[Sol_Zhen]

Quote:

Originally posted by Beagle This is a load of horsedung. What is your experience with turntables? A Mickey Mouse record player? Please refrain from posting nonsense such as this.

I think this is the first time I've agreed with Beagle.

I'll wait for an LP advocate to straighten that guy out with the details. But if I’m not mistaken, vinyl has more range than CD and any quality record can sound much better than the same album on CD.

Also, lots of pop and rock CDs are dynamically compressed so they sound good on peoples’ cheap **** equipment.

It’s about demographics. Mom and dad buy Jazz and listen on the hi-fi so the recordings are not dynamically compressed in this way. But these good recordings will not sound very good on junior’s cool looking but ****ty mini-system because junior’s system has crap for dynamic range reproduction. So the pop and rock CDs that junior buys are dynamically compressed in the mastering process so they sound “good” on his mini-system (the one with the kaleidoscope EQ).

FM rock stations do the same compression with their broadcasts so their stations don’t have a big range between quiet parts in songs and the peaks in songs. Reason? So their station sounds “good” on crappy car stereos.

 

[Orpheus]

"I'll wait for an LP advocate to straighten that guy out with the details. But if I’m not mistaken, vinyl has more range than CD and any quality record can sound much better than the same album on CD."

--no, you're definately wrong on this. typical vinyl dynamic range is 40-50db, compared with CD's 90+db. i suppose with high end equipment and supremely well made vinyl, you could increase the 40-50db quite a bit, but it still would not come even close to a CD's dynamic range. and we're talking redbook.... DVD-A is of course 2^8* better. if you say that vinyl sounds better, that's a subjective argument, and probably is completely true with your ears. however, objectively, vinyl doesn't even come close to a CD, in any measurement.

"Also, lots of pop and rock CDs are dynamically compressed so they sound good on peoples?cheap **** equipment. "

--yes, you are right. you have to remember, the vast majority of people don't care for our hobby, and thus won't spend more than a couple hundred bucks on stereo equipment.

"It’s about demographics. Mom and dad buy Jazz and listen on the hi-fi so the recordings are not dynamically compressed in this way. But these good recordings will not sound very good on junior’s cool looking but ****ty mini-system because junior’s system has crap for dynamic range reproduction. So the pop and rock CDs that junior buys are dynamically compressed in the mastering process so they sound “good?on his mini-system (the one with the kaleidoscope EQ). "

--again, yes, you're right.

"FM rock stations do the same compression with their broadcasts so their stations don’t have a big range between quiet parts in songs and the peaks in songs. Reason? So their station sounds “good?on crappy car stereos."

--well, sorta. that's not the entire reason. ....it's not just that the fact that compressed sound in general sounds better on worse equipment. it's also because when you drive, cars make noise. thus, you cannot hear small details. by compressing, it brings smaller details out front and louder, thus you hear better. you wouldn't want to play an audiophile CD in a car. you wouldn't be able to appreciate the dynamics. also.......... one very simple reason why radio stations do this....... they compete with other radio stations with pure loudness!!! the louder a station is, the more successful it will be. thus they compress as much as they can to simply blast other stations away. down here, we have KIIS 102.7fm... and it is one of the loudest stations on the radio. very very very loud. you turn on this channel, and your car would be bumpin' at volumes other channels only sound decent at. no wonder it is also one of the biggest radio stations...

and lastly, DON'T KNOCK MY MICKEY MOUSE TURNTABLE! my GF thinks it's cute!

 

[sliberman]

The source of distortion can be anywhere along the recording chain.
And it can be also in the playback stage. Assuming that the bits are
read OK from the CD by the CD player, then the distortion
can appear in the digital to analog conversion stage.

There are a large number of D/A converters out there that use
the Delta-Sigma architecture, of different orders.
These are the converters that have the actual D/A stage using
from 1 to a few bits.
The Delta-Sigma modulator has a feedback structure where the
quantization error from the output is feed back to the input.
This means that they can and are very prone to oscillations,
if steps are not taken to eliminate or at least strongly randomize
this tendency.

These oscillations will appear as random bursts of chirps and
background noise, generally at a very low level, otherwise the
D/A would not be considered good enough for audio. So they
are generally audible only when using headphones.

If D/A oscillation is suspected, then it is necessary to try and hear
the same music segment in another CD player that uses a
different D/A, such as a non-Delta-Sigma multi-bit converter, or
at least a Delta-Sigma of different order. If the distortions again
appear, then it is not related to the D/A, and the source is
somewhere earlier in the recording stage.

 

[disturbed]

Any Yoko Ono CD brings pain to my ears due to distortion ....

 

[Orpheus]

you know.... on the subject of "good" distortion: your acoustical environment can also be seen as a source of distortion. reflections off walls, and off other objects also disturb the coherance and frequnecy reponse of the sound. still, people like the sound of speakers... and that's one of the reasons. headphones are immune to this effect of course, and near-field monitoring has less of this effect compared to big main monitors. but you know...... when you go to concerts, certain venues sound better than others. the acoustics play a big part in the sound. and acoustics is in effect distortion. if you like speakers compared to headphones, perhaps you like this sort of "distortion" too.

 

[Sol_Zhen]

Quote:

Originally posted by disturbed Any Yoko Ono CD brings pain to my ears due to distortion ....

Don't need distortion to make Yoko Ono cause pain.