[rickcr42]

sounds like cerbie is spoiling for a fight with the rickmonster and is getting a bit snotty about it it.

Cool ! I'll bite

First off.If you are going to get snarly with the big boys you need to do some minimal homework which by your response you seemed to have forgotten to do.

Quote:

One is easy to deal with, both in software and hardware. One isn't.

wrong.Neither is easy to deal with and all you would be doing anyway is making YOUR personal preferences the overriding sonic trait and they may be every bit as evil to others as what bothers you.Music recordings are and always have been aimed at the majority audience,those who buy the most goods and that throughout history has been the teenage "pop music" gang with low level playback equipment.The NEED compression and they WANT bass.Just read the forums here if you doubt that.
Better yet read early posts from every young member and read as their music sensibilities and taste have come to be refined over time from being exposed to better equipment.
The typical first post is "what headphones have the most bass" then a year ot two later they are squealing about how lacking CDs are

Quote:

Oh, please.

you forgot one of these

essential if you want to be condescending

see ?

Quote:

That's hair-splitting. You should know very well I meant lots of range compression, screwy EQ, etc..

Hair splitting ? do you actually have experience in all mediums of music playback ? LP ? 45 ? 8-Track ? Cassette ? Open Reel ? CD-4 ? SQ/QS/QD4/Etc. ?


"screwy EQ" and "lots of range compresssion" have been pretty much the norm since the beginning.After the recording machines were invented and the amps/speakers to monitor the sounds built it was realised right away something was not right so stage-ll of studio electronics desing was the what ?

The Equaliser and the compressor !Control over the sinal instead of scrapping the whole deal and starting over.Try to make a good recording without a compressor and you will fail.Fail to use selective equalistaion and it WILL sound like crap.so it comes down to what and where choices.

The average system in the home is HT Receiver based with tiny little speakers and a single "boom and thud" box called a subwoofer.It is not one but why split hairs now ?

These crappy speakers are anything but serious monitors,have limited frequency response and that not flat by any standard,can mostly not handle any REAL power top to bottom and are about as dynamic as a block of ice.

you play a CD on that system that is equalised "honest" and do not compress the peaks or bring up the low level signal and you will have about the worst sounding event in the home you can possibly imagine.Dull,lifeless and will clip the amp every time there is a dynamic event because you had to turn the volume WAY UP just to hear the low volume notes.An unworkable situation and if you expect to sell music software to this person you need to fit the music to the system.

that means Compression,lots of compression so the entire selection can be played at a good litening volume level and you do not have to strain to hear some of the content or fear clipping your amps during busy passages.That same person can now turn up the volume and not fear the consequences of the act.Volume up,volume down,all the same.

EQ-That formerly "lifeless/gutless" song can be playable on that crap system only if the freqeuncy response is manipulated to make the format fit the system.That means boosted bass and boosted highs to make uyp for the areas where the average system sucks.

That fact that we can play these discs at all on a good system and still get some enjoyment is the amazing part to me knowing "why" certain choices have to be made by the big labels to satisfy the requirements of the majority buying public-kids with bedroom systems,families with HT systems,students with computer or portable systems.

Toss in the fact that these same knucklheads will SWEAR and MP3 sounds as good as a CD ..................

So there are valid reasons for much of the "damge" done and those are to fit the music to the system.My problem with many modern engineers is they think they are the star of the show and impose ideas on the music not previously there.I have heard CDs that were not just bad but so bad as to be painful and i can only wonder what that person was thinking.Is it the studio monitoring gear ? Is it so far from nuetral that this actually sounded good before finalising the decision to ship the product ?
I don't have that answer but DO know if you want to make a recording that has the widest appeal you mix to your large format monitors then check it off against mini-monitors (and if you are smart a pair of 6x9 coax car speakers

) then shoot for a mix that works well across the board while being not particularly ideal for any single playback system.again to the audience and expectations of their equipment level.


I have LPs with "gobs" of compression and serious amounts of EQ.I have cassteetes that have ZERO dynamic range (some lynnard Skynnard for example

) yet the music is good so I still play the cuts.
Maybe if we had better performers across the board as we once did the EQ and compression would be less of an issue ? When the songs suck you have nothing left to concentrate on but the engineering and to me that is the real sad part of modern music-bad songs done by zero talent performers who spend more time on their wardrobe than their craft

Quote:

Why does one need a good compressor?

because no recording medium known to humans can handle the full dynamic range of a live performance and even if it could,no system coul play it

Quote:

use one that was under $10 brand new retail, for movies with too much range to be comfy. If put in the devices themselves, I would find it hard to believe it would be more

That you find something hard to beleive means zero since you obviously do not feel a pressing need to research the topic yet do feel a need to comment on it.That you think a $10 compressor is the equal of a studio compressor is laughable.That you compare a MOVIE which is all about bigger than life FX sound to a CD then b*tch about CD EQ for being FX is amazing.

I also use a compressor in my AV system but it is not even close to the complexity level of my recording compressor OR limiter.A stupid little SSM chip in a box so i can listen to a DVD without straining to hear dialog and the next minute running for the volume remote to turn it down.

This is called "gain riding" and where an engineer has a hand on the input attenuator of that channel ready to bang down the signal manually if it gets too loud or bring it "up" if the sound is so soft its gets lost in the mix.

a peak limiter is just an automatic method to keep the loud peaks in check and the compressor to keep the entire mix within a certain range so nothing goes off the farm in any extreme direction and the former HUGE dynamic range of the live event will now fit into the range of as consumer level playback system

Quote:

If that existed for everything made, and did not end up costing as much as the system to play it on, sure. Does it? Can you* take something that didn't range range from the very early stages, and add it back in? (anyway, AFAIK: no, maybe, no)

It is close to everything made.if there is enough interest it is done.Cost ?
Man,if it is now about not wanting to pay a couple of extra bucks for a superior product then you have no right to cry about the state of music !
anyone with a system above the normal consumer level actually had to spend some loot to get there so what is the beef ? Is it just about "look hopw cool my gear is" ?
Without music it is just so much pretty junk and without good music you would be better off going to K-Mart for your next system.the music will sound quite nice on it

Quote:

Forget quality of gear. It's as bad coming from a TV's integrated speakers, or the average stock car stereo, as it is anything else. If it was done right once, then it could be mangled later, and not be a problem. No matter the technology, there is distorted and missing information. At this point, we are unable to fully replicate what was played back. With current technology, the audio signal from some microphones is all we've got. It aught to be made decent to listen to. * a consumer, without a super powerful computer, since it may be possible in theory, and maybe even practice

It is guys like you who have forced this sad state of affairs on the rest of us who were quite content playing our analog tapes and discs (and still do) with your "digital is great and can do anything" but one thing your generation lacks in abundance,other than manners ,is TALENT and that pretty much across the board and in all things.
You guys like to b*tch about everything,how bad things are (mostly of your own making) but hardly ever look to change anything and why I personally take none like you seriously.

My response was more because I felt like it not to have a dialog with someone who obviously knows so much he sees no reason to read at least the basics of the subject

Rickmonster-1
Opposition-0

 

[Publius]

On the specific issue of compressors: What Rick said. No artist or mastering engineer would be particularly happy with delegating mix compression to a sub-$10 user-controlled unit on playback, when they have compressors in the studio that still cost hundreds/thousands of dollars and give them a sound they like more. Compression is nowhere near a solved science, nor is it a commodity. Plus, you know, mastering to expect a compressor on playback is going to piss everybody else off who hasn't bought one yet.

There are a lot of details with such a scheme that haven't been worked out yet. It would be cool if they were, but you can't just handwave all of them away with a playback compressor/limiter.

 

[rickcr42]

Imagine a compressor in the hands of the consumer instead of a pro for a moment.

The same "needs more bass" and "how do I work the equaliser in winamp" crew and the mental image is not a pretty one.

If there is a "gadget" that may have applications to consumer mid-level gear it may well be a "peak unlimiter" that while not an exact copy of the original dynamics (an unknown without details of every mic limiter and final mix compressor spec on every single disc !) could maybe with a simple "0dB,+3dB,+6dB" idiot proof setting control be usable to open up at least the peaks.

Downward expansion is off the list for consumer level gear I would think since that would mean putting content into the noise floor of the gear many times not to mention the in combination with the above would be dangerous

One thing I know and have observed over time is most consumers are idiots and the less control they have the better off they are in the end.
If there is a knob or button that does something they WILL play with it and are the reason tone controls get a bad rap.
Too much power in the hands of the clueless is like giving a loaded revolver to a child and expecting them to know gun safety............

 

[cerbie]

Quote:

wrong.Neither is easy to deal with

I know of nothing that I can buy or put together that will analyze a track or set of tracks, find the actual range, and expand it out, with some decent way of getting rid of aliasing. I can easily find something I can buy or download to reduce that range.
Quote:

and all you would be doing anyway is making YOUR personal preferences the overriding sonic trait and they may be every bit as evil to others as what bothers you.Music recordings are and always have been aimed at the majority audience,those who buy the most goods and that throughout history has been the teenage "pop music" gang with low level playback equipment.The NEED compression and they WANT bass.Just read the forums here if you doubt that.

As I said before, this should have been integrated into the equipment, when the medium has the capability to be better than it is used as.
Quote:

Better yet read early posts from every young member and read as their music sensibilities and taste have come to be refined over time from being exposed to better equipment. The typical first post is "what headphones have the most bass" then a year ot two later they are squealing about how lacking CDs are

The two are not mutually exclusive, just as you have helped point out. Compression and EQing to color sound a certain way can be done by the user, and is dead simple to do, often with multiple methods available. I just see no reason why the media itself should contain it that way.

Sorry, next time I'll try to remember the

!

Quote:

Hair splitting ?

Yes. That is why there are people whose job is to deal with sound equipment, and the recordings themselves. They should be giving us things to spend money on that have some semblance of silence, and some hard-hitting peaks. Use the whole 90+dB range of the CD? Not unless there's good reason or compression is required to fit it. But often it's less than 20dB, now.

Those crappy systems might not handle a 'real' recording of a live event, but can handle older stuff with 40+dB range just fine. If not...there's my previous suggestion of using the DSP for something useful. In fact, default to 10:1 or so. Typically, such systems already come with a jacked up low and high EQ.

Here's what I had that I began noticing compression and clipping with:
-cheap TEAC CD player.
-Criterion reciever, I think from the mid 80s. Built like crap, needed regular cleaning. Unknown quality.
-$30 Radio Shack speakers.

That certainly lacked in many ways, and on classical recordings, with real range, it was an absolute joke. But it still didn't hide noise that should be getting quieter not doing so, and what should be peaks having no substance to them, where the stuff up through the 80s, in most cases, had real decay in voices, guitar, and percussion, and actual peaks.

Quote:

Maybe if we had better performers across the board as we once did the EQ and compression would be less of an issue ? When the songs suck you have nothing left to concentrate on but the engineering and to me that is the real sad part of modern music-bad songs done by zero talent performers who spend more time on their wardrobe than their craft

I don't think they'd be less of an issue--I think it would not be as bad as it is now.

What we have now is a situation in which two things are different than the past. Even in my short life thus far, both have blossomed (or grown as a cancer) to become exceptionally common circumstances:
1. Music = advertizing. getting your attention is more important than creative expression, or your enjoyment.
2. Music used to block the noise of the world, rather than fixing said noise. Noise pollution is increasingly coated and blocked by music, and suburban and urban areas get louder and louder. This necessitates low dynamic range, because even 20dB or so of quiet is overtaken by ambient sounds.

Quote:

That you find something hard to beleive means zero since you obviously do not feel a pressing need to research the topic yet do feel a need to comment on it.That you think a $10 compressor is the equal of a studio compressor is laughable.

That's your comparison, not mine. I do not think any such thing. I think that the $10 one gets the job done with minimal hassle, while not affecting the source media in any way.

Quote:

It is close to everything made.

OK, where's a Californication that sounds decent, FI? Vapor Trails?
Quote:

if there is enough interest it is done.Cost ? Man,if it is now about not wanting to pay a couple of extra bucks for a superior product then you have no right to cry about the state of music ! anyone with a system above the normal consumer level actually had to spend some loot to get there so what is the beef ? Is it just about "look hopw cool my gear is" ?

A couple extra bucks, last I looked, was more like a couple hundred extra bucks. A piece. Limited printing does that.
Quote:

Without music it is just so much pretty junk and without good music you would be better off going to K-Mart for your next system.the music will sound quite nice on it

No, it won't. It doesn't. That's the problem. Poor equipment may mask extreme quiet, and finer touches and errors, but extreme clipression sounds like crap even when played through crap.

Quote:

It is guys like you who have forced this sad state of affairs on the rest of us who were quite content playing our analog tapes and discs (and still do) with your "digital is great and can do anything"

Dead horse, and irrelavent. Given enough time, I'm sure this could have been done just as bad with newer analog tech by now. The problem is social. Any decent technology could be used.
Quote:

but one thing your generation lacks in abundance,other than manners ,is TALENT and that pretty much across the board and in all things.

It's your generation that created it, and allows it to prosper--or, if you're old enough, maybe your kids, too. Business-savvy pays, while talent rots, or is never cultivated. Today, are artists given enough freedom? Imagine some boy band deciding to really let themselves go, and show actual talent and skill. Would the Beatles be able to get away with that, today, since that's basically what they did? I bet they'd be dropped in a flash, and with the record company owning the music, no one would ever hear it.

I don't see anyone my age voting in things like the NCLB, which is a perfect example. I also don't see anyone my age running the music business in any way, which is more on the topic. We didn't create this. We're just riding it down. Some of us have found ourselves well enough to be looking forward to it, as previous avenues of change (such as public protest) have been falling flat--government and corporate crooks ahve learned over the years, it seems. Others will jst remain miserable and escape to mindless entertainment, overwork themselves, and stuff themselves with fast food; instead of trying to use their minds and bodies.

 

[rickcr42]

Quote:

I know of nothing that I can buy or put together that will analyze a track or set of tracks, find the actual range, and expand it out, with some decent way of getting rid of aliasing. I can easily find something I can buy or download to reduce that range.

if so then you are wasting your talents here

Quote:

As I said before, this should have been integrated into the equipment, when the medium has the capability to be better than it is used as.

so the elite that think they are better than everyone esle should have all Cds matered to some standard of supersystem and the clueless 14 year old with a radio shack set up needs to learn how to use a compressor ?

dude.you are wearing out this emoticon

Quote:

The two are not mutually exclusive, just as you have helped point out. Compression and EQing to color sound a certain way can be done by the user, and is dead simple to do, often with multiple methods available. I just see no reason why the media itself should contain it that way. Sorry, next time I'll try to remember the !

compression and EQing to make the format fit the system ! Not rocket science man but pure economics and target consumer,the bigger slice of the pie.I still contend good music mastered badly or even on outdated equipment is far more enjoyable than crap plyed on the best of systems using ther cleanest dub and for that i point you too 60's era music and early seventies music.the songs still hold up but I doubt the dynamic range is that of a cassette tape

Quote:

Yes. That is why there are people whose job is to deal with sound equipment, and the recordings themselves. They should be giving us things to spend money on that have some semblance of silence, and some hard-hitting peaks. Use the whole 90+dB range of the CD? Not unless there's good reason or compression is required to fit it. But often it's less than 20dB, now.

And have an unplayable product on 80% of the systems out there including probably your own.Have you even considered for a moment there is not a portable system out there that could reproduce this superior music ? No car sound system ?

oh yeah.Back to our own compressors theory......


Quote:

Those crappy systems might not handle a 'real' recording of a live event,

nor could a super system...........

Quote:

but can handle older stuff with 40+dB range just fine. If not...there's my previous suggestion of using the DSP for something useful. In fact, default to 10:1 or so. Typically, such systems already come with a jacked up low and high EQ.

there is no default that fits all music.You want something that does not exist and if it did would be a suck event.imagine not being able to actually understand a lead vocalist's words as is often the case at a live event ? Or having some instruments drowned out by others ? Or straining to hear soft notes above the ambient noise in the room ?
That is the REAL world of music not the pretty forwrd presence of a female vocal or the slashing solos you hear on a CD.All manipulation to produce a product in a way that is pleasing in the home or on the road and has zero to do with reality

Quote:

Here's what I had that I began noticing compression and clipping with: -cheap TEAC CD player. -Criterion reciever, I think from the mid 80s. Built like crap, needed regular cleaning. Unknown quality. -$30 Radio Shack speakers.

Your "clipping" would be far far worse on that system without the "compression" and maybe you problem is not the CD but the gear........


Quote:

That certainly lacked in many ways, and on classical recordings, with real range, it was an absolute joke. But it still didn't hide noise that should be getting quieter not doing so, and what should be peaks having no substance to them, where the stuff up through the 80s, in most cases, had real decay in voices, guitar, and percussion, and actual peaks.

The stuff in the eighties had analog as the recording medium instead of a "sample" or the event.That is the real problem here not what is done to the signal after since the same techniques have been in use for decades

Quote:

I don't think they'd be less of an issue--I think it would not be as bad as it is now.

Don't think man.listen

Most humans can enjoy good music on the car radio or even on the TV but a bad song on a great system will still suck no matter what you do to it.


Quote:

What we have now is a situation in which two things are different than the past. Even in my short life thus far, both have blossomed (or grown as a cancer) to become exceptionally common circumstances: 1. Music = advertizing. getting your attention is more important than creative expression, or your enjoyment. 2. Music used to block the noise of the world, rather than fixing said noise. Noise pollution is increasingly coated and blocked by music, and suburban and urban areas get louder and louder. This necessitates low dynamic range, because even 20dB or so of quiet is overtaken by ambient sounds.

1-no talent pool
2-no talent pool

Good jams are good,bad music is noise and no amount of advertising or noise pollution can hide the facts.Where once there was emotion behind the songs and every artist was a unique sound we now have formulas and a "wall of sound" replacing talent.Hell i have a hard time even hearing an artist who can actually play an instrument at the pop level ! Listen to the damn backgrounds and you will find many should be practising their craft instead of ccutting a disc.
how many significant instrumentalists are form the last ten years ? how many from twenty or even thirty years ago ? Why is it old bast*rds who can barely piss straight are still packing arenas and putting on the best shows ? That sell the most CDs when they introduce a new album ?
coincidence ?

TALENT

Quote:

That's your comparison, not mine. I do not think any such thing. I think that the $10 one gets the job done with minimal hassle, while not affecting the source media in any way.

BULLS*T !

I have compressors and I have limiters and they ALL effect the source media becayuse the source media PASSES THROUGH THE DEVICE and as such has an effect......

Quote:

OK, where's a Californication that sounds decent, FI? Vapor Trails?

was mastered to make a statement and is grundy on purpose,by intent

Quote:

A couple extra bucks, last I looked, was more like a couple hundred extra bucks. A piece. Limited printing does that.

Minor price increase if you have a system able to resolve the improvement and it IS a lifetime investment so yes,pennie on the dollar and worth every cent.Problem is with you is you want it all and you want it free in a society that says for everything gained pony up the cash.No free rides.....

Quote:

No, it won't. It doesn't. That's the problem. Poor equipment may mask extreme quiet, and finer touches and errors, but extreme clipression sounds like crap even when played through crap.

BZZZZZT !

wrong answer

Quote:

Dead horse, and irrelavent. Given enough time, I'm sure this could have been done just as bad with newer analog tech by now. The problem is social. Any decent technology could be used.

ding ding ding !

rick hits a nerve,point rick

Quote:

It's your generation that created it, and allows it to prosper--or, if you're old enough, maybe your kids, too. Business-savvy pays, while talent rots, or is never cultivated. Today, are artists given enough freedom? Imagine some boy band deciding to really let themselves go, and show actual talent and skill. Would the Beatles be able to get away with that, today, since that's basically what they did? I bet they'd be dropped in a flash, and with the record company owning the music, no one would ever hear it.

we gave you what you wanted and looking at the way things are going still are even though that "what" is bleak.

The talent pool is drying up and the song writers going the way of the dinosaur because the solution in all things is to "google it" and find either a computer based or online resource to make up for actual thought processing.
Instead of falling off a cliff then writing a funny song about it your generation sits at the desk trying to imagine what it would be like to fall off a cliff then does a search to find all the words that rhyme with cliff so they can write a song

My generation had an actual life and actual experience and that from the age of 7 or 8.by the time they reached late teens/early twenties had a lot of real world screwups and real world expereince that made for some great music.

this has been replaced with sitting in front of a TV or Monitor gaming the day away and trating online as if it has its own life and using the experiences of other vicariously to manufacture a demi-life filled with cacoon like protection and so PC no one has to even think about hurting someone elses feelings in a song.

BLAND ! Plain brown wrapper PC bullcrap with zero emotional content and from "artists" who can't even play their instruments because they did not pay their dues


Quote:

I don't see anyone my age voting in things like the NCLB, which is a perfect example. I also don't see anyone my age running the music business in any way, which is more on the topic. We didn't create this. We're just riding it down. Some of us have found ourselves well enough to be looking forward to it, as previous avenues of change (such as public protest) have been falling flat--government and corporate crooks ahve learned over the years, it seems. Others will jst remain miserable and escape to mindless entertainment, overwork themselves, and stuff themselves with fast food; instead of trying to use their minds and bodies.

mmm hmmmmm...same old "not my fault" and b*tch moan moan b*tch while changing nothing because to do so would be actual work..


Points :

rickmonster 2
Puppy food ZIP

 

[Febs]

Rick, why are you so antagonistic? It seems that you are Cerbie are really not that far apart in what you're saying, but you are so focused on scoring imaginary points that you are not really making an effort to understand his argument.

Cerbie makes an interesting point. If I understand his argument correctly, the whole loudness race could be avoided if, instead of using ridiculous amounts of brick wall limiting, mastering engineers used a reasonable amount of compression and playback devices had onboard compression. I don't think that this idea is nearly as crazy as you think it is, and your personal attacks are unjustified. You wouldn't need to put a Fairchild Limiter in a $50 stereo to achieve compression that would knock the dynamic range of such a system down to a point where it sounds "good" to a person who is willing to listen to a $50 system.

For what it is worth, I agree with you with respect to mixing/mastering being a compromise for the masses. We mixed my band's last CD on tri-amped Genelec nearfields. They sounded absolutely unbelievable! But we also listened through a little boombox that had maybe 4" speakers, and we made an effort to make the mix sound as good as possible on both rather than great on one and crappy on another. Likewise, we applied a fair amount of mastering compression. In fact, we used more mastering compression than I personally preferred, and I thought that we lost more of the pop on one particular drum entrance than I wanted to. It was a concession to the masses and today's unfortunate mastering trends--and the fact that the CD was unlistenable, for example, in the car without some significant compression.

Had we had the option, I would much rather have used substantially less compression at the mastering stage. If car stereos had an on-board compressor, I would be able to listen to that CD in the car without riding the volume knob, but I would also be able to sit down in front of a good system in a quiet room and hear it in all of its dynamic glory.

 

[cerbie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rickcr42 if so then you are wasting your talents here

OK. How so?

Quote:

so the elite that think they are better than everyone esle should have all Cds matered to some standard of supersystem and the clueless 14 year old with a radio shack set up needs to learn how to use a compressor ?

Yes. Push one button. That was hard to do. Really. So very hard. No more difficult than operating My-Corporation's-Proprietary-Bass-tech(tm) button.
Quote:

compression and EQing to make the format fit the system ! Not rocket science man but pure economics and target consumer,the bigger slice of the pie.I still contend good music mastered badly or even on outdated equipment is far more enjoyable than crap plyed on the best of systems using ther cleanest dub and for that i point you too 60's era music and early seventies music.the songs still hold up but I doubt the dynamic range is that of a cassette tape

Quote:

And have an unplayable product on 80% of the systems out there including probably your own.Have you even considered for a moment there is not a portable system out there that could reproduce this superior music ? No car sound system ?

I highly doubt it would be a problem. It doesn't need to play back and one be able to hear every little detail. The playback device can also acceptably mangle it. My beef is with the information on the CD being per-mangled. Anything done after reading that info is perfectly fine, for any effect desired.
Quote:

oh yeah.Back to our own compressors theory...... (live stuff) nor could a super system...........

OK, fine.

Quote:

there is no default that fits all music.You want something that does not exist and if it did would be a suck event.imagine not being able to actually understand a lead vocalist's words as is often the case at a live event ? Or having some instruments drowned out by others ? Or straining to hear soft notes above the ambient noise in the room ? That is the REAL world of music not the pretty forwrd presence of a female vocal or the slashing solos you hear on a CD.All manipulation to produce a product in a way that is pleasing in the home or on the road and has zero to do with reality

Again, that's what the guys in the studio are to deal with. That means that as far as I am concerned, it is a black box with guys inside. Stuff goes in, stuff comes out. It is not real world music. It is its own, separate, typically individual, experience. It's just as a play against a book.

Quote:

Your "clipping" would be far far worse on that system without the "compression" and maybe you problem is not the CD but the gear........

Whether the problem is worse or not I don't know, because I've never heard one in excess without the other. As far as gear, no. There is no difference in the effect with my old speakers, either/any of my current cans, the few that I didn't think were worth the extra money at this point, stock or modified car systems I've heard, etc.. The stuff is supposed to have some quiet, and certain sounds are supposed to decay, and they just plain don't.
Quote:

The stuff in the eighties had analog as the recording medium instead of a "sample" or the event.That is the real problem here not what is done to the signal after since the same techniques have been in use for decades

Those samples are then made back into a signal, with noise added to smooth it out. Got any (blind) tests or methematical evidence that it is worse? If it is, why are the digital masters (and depending on the circumstance, remasters) also better sounding than many of the newer recordings? It's still a set of samples.

Quote:

Don't think man.listen

Thinking is more trustworthy, in this. What evidence could there be to support either of our cases? It's pure opinion v. pure opinion.
Quote:

Most humans can enjoy good music on the car radio or even on the TV but a bad song on a great system will still suck no matter what you do to it.

I disagree on the good song being enjoyable. Much like oversaturation and fast camera angle switches on television shows (CSI is the worst set of them), it distracts from the experience of an otherwise enjoyable thing.

Quote:

1-no talent pool 2-no talent pool

You're assuming that the people listening can think for themselves, and that the big business guys want musical talent. They don't.
Quote:

Good jams are good,bad music is noise and no amount of advertising or noise pollution can hide the facts.Where once there was emotion behind the songs and every artist was a unique sound we now have formulas and a "wall of sound" replacing talent.Hell i have a hard time even hearing an artist who can actually play an instrument at the pop level ! Listen to the damn backgrounds and you will find many should be practising their craft instead of ccutting a disc. how many significant instrumentalists are form the last ten years ? how many from twenty or even thirty years ago ? Why is it old bast*rds who can barely piss straight are still packing arenas and putting on the best shows ? That sell the most CDs when they introduce a new album ? coincidence ? TALENT

They have talent. It's just not musical in any way. That's my point on that. There is talent in working crowds, there is talent in sealing business deals, and being your own spectacle. This makes money.

One guy with tons of talent, who is still going at it, and well, but he'll never touch the top-100 again.

The formula has been worked out. Some find out it's crap to pacify them and link a certain set of sounds with something else (notice this in commercials where current hit songs are used, or covers/remixes of old hit music), some don't. The only sad thing is I'll probably be working under the people who don't figure it out.

Quote:

BULLS*T ! I have compressors and I have limiters and they ALL effect the source media becayuse the source media PASSES THROUGH THE DEVICE and as such has an effect......

No, not bullsh!t. You run it through anything, and you affect the output. The source media is as unchanged as if it were played straight. That compressor does not touch the record's grooves, the the tape's magnetic imprint, or the CD's bits. There is no more effect than playing it straight through without it.

Quote:

was mastered to make a statement and is grundy on purpose,by intent

Then I'll just lament it as another album I'd like to have, were it worth listening to.

Quote:

Minor price increase if you have a system able to resolve the improvement and it IS a lifetime investment so yes,pennie on the dollar and worth every cent.Problem is with you is you want it all and you want it free in a society that says for everything gained pony up the cash.No free rides.....

Whining, with no substance. I didn't shay anything about free. My complaint was an order of magnitude of cost due to being limited to a small number of first printings only, in almost all cases, largely caused by catering to boutique(sp) buyers and collectors (and lawyers). As such, what was $25-$40 when it was new is now $250-$400 by the time I find it exists. In fact, this is the perfect scenario for internet distribution. Moderately low cost for lossless audio files. In fact, the original release cost would still be reasonable, even for some ones and zeros. I have a feeling some lawyers would have heart attacks at this thought, though, from what I've read about what these guys go through in getting the licensing.

Quote:

BZZZZZT ! wrong answer

Not at all. It still sounds like crap compared to something older with a few more dB. Both fully digital at this point.

Quote:

ding ding ding ! rick hits a nerve,point rick

Can you show any relevancy? There's no more meaningful information in an analog signal. Often, there's less. Each one can be used well, or used poorly. In both scenarios, there is a lot of information missing. That information has been missing since we started recording sound and playing it back later than it was created. Only further understanding of what our minds are doing during the concert experience can fix this. Analog v. Digital is an old debate, and neither will win, because both have the same problem: they are incomplete samples of a performance. One is dots made into a line, one is a line, but they lack the same information that creates an experience beyond your own mind.

Quote:

we gave you what you wanted and looking at the way things are going still are even though that "what" is bleak.

Oh, yes. I wanted smog. I wanted chemical-laiden food. I wanted it never to be dark. I wanted to pass up what might otherwise have been good entertainment, with quality expression beyond verbal bounds...to be made to sound so horrible that I wonder if listening to fighting cats wouldn't be easier on me (my cat is quite cowardly, BTW).

Quote:

The talent pool is drying up and the song writers going the way of the dinosaur because the solution in all things is to "google it" and find either a computer based or online resource to make up for actual thought processing. Instead of falling off a cliff then writing a funny song about it your generation sits at the desk trying to imagine what it would be like to fall off a cliff then does a search to find all the words that rhyme with cliff so they can write a song

No, no, no. The producer hires a hit songwriter to do that for them

. They just change a couple words here and there, the producer makes sure you know he produced it, and they sing. Oh, yeah, and if female, but on way too much make-up. Oh, no, wait--there's a guy doing that for them, too...

Quote:

this has been replaced with sitting in front of a TV or Monitor gaming the day away and trating online as if it has its own life and using the experiences of other vicariously to manufacture a demi-life filled with cacoon like protection and so PC no one has to even think about hurting someone elses feelings in a song.

...and who allowed this to be happen, and be perpetuated? What generation is giving their kids drugs for being halfway intelligent, or maybe malnourished?

Quote:

(moved downdue to having the exact same response) My generation had an actual life and actual experience and that from the age of 7 or 8.by the time they reached late teens/early twenties had a lot of real world screwups and real world expereince that made for some great music. BLAND ! Plain brown wrapper PC bullcrap with zero emotional content and from "artists" who can't even play their instruments because they did not pay their dues

No disagreements, there, as far as pop goes.

Quote:

mmm hmmmmm...same old "not my fault"

It isn't. I don't know quite how old you are, but let's say you were old enough to be considered for drafting way back in another pointless war. That draft, the war, and its surrounding circumstances, would not have been your fault *gasp*. And, it took a waking up of not only those in danger from it directly, but those who allowed it to reach that critical point. That is important. Without the eventual support of the previous well-defined generation, nothing would have changed to any significant degree.

I am not responsible for the world I grow up in. I am responsible for the world I grow old in, and I am responsible for making it better for the kids being born into it right now.
Quote:

and b*tch moan moan b*tch while changing nothing because to do so would be actual work..

No, working out how to change it. We're not yet at such a critical point, but we're nearing it. The recent massive Slacking of illegal immigrants is a good example of the kind of protest that will work, and a showing that we're reaching that window of opportunity. There needs to be a time at which we pass into a window of having, to all perceptions, more to gain than lose, and in large numbers.

More people are beginning to see that we're near such a point. I see someone I've dealt with before acting differently about their finances, or complaining about something radically different that someone in DC is doing, now. There is always a chance (hopefully a probability) that this change will spill over and our society will simply start taking a better turn.

It will take a realization of many problems. That education by treating kids as chattle is wrong. That exposing us to entertainment sharply divided into advertisement breaks, is wrong. That allowing both spouses to work full time, leaving a kid alone most of it, was wrong. And so on. It will not be any grand revolution, but a long healing process tearing away the obvious generation gap, and creating an ultimately better future (of course, impeded a bit as usual by red tape, but that's been the case for thousands of years

). It has happened in the past, and will happen in the future.

Maybe even a future in which popular music and movies will again become a thing of communication beyond thought and language, not a necessary distraction and way of advertising unrelated products. Art should be created out of drive and passion, not egotism (with this issue of music also comes the many remakes of perfectly good movies, made not out of lack of writers and directors of something different, but an unwillingness to take creative risks, as it is in pop music).

Quote:

Points : rickmonster 2 Puppy food ZIP

I say 0/0. We're not seeing the same world in any way at all, though we call the things in it by the same name. We do, however, both happen to be long-winded, which often is tiring on an internet forum, because it means more time away from life. But there is a challenge and intrigue in argu--um, "debate," yeah, that's it--even if there are no real stakes.

 

[rickcr42]

Quote:

Rick, why are you so antagonistic?

when someone gets snotty with me I don't play nice with others and he decided to go there with the wrong guy.


you guys have fun.Any points i felt a need to make have been

 

[Publius]

get a room you two.

On topic: I actually posted about possibly implementing this on stevehoffman.tv but it sort of went over like a lead balloon. Again, a lot of it has to do with compressors (and compression settings) not being a commodity.

 

[JahJahBinks]

Man, just scroll down this page without reading a single word takes a bit of effort. Holy sweet mother jesus christ.

 

[Ferbose]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cerbie Why does one need a good compressor? I use one that was under $10 brand new retail, for movies with too much range to be comfy. If put in the devices themselves, I would find it hard to believe it would be more than a few grand of R&D, and 0 to the actual unit production cost. Almost nothing that does audio or video sold to most people within the last 15 years (maybe longer) has failed to have a DSP in it with some kind of cheesy effects.

$10 compressor?! Is that a typo?
A plastic box with a couple of connectors has to sell for more than $10.
Compression is a complicated process with lots of choices to make and parameters to tweak.
In my DVD player there is a "night" function to limit loud sounds for late night viewing. Its negative effect on SQ is very obvious. And this is a $1000 Sony SACD/DVD player.