[Brahmsian]

Do you happen to have a link for the headphone's frequency response? Or maybe a more advanced spec sheet? Those numbers are worthless without mentioning tolerance. My phone's speaker could go from "3Hz to 100kHz" if I forgot to mention how much it rolls off on both ends.

I posted that mostly as a humorous aside considering we're debating anything above 20kHz.

1. Did you actually look at what you posted? Fractions of a percent at freqs which only young people can hear and even then, only if you blast them with pure tones! So, if you're young, have a collection of recordings of nothing but pure >20kHz sine waves and play them back at >100dB, then yes, >44.1kHz sample rates would be worth it for you!
2. He does leave it open, as a marketing ploy, because there is ZERO evidence to support it! Brain activity was measured BUT none of the study participants were actually aware of it. So, if you mechanically bolt your speakers to your skull, you're "enjoyment of music" will be unaffected UNLESS you enjoy watching a real time EEG while you're listening to your music!

G

I know what the problem is: you don't suffer fools like me gladly. But as there will probably always be a lot of stupid people in the world you're just going to have to deal with it.

1. I did indeed look before posting, and I see more than just fractions of a percent there: human sibilant 1.7%, trumpet 2, claves 3.8, rimshot 6, crash cymbal 40, jangling keys 68. And the issue isn't so much whether you can hear these frequencies as feel them or whether they somehow affect the frequencies that you do hear.

2. Sorry, what is he marketing again? I missed it.

This thread has gotten too abstract. It doesn't focus on the concrete.

For example, why does this particular MQA release sound so different from (and in my opinion better than) the non-MQA release? All this talk about subtle differences which you can barely hear or can't hear at all doesn't apply. I'm perfectly willing to accept that it's nothing more than remastering. In fact, I'm even willing to accept that the record label intentionally made the non-MQA version sound like crap in order to make the MQA version sound better. But we're not talking subtle differences here.

MQA: https://listen.tidal.com/album/68731546

non-MQA: https://listen.tidal.com/album/51005915

The links take you to Tidal's website. They are merely so you can see what recording I'm referring to. For the MQA content you have to have downloaded the Tidal desktop app. Of course, I'm assuming that on a thread dedicated to MQA somebody can actually play MQA, that people actually have access to it.

What accounts for the vast difference? Granting there's a difference, which nobody with even average hearing would deny, it comes down to which sound you prefer. If you prefer the MQA, then clearly exploring MQA is well worth it and people who do explore it shouldn't be spoken of as though they were stupid (often the case on this thread).

To call it snake oil isn't correct. When I think of snake oil I think of things that claim to improve something but actually don't. MQA does something and whether it degrades the sound in at least some cases is open to debate and subject to personal taste. Again I prefer the MQA version of this particular release because it sounds smoother, more natural, and less compressed to me.

 

[bigshot]

Wow! And I thought we'd solved this problem and here it comes back from the dead!

As for the Tidal comparison... You're assuming the difference is because MQA is improving the sound quality. I think it's much more likely that the normal track is hobbled to make the MQA seem better. Why would you want to support a format that has to skew its advantages by hobbling the normal track? I found a Stones SACD that had the nice new mix on the SACD layer and a very old CD mix on the CD layer. Not even the same mix. Did that endear SACDs to my heart? Nope.

 

[headfry]

I posted that mostly as a humorous aside considering we're debating anything above 20kHz.


I know what the problem is: you don't suffer fools like me gladly. But as there will probably always be a lot of stupid people in the world you're just going to have to deal with it.

1. I did indeed look before posting, and I see more than just fractions of a percent there: human sibilant 1.7%, trumpet 2, claves 3.8, rimshot 6, crash cymbal 40, jangling keys 68. And the issue isn't so much whether you can hear these frequencies as feel them or whether they somehow affect the frequencies that you do hear.

2. Sorry, what is he marketing again? I missed it.

This thread has gotten too abstract. It doesn't focus on the concrete.

For example, why does this particular MQA release sound so different from (and in my opinion better than) the non-MQA release? All this talk about subtle differences which you can barely hear or can't hear at all doesn't apply. I'm perfectly willing to accept that it's nothing more than remastering. In fact, I'm even willing to accept that the record label intentionally made the non-MQA version sound like crap in order to make the MQA version sound better. But we're not talking subtle differences here.

MQA: https://listen.tidal.com/album/68731546

non-MQA: https://listen.tidal.com/album/51005915

The links take you to Tidal's website. They are merely so you can see what recording I'm referring to. For the MQA content you have to have downloaded the Tidal desktop app. Of course, I'm assuming that on a thread dedicated to MQA somebody can actually play MQA, that people actually have access to it.

What accounts for the vast difference? Granting there's a difference, which nobody with even average hearing would deny, it comes down to which sound you prefer. If you prefer the MQA, then clearly exploring MQA is well worth it and people who do explore it shouldn't be spoken of as though they were stupid (often the case on this thread).

To call it snake oil isn't correct. When I think of snake oil I think of things that claim to improve something but actually don't. MQA does something and whether it degrades the sound in at least some cases is open to debate and subject to personal taste. Again I prefer the MQA version of this particular release because it sounds smoother, more natural, and less compressed to me.

- the need to denigrate comes easy to know-it-all armchair critics who don't need to fairly audition something they are against in
principle, but that doesn't stop them from criticizing it as snake oil and putting down those who like it as idiots.

Thanks for your post, it was needed here at head-fi.

 

[bigshot]

By the way, that particular album is available at Amazon for $1.33 right now. It might be worth picking up the CD and finding out whether it more resembles the regular Tidal or the MQA Tidal. That would be a good bet. I'd put a quarter on the CD sounding identical to the Tidal.

2002 Reissue http://amzn.to/2tivOXj
1990 Original Release http://amzn.to/2tivOXj

 

[old tech]

I posted that mostly as a humorous aside considering we're debating anything above 20kHz.


I know what the problem is: you don't suffer fools like me gladly. But as there will probably always be a lot of stupid people in the world you're just going to have to deal with it.

1. I did indeed look before posting, and I see more than just fractions of a percent there: human sibilant 1.7%, trumpet 2, claves 3.8, rimshot 6, crash cymbal 40, jangling keys 68. And the issue isn't so much whether you can hear these frequencies as feel them or whether they somehow affect the frequencies that you do hear.

That's a bit like saying "the issue is not whether we can see an exploding star in a distant galaxy but whether we can feel it or it somehow effects how we see the moon"'.

1. It is a logical fallacy and without any substance or real world experimental data.
2. With regard to these supersonic audio frequencies, it simply does not stack up with logic. Here is a thought experiment, lets say these supersonic frequencies do somehow affect the frequencies we do hear, regardless of nil evidence for it. Why is that relevant to a recording being played back? If those ultrasonics are affecting frequencies within the human hearing domain then by definition that is the sound that would be captured in the recording and heard on playback. Why would the ultrasonics need to be played back when the effects are already in the recorded sound?
3. Lastly, IMO it is irrational to focus on things that have no grounds in logic and no evidence for it rather than the things that do matter - ie the linearity of the frequency response within the human hearing range and, more importantly, the quality of the actual recording/mastering, the loudspeakers and room acoustics.
4. Even if one has a fetish for out of range content, why focus on weak, directional, easily masked high frequencies rather than powerful, omni-directional >20hz frequencies which we can perceive as vibrations of things within and around us?

 

[bigshot]

Ultra sonic frequencies add nothing to the perceived sound quality of music. There was a test with music comparing the same track with ultrasonic content and run through a bandpass filter chopping it off below 20Hz and above 20kHz. They were asked to rate the sample tracks for sound quality. No one tested expressed any preference for one over the other. Then they took the same track and removed all of the high frequencies above 10kHz. A few people could discern a difference, but no one said it make any real difference to the sound quality.

 

[castleofargh]

- the need to denigrate comes easy to know-it-all armchair critics who don't need to fairly audition something they are against in
principle, but that doesn't stop them from criticizing it as snake oil and putting down those who like it as idiots.

Thanks for your post, it was needed here at head-fi.

lucky for us, you are here to offer an impartial vision in a constructive comment.
you really think if you post "I like listening to MQA", or "I dislike listening to MQA" without any extra nonsense, objectivists will give a crap? you might not have noticed but this section isn't too big on impression threads.

more likely, we bite when we read made up self justifications involving unverified claims and dubious hypotheses.

 

[Strangelove424]

As for the Tidal comparison... You're assuming the difference is because MQA is improving the sound quality. I think it's much more likely that the normal track is hobbled to make the MQA seem better. Why would you want to support a format that has to skew its advantages by hobbling the normal track? I found a Stones SACD that had the nice new mix on the SACD layer and a very old CD mix on the CD layer. Not even the same mix. Did that endear SACDs to my heart? Nope.

This is the issue that irks me the most. What they're doing is trashing the quality of the CD remasters (and setting fire to the world's cannon of music in the process) to up-sell the HD stuff. It's a scam, and it's culturally destructive. I get the most breathless and exasperated about this issue because it is robbery for the labels to be doing this. It should be illegal quite frankly, Each master, once it leaves the studio, should be cataloged and serial numbered, and somewhere on every CD, MP3, DVD, SACD, etc. there should be a number that indicates what master is on that media. If it's found that the media contains a different master than indicated, there should be heavy fines.

By the way, that particular album is available at Amazon for $1.33 right now. It might be worth picking up the CD and finding out whether it more resembles the regular Tidal or the MQA Tidal. That would be a good bet. I'd put a quarter on the CD sounding identical to the Tidal.

2002 Reissue http://amzn.to/2tivOXj
1990 Original Release http://amzn.to/2tivOXj

In fact, I wager to bet the used CD (if it was mastered in the early to mid 90s) would sound better than the modern day high res track. High res is no savior from brick walling, but if you get an old CD from before the compression days really hit, it will sound wonderful. Better than vinyl I think. I wish I could blind test a bunch of audiophiles on a popular 90's CD vs. a modern HD remaster, I am very confident the semi-vintage CD would be preferred. And they're a few bucks on Amazon, as you noted. $3 vs $30. All of this blows my mind. I don't feel bad for cable or magic rock people, they're silly and obsessive enough to create their own market, but the music studios are going out of their way to artificially create this market, and dupe well-meaning music lovers by playing shell games with the new masters.

 

[Brahmsian]

By the way, that particular album is available at Amazon for $1.33 right now. It might be worth picking up the CD and finding out whether it more resembles the regular Tidal or the MQA Tidal. That would be a good bet. I'd put a quarter on the CD sounding identical to the Tidal.

2002 Reissue http://amzn.to/2tivOXj
1990 Original Release http://amzn.to/2tivOXj

I listened again to the first few minutes of the two Tidal albums I linked to above (Bach/Perlman MQA and non-MQA). Aside from the fact that the non-MQA version sounds louder, they have the left/right channels inverted. The harpsichord comes in on the left in one version and on the right in the other version. Ditto the violins. It's the same with the two Perlman plays Fritz Kreisler releases. Any guesses as to why this should be the case? How would something like this come to happen? Anyhow, that one is louder than the other and furthermore the fact that the left/right channels are inverted, these two things alone can account for significant (if trivial) differences.

 

[bigshot]

Each master, once it leaves the studio, should be cataloged and serial numbered, and somewhere on every CD, MP3, DVD, SACD, etc. there should be a number that indicates what master is on that media. If it's found that the media contains a different master than indicated, there should be heavy fines.

In fact, I wager to bet the used CD (if it was mastered in the early to mid 90s) would sound better than the modern day high res track.

That album was mastered in 1986.

In the era of the 78, the master number and take number was etched into the runout groove. You would have been happy back then!

It sounds to me like MQA is just doing stupid stuff to sound different. Inverted L/R is very dumb.

 

[gregorio]

I know what the problem is: you don't suffer fools like me gladly. But as there will probably always be a lot of stupid people in the world you're just going to have to deal with it.

There's ignorant, stupid, ignorant + stupid and then willfully ignorant + stupid. The latter is what I don't suffer gladly, the others I certainly can "deal with", as for some years I was a university lecturer in audio!

[1] I did indeed look before posting, and I see more than just fractions of a percent there: human sibilant 1.7%, trumpet 2, claves 3.8, rimshot 6, crash cymbal 40, jangling keys 68. [2] And the issue isn't so much whether you can hear these frequencies as feel them or whether they somehow affect the frequencies that you do hear.

1. Mainly it's factions of a percent, some are a few fractions more. Take the human sibilant (1.7%), A. You think you can hear that 1.7% in the presence of the other 98.3%? If so, how loud would that 98.3% have to be in order to cross the threshold of audibility for that 1.7%? B. With the human sibilant and with most of the instruments which have more than a fraction of a percent above 20kHz, it only exists within in a few inches of the source. Move a few feet away from someone speaking or say 20 feet from a trumpet and that >20kHz content reduces to a fraction of a percent or nothing at all. With a trumpet then, when you go to a symphony concert do you sit in the auditorium/audience or at the back of the viola section just a few feet away from the trumpet? A few instruments do produce significant content above 20kHz, typically the metallic, untuned instruments such as cymbals. However, because they are untuned what they are producing in the high and ultrasonic range is indistinguishable from random noise.

[1] For example, why does this particular MQA release sound so different from (and in my opinion better than) the non-MQA release? ... I'm perfectly willing to accept that it's nothing more than remastering. In fact, I'm even willing to accept that the record label intentionally made the non-MQA version sound like crap in order to make the MQA version sound better.

1. Different masters is the most likely explanation, however, remastering isn't! Unless something has changed very recently, none of the MQA tracks on Tidal were remastered for MQA, the MQA personnel were simply given access to pre-existing master versions.
2. The record label didn't intentionally make the non-MQA version sound like crap, they didn't have any new masters made. While it's entirely possible that MQA deliberately doctored the non-MQA masters for tidal, I think that's rather unlikely, for various reasons.

When I think of snake oil I think of things that claim to improve something but actually don't.

The Meridian/MQA team have simply chosen a different pre-existing master. They could have distributed that different master in WAV or FLAC and achieved the exact same result (technically, a slightly superior result). So what is the benefit of the MQA codec and of having to pay for the equipment to encode and decode it, what is the MQA codec itself improving? ... That's why it's snake oil!!!

-[1] the need to denigrate comes easy to know-it-all armchair critics who don't need to fairly audition something they are against in
principle, but that doesn't stop them from criticizing it as snake oil and putting down those who like it as idiots.
[2] Thanks for your post, it was needed here at head-fi.

1. The need to defend being suckered by marketing comes easy to know-it-all armchair audiophiles who don't need or even want the actual science/facts which (in order to defend themselves) they are against in principle, but it doesn't stop them coming on to a science sub-forum and criticizing the science/facts and those who put the facts above the marketing!
2. I'm sure to a troll or shill it was "needed" but why would the average serious music listener "need" to be suckered by the marketing and even worse, how on earth could it be needed in science sub-forum? ..... If you don't want to be treated like an idiot, then don't act like one!!!

[1] This is the issue that irks me the most. What they're doing is trashing the quality of the CD remasters (and setting fire to the world's cannon of music in the process) to up-sell the HD stuff. It's a scam, and it's culturally destructive. I get the most breathless and exasperated about this issue because it is robbery for the labels to be doing this.
[2] ...but the music studios are going out of their way to artificially create this market, and dupe well-meaning music lovers by playing shell games with the new masters.

1. To be honest, while it's entirely possible and may well have occurred, I think it's very rare that a CD master or remaster has been deliberately trashed in order to up-sell the HD version. What's going on instead is that the CD master is being more highly compressed for ostensibly honest reasons. In a critical listening environment a less compressed master will typically sound superior but in virtually all of the more common listening scenarios, the more compressed version will sound better. When I'm driving or listening to music on a plane or bus, the compressed version is eminently preferable, even to the point that I virtually never listen to classical music while driving because it's too dynamic to the point of un-listenable, I simply can't hear any of the quieter sections above the car/traffic noise. So, it's not a scam to have different masters and some more highly compressed than others and it's certainly not culturally destructive, if anything the opposite! However, do the peddlers of HD take advantage of and misrepresent this fact? Absolutely they do, if they didn't there wouldn't be a HD market! If they wanted to be honest about it, they would distribute both the more highly compressed master and the less compressed ("HD") version in 16/44.1 but of course they don't want to be honest about it, you can't charge as much for a "HD" version if it's in the same format and of course the audio hardware/equipment manufacturers have nowhere to go if there are no new formats to support.

2. Again, that might be true in a few rare cases but it's generally not true. The music studios (recording and mastering studios) are just doing what their clients, the record labels, demand. For example, the outcry against the loudness war was not initiated by consumers, audiophiles or the audio magazines/reviewers, it was initiated by the studios and engineers themselves. It was already raging within the industry when I entered it, 25 years ago! The entire ethos of studios and engineers for the whole history of music recording, mixing and mastering had always been to achieve the best subjective quality that the time, money and technology would allow but that gradually stopped being the case as engineers, particularly mastering engineers, were being asked to apply levels of compression which they felt were subjectively damaging. A few mastering engineers spoke openly against it but the vast majority, fearful of loosing major clients, only complained privately or anonymously. Many years later, audiophiles and the audiophile press latched on to the issue. The studios and engineers do not object to a more highly compressed master and a less compressed master because as mentioned above, there are many, if not the majority of consumer listening scenarios where the more compressed master is subjectively superior but we do object to the ridiculous loudness war levels of compression and we do object to the whole thing being misrepresented to scam consumers for so called HD versions. Again though, there aren't many in a position to speak openly/on the record about it. In private and between ourselves though, we just shake our heads in disbelief at the ridiculousness of it all!

G

 

[bigshot]

There are plenty of examples of hobbled CD tracks on SACDs. The CD layer of the Dark Side of the Moon is slightly compressed and at a lower level compared to the SACD layer. They sound similar, but there's a difference. I found a Rolling Stones SACD that had the new 24 bit remastering on the SACD track and the old 1980s CD mastering on the CD track. I can't see how that wasn't deliberate. When I was doing comparison tests of SACD vs CD, I had a hard time finding any SACD that was the same on both layers. Only classical music released by labels that only distributed their music on hybrid SACD had both tracks the same. I think that hobbling is a tool that the industry uses to push the format.

 

[Strangelove424]

That album was mastered in 1986.

In the era of the 78, the master number and take number was etched into the runout groove. You would have been happy back then!

It sounds to me like MQA is just doing stupid stuff to sound different. Inverted L/R is very dumb.

I probably would have been thrilled! That sounds like a perfectly rational way to run a commercial media distribution system. I'm not sure if vinyl sounded better because it was analogue, or if it sounded better because they actually respected basic quality standards and didn't push those standards. Maybe it was the physical limitations of vinyl that imposed a limit too, but either way the outcome was a better sounding master. To me, 90s CDs sound like clean vinyl.

1. To be honest, while it's entirely possible and may well have occurred, I think it's very rare that a CD master or remaster has been deliberately trashed in order to up-sell the HD version. What's going on instead is that the CD master is being more highly compressed for ostensibly honest reasons. In a critical listening environment a less compressed master will typically sound superior but in virtually all of the more common listening scenarios, the more compressed version will sound better. When I'm driving or listening to music on a plane or bus, the compressed version is eminently preferable, even to the point that I virtually never listen to classical music while driving because it's too dynamic to the point of un-listenable, I simply can't hear any of the quieter sections above the car/traffic noise. So, it's not a scam to have different masters and some more highly compressed than others and it's certainly not culturally destructive, if anything the opposite! However, do the peddlers of HD take advantage of and misrepresent this fact? Absolutely they do, if they didn't there wouldn't be a HD market! If they wanted to be honest about it, they would distribute both the more highly compressed master and the less compressed ("HD") version in 16/44.1 but of course they don't want to be honest about it, you can't charge as much for a "HD" version if it's in the same format and of course the audio hardware/equipment manufacturers have nowhere to go if there are no new formats to support.

2. Again, that might be true in a few rare cases but it's generally not true. The music studios (recording and mastering studios) are just doing what their clients, the record labels, demand. For example, the outcry against the loudness war was not initiated by consumers, audiophiles or the audio magazines/reviewers, it was initiated by the studios and engineers themselves. It was already raging within the industry when I entered it, 25 years ago! The entire ethos of studios and engineers for the whole history of music recording, mixing and mastering had always been to achieve the best subjective quality that the time, money and technology would allow but that gradually stopped being the case as engineers, particularly mastering engineers, were being asked to apply levels of compression which they felt were subjectively damaging. A few mastering engineers spoke openly against it but the vast majority, fearful of loosing major clients, only complained privately or anonymously. Many years later, audiophiles and the audiophile press latched on to the issue. The studios and engineers do not object to a more highly compressed master and a less compressed master because as mentioned above, there are many, if not the majority of consumer listening scenarios where the more compressed master is subjectively superior but we do object to the ridiculous loudness war levels of compression and we do object to the whole thing being misrepresented to scam consumers for so called HD versions. Again though, there aren't many in a position to speak openly/on the record about it. In private and between ourselves though, we just shake our heads in disbelief at the ridiculousness of it all!

G

Fair points, I perhaps portrayed it a bit too much like a conspiracy or conscious decision, when the reality is far more nuanced. Bob Katz has attributed 90% of the phenomenon to loudness envy, especially among rock bands, and 10% to artistic tastes. In competition with other acts, musicians and producers started to fall down a slippery slope. Factor in the changing environments of audio appreciation, the abandonment of focused listening sessions in favor of our mobile life styles, and the slope got even more slippery. So perhaps it's not as much a conscious scam, at least for the engineers, as a tragic compounding of commercially-driven goals.

It's ironic, but I have the very opposite complaint about sound design in movies, there's way too much dynamic range! They'll mix a dialogue scene in very low, to the point that I am leaning forward to hear, and then BAM! the action scenes start and guns are blazing, my subwoofer is tossing me around, and it almost feels like the sound designer was trying to trick me into setting an inappropriate volume, or spook me somehow. It's intolerable in modern movies. Classics never sound like that. I've grown weary of it, and began using my receiver's "Evening" and "Midnight" settings even during the day to reduce the dynamic range.

I can understand someone listening in a car, and finding that the quiet passages are too quiet, which causes them to play with the volume knob too much. In these cases, perhaps the best solution would be a hardware DR limiter inside the car, which could be implemented for a few dollars (if not pennies) per car by the automotive manufacturers. It could function just like my receiver's night mode, or perhaps be even smarter than that, and run the compression algorithm correlated to speed. However implemented, the benefit of this would be that the DR can be customized for each and every taste and situation, and by retaining the original DR we are not losing data that can never be salvaged again. It seems to me a bad idea to try to master multiple versions for different listening situations and environments. Better to make one ideal copy in the the eyes of the artist, created with neutral systems for neutral systems, and let the audience tailor that version to their own specific system, in whatever deviations from neutrality they must achieve to make it sounds good to them. I certainly won't buy 2 versions of all my music to match different situations. The cost of that is mind reeling.

If "HD tracks" actually means "mastered for home listening" and "CD quality" means "mastered for mobile" that's where I believe the purposeful ambiguity, and thus the scam is at play. They cannot charge more for a different master, a CD is a CD, but if they add more dots and digits, people with no idea of Nyquist will assume the quality comes from that, and not a mastering decision, an artisitc choice. And that's why listeners like bigshot aren't getting a CD/SACD together in a package with the same master. The studios are afraid that if he nulled the tracks he would have heard silence. That's why I beleive so strongly in identifying each and every master through a catalogue system. We're not paying for the digits, we're paying for the craftsmanship.

Despite my rageful bitterness, I am actually quite hopeful. We hardly know how good things can sound yet - we haven't taken full advantage of digital's processing benefits because we've been using all of it in a singular quest for loudness instead of balance. The early 90's CDs, though I am fond of them, are essentially a cleaned up vinyl. If the enhancements of these 1+0s can be used to our advantage rather than our detriment (and I don't mean resolution, I mean mixing/mastering) the best versions of all the albums we love are yet to be made. It's not HD that will bring it to us, it's just good 'ole decision making in combination with better software tools. Nostalgia is myopic. I truly believe the best days of audio are yet to come. Thank you for your thoughtful and candid post.

 

[pinnahertz]

That album was mastered in 1986.

In the era of the 78, the master number and take number was etched into the runout groove. You would have been happy back then!

No, the number in the runout area is the matrix number, essentially the stamper. The purpose was to tie the pressing to the correct label, and to indicate how many pressings came from a given stamper, which were only good for a limited number of pressings before they had to be replaced. It's not a reference to a recording take or master.

 

[pinnahertz]

I probably would have been thrilled! That sounds like a perfectly rational way to run a commercial media distribution system. I'm not sure if vinyl sounded better because it was analogue, or if it sounded better because they actually respected basic quality standards and didn't push those standards. Maybe it was the physical limitations of vinyl that imposed a limit too, but either way the outcome was a better sounding master. To me, 90s CDs sound like clean vinyl.

There is no aspect of the vinyl process that results in better sound. If a particular vinyl version sounds subjectively "better" than the CD version, there are a number of reasons, but vinyl itself isn't one of them. It's important to remember than when comparing vinyl to a CD of the same material you are not comparing the release medium alone. In fact, that's not a valid comparison of anything other than the entire process and creative decision chain to each.

I can understand someone listening in a car, and finding that the quiet passages are too quiet, which causes them to play with the volume knob too much. In these cases, perhaps the best solution would be a hardware DR limiter inside the car, which could be implemented for a few dollars (if not pennies) per car by the automotive manufacturers.

Until the days of cheap DSP, this would not have been simple or cheap to do. Adequate execution of DR compression in the analog world is difficult and expensive, and would require several different settings for different genres. It hasn't been done because it's hard to do well.

It could function just like my receiver's night mode, or perhaps be even smarter than that, and run the compression algorithm correlated to speed.

Speed influenced volume has been done for quite some time, and on some very common vehicles. GM products, late 90s, possibly earlier, had it. Probably many others too, I just owned some of the GM product and used the feature. It' works well, so long as the amount of volume adjustment is selected by the user, there are usually at least 3 levels to pick from. But it doesn't deal with DR, just a volume offset.

However implemented, the benefit of this would be that the DR can be customized for each and every taste and situation, and by retaining the original DR we are not losing data that can never be salvaged again.

Yes, that would be the benefit, but the market won't support it. The bulk of modern music is already low DR, no point in making it less. The exceptions of genres like Jazz and Classical don't drive enough sales to support the concept. Probably won't ever happen except for the high-end cars and systems. I have a friend who, in the 1980s, installed a power inverter and a pair professional recording compressors (Aphex Compellors) to accomplish this. Worked well, cost a bloody mint.

It seems to me a bad idea to try to master multiple versions for different listening situations and environments. Better to make one ideal copy in the the eyes of the artist, created with neutral systems for neutral systems, and let the audience tailor that version to their own specific system, in whatever deviations from neutrality they must achieve to make it sounds good to them. I certainly won't buy 2 versions of all my music to match different situations. The cost of that is mind reeling.

Never going to happen.

If "HD tracks" actually means "mastered for home listening" and "CD quality" means "mastered for mobile" that's where I believe the purposeful ambiguity, and thus the scam is at play. They cannot charge more for a different master, a CD is a CD, but if they add more dots and digits, people with no idea of Nyquist will assume the quality comes from that, and not a mastering decision, an artisitc choice. And that's why listeners like bigshot aren't getting a CD/SACD together in a package with the same master. The studios are afraid that if he nulled the tracks he would have heard silence. That's why I beleive so strongly in identifying each and every master through a catalogue system. We're not paying for the digits, we're paying for the craftsmanship.

You're over-thinking the industry quite a bit here. HD Tracks sells HD "versions" that lack any sort of provenance, so it's a money grab with few exceptions. 192/24 versions of analog tape recordings? Come on. The idea of someone nulling tracks of two different releases of the same material isn't even on studios radar.

Despite my rageful bitterness, I am actually quite hopeful. We hardly know how good things can sound yet - we haven't taken full advantage of digital's processing benefits because we've been using all of it in a singular quest for loudness instead of balance. The early 90's CDs, though I am fond of them, are essentially a cleaned up vinyl. If the enhancements of these 1+0s can be used to our advantage rather than our detriment (and I don't mean resolution, I mean mixing/mastering) the best versions of all the albums we love are yet to be made. It's not HD that will bring it to us, it's just good 'ole decision making in combination with better software tools. Nostalgia is myopic. I truly believe the best days of audio are yet to come. Thank you for your thoughtful and candid post.

Well, that's an awful lot of generalities. "We" do know how good things can sound, and there are many commercial examples to be had. The popular genre has gotten into the competitive loudness war, that's a different issue. 90's CDs are cleaned up vinyl? That's crazy. You don't have any idea what goes on in either production chain. 90's CDs have no relation to anything vinyl at all.

The best version of your favorite recordings are the bit-perfect copies of the masters you already have. You can't improve on a bit-perfect copy. Your issues are with what's on the masters, and that's an issue of creative and marketing choices. You can have that argument, and it's valid, but has nothing to do with the technology. Don't fall into the "vinyl is better" trap, or the "older stuff is better" trap either. There are plenty of instances where the vinyl/oder versions may indeed sound better, but it has nothing to do with the medium. It's all about the choices made in the releases, and their production chains. Place the blame for poor contemporary audio where it belongs: music industry marketing. The technology has been way beyond capable for many decades. You can use or abuse anything.