be a real challenge with a design like this.

Does anyone know if there have ever been experimental LPs that were cut "inside out" - starting at the centre and moving towards to outer edge. For some classical music, where the beginning is quiet and the climax has all-guns-blazing, I'd have thought that might help.

Quote from: Leigh on 2010-09-13 18:49:03

I can't find the link, but there was an early phonograph design where constant linear velocity was maintained. Obviously, the record would spin faster and faster as the needle made its way to the center (or slower as it moved away from the center if it were designed that way), and the record would have to be cut this way also. However this would obviously lead to much less program time per side. I would imagine getting the speed/pitch right would be a real challenge with a design like this.

Actually quite the opposite is true. If currently LPs have to rotate at 33 1/3 in order to have sufficient fidelity at the innermost groove, then that is much faster than it needs to be at the outermost groove. This would result in increased capacity.

This is very reminiscent of Laser Discs and their CAV vs. CLV modes.

I completely agree about the difficulty of getting the speed/pitch right.

The so-called "inner groove distortion" is not a function of tone-arm alignment. Any pivoting  tone-arm alignment leaves variable horizontal tracking angle errors and in “outer”, and in “medium”, and in “inner” grooves.