Why does vinyl sound better?

[Radioeng2 33]

 

 

No offense' date=' Radioeng, but your last post is (to me) a garbled rambling incomprehensible mass of goobly-gook (and I challenge anyone to make sense of it!). [/quote']

Criticism accepted. The mind works much faster than the fingers.

 

 

 

Kind of wish people would stop worshiping (and assigning "magical" properties to) old technology just because it is old.

Agreed. I prefer to go with the strengths regardless of age. I've also learned that being newer doesn't automatically make it better either.

 

 

 

Like BillD said' date=' the analog signal cut into a record groove can only contain what the mic picks up (and few mikes are good to anything close to 20K!). [/quote']

Whatever...it's there! Look up some of the articles about the HF drivers that go up into the ear bleed territory and also some references in the articles about the wider bandwidth systems.

 

 

 

That being said' date=' there is perhaps aspects of "pure analog" that "sound better" then "digitized analog" (as even digital samples are converted into analog before amplification. [/quote']

Agree that leaving something unconverted is really a good idea. If digital, leave it there as long as possible. RF is now digitally modulated without converting to analog at all. I think there maybe some high dollar amps that take digital in and truly modulate with it. That's a coming technology to watch!

 

 

 

 

And as an aside' date=' the "stairstep" analogy you used to describe digital representation is bogus. The digititized signal is not "flat" over the "stairstep" and then jumps to the next level or "stairstep". Instead, the signal is sampled at discrete intervals and from this sampling, a DAC reconstructs the (very smooth) analog frequency content/signal). [/quote']

Bogus huh? Really! I guess digital works differently out on the left coast! I'll have to check into that! Smoothly reconstructs it! I guess that's because it pulls from that perfect pool of DC! :ddd

 

 

 

I let a lot of bogus and un-scientific stuff slide on this forum* (as it is just a forum afterall)' date=' but at some point the shit just gets too deep! [/quote']

Guess we're just all a bunch of hicks! Really, you should not hold back. Enlighten us more often with why the science tells the music how it is and how to work!!

 

 

 

Too much of people's love of vinyl is more nostalga and worship of the past (as in old cars) than reality. Let's face it' date=' unless you have over $10k to invest in analog systems/media like records, CD's (with the help of a good DAC or SACD, etc.) beat "records" hands down (everyone was gaga over CD's when they first came out - no more pop/crackle/snap and incredible dynamic range, etc.). But it's no longer in fashion to go gaga over CD's anymore. Too passe![/quote']

Really, Elg...you need to get out more! I take it you've never heard good vinyl. Lots of people spend 10K on analog pb...and lots spend 10K on a digital too! The 10K digital guy will spend that several times trying to ride the new technology and all the updates trying to get it up to a listenable level. Whereas the analog guy will spend it and set back and just enjoy it! Watch the digital guy adjust the volume...and again, change to the next track (cause it's easy and not for the analog guy), jump up and change to something more impressive. The analog guy sets back and gets lost in the music and too quickly the whole side is over. But the big grin doesn't fade so quick....

 

Once you get over just playing music loud and trying to impress somebody, then you get, if you're in for more than the technology, to the point you care about the interplay between the sax player and the trumpet player. The snap of the snare and how it drives forward the guitar player riffs. How the brassy bite of the trumpet sounds and reflects back minutely from the studio wall. This is what the analog does so well and what we keep seeking to get out of the digital pb.

 

I say get out more as in you need to read, listen and talk about this and get away from the scientific absolutes. This can be fun, the search for better reproduction, the answer for what doesn't add up. Like why analog has so much going for it when it has so many problems at the same time.

 

You really need to spend more time out riding the waves and come in here with a more relaxed feeling! Forget what all those crazies around you are doing out there... Have some fun with this music thing and enjoy the other guys around here too.

 

Mark

[snarffydoggy 1]

Alright, let's really throw some doo doo in the pile and compare master tapes, vinyl and cd.s. I Think master tapes sound better!!! **)) Maybe we might have to move this to the fight club

[elgrau 84]

Good point doggy. The minute differences between "pure analog" and "digitized analog" are far out weighed (IMHO) by numerous other "1st order effects" like:

1. The quality of the original recording. How well was the music recorded/engineered and stored onto master tape (or digital media?).

2. How well it was transferred from master to "mass media".

3. How good of a "player" (analog or digital) you have.

4. How well your "wires" transfer the musical signal in it's long journey to your speakers.

5. How well your amps faithfully blow this signal up to voltage levels necessary to drive speakers.

6. How well your speakers transform that high voltage signal back into sound waves that perfectly mimic this signal.

7. How well does your listening room interact with your speaker output.

8. How well does your "personal microphone" (i.e., your ears) pick up these "pristine" sound waves and convert them BACK into electrical impulses that your brain then magically interprets as "sound". And in my experience some days one's brain does a much better job of this then other days. Some days it seems to just say "fuck it. I don't care about doing this job. try another time." When that happens, no matter how great your "system" is (analog, digital, whatever), it will sound like crap. Other days it will sound so heavenly, you will almost cry... This effect can really mislead folks into stuff like "burn in periods", attributing system improvements to things that have no effect, etc., etc. As my Chinese PHd. engineer friend says: It's complicate.

 

All of these are more important then "analog" vs "digital" issues.

 

And radioeng: please show me a graph/trace of your imaginary "stair step" "digitized" audio signal. You'll find it to be a figment of your imagination/lack of understanding of "digital music". A "stair step" signal (that you imagine) would sound like pure crap. In reality, if you were to overlay a "pure analog" audio signal with the same "digitized" source signal they would lay right on top of each other and be 100% visually indistinguable (sp?) from one another.

[snarffydoggy 1]

And all of that said, It is exactly all that that keeps the audio hobby so enjoyable and all the audio equipment folk in business. ](*,) ](*,) ](*,) ](*,)

[BillD 239]

That, and the music.

[snarffydoggy 1]

You hit the nail square on the Head Billd. and with my new to me DBX unit I don't even have any tape hiss=d> =d> =d> =d>

[RichP714 3,152]

 

 

........please show me a graph/trace of your imaginary "stair step" "digitized" audio signal.......

 

Here's tracks 93-96 of that test disc I talked about (careful, it's the same track at -60, -40, -20 and 'normal' levels, If you don't normalize the tracks or if you keep the volume cranked you'll hurt something). You can hear the grain in the tracks recorded at the low levels. That's what's being done to the low level detail in music on disc.

 

http://thecarversite.com/yetanotherforum/userfiles/Qnoise.zip

 

Here are screenshots of the same section of music, the normal track is black, the -60 dB track red. It's a superposition about 3 seconds in. NOt only is the low level track stairstepped horizontally (in time), but the lack of available bits for sampling volume changes means the low level track doesn't follow the amplitude with as much fidelity as the higher level track

[elgrau 84]

Is that a trace of the sample levels (bytes) or output from the DAC? I did say audio signal. Hard for me to believe that is the analog output from a DAC (a cheap one?). Does not a DAC "smooth out" or "curve fit" the samplings to end up with nice smooth analog output? If not, then I stand corrected! But what is the time scale? If that whole trace is a few milliseconds, then it would obviously look a lot smoother in a more compressed time scale.

[BillD 239]

Someone also needs a capacitor or inductor on that output. Maybe a tube buffer.

[snarffydoggy 1]

Maybe a flux capacitor:-" :-" :-" :-"

[elgrau 84]

I was right (of course :dd ): From Wikki:

 

"A DAC converts an abstract finite-precision number (usually a fixed-point binary number) into a concrete physical quantity (e.g., a voltage or a pressure). In particular, DACs are often used to convert finite-precision time series data to a continually-varying physical signal.

 

A typical DAC converts the abstract numbers into a concrete sequence of impulses that are then processed by a reconstruction filter uses some form of interpolation to fill in data between the impulses. Other DAC methods (e.g., methods based on Delta-sigma modulation) produce a pulse-density modulated signal that can then be filtered in a similar way to produce a smoothly-varying signal."

 

Not sure what Sir Rich was showing (perhaps the "concrete sequence of impulses", but it obviously not what I was referring to (analog output from a DAC)!

 

 

 

[elgrau 84]

@radioeng

"The 10K digital guy will spend that several times trying to ride the new technology and all the updates trying to get it up to a listenable level. Whereas the analog guy will spend it and set back and just enjoy it! Watch the digital guy adjust the volume...and again, change to the next track (cause it's easy and not for the analog guy), jump up and change to something more impressive. The analog guy sets back and gets lost in the music and too quickly the whole side is over. But the big grin doesn't fade so quick...."

 

I have roughly $5k invested in my "used"/vintage system (not counting the countless hours invested in building my two main speaker systems - EPI 1000's and AOS's. And, BTW, the AOS's sound so good - especially at lower listening levels! that I honestly would not take $10k for these one of a kind "EPI heritage" speakers!). You're characterization of "Mr. Digital" could not be further from me! And since my source is a digital (thru Entech DAC) 300 disk player, I can relax on my sectional for literally hours (and I do!) and listen to my entire musical collection (about ~2 weeks of continuous play! Try that with a TT || ). I intend to see just how long I can listen some day when I'm retired. 24 hours? 48 hours? With these crystal clear, extremely detailed speakers with no hint of "harshness" and that famous "tube-like" Carver 42 sound, I've never yet reached a point of "listener fatique" with them!). Now that's my kind of "smile"! Just pure musical bliss (and since CD player is in the next room, I seldom bother to skip to the next random track even if I don't particulary like it - which is rare since every/any track can sound nice on a "nice" system! (except for poorly recorded stuff - that sucks on any system!). So don't think you have me "pigonholed", radioeng (and I'll afford you the same courtesy!). I've designed/built my system for one purpose and one purpose only: maximum listening pleasure and high fidelity per buck (which is ONE reason I'm not a tube/analog/TT guy: too much hassle! (record changing, tube "rolling"/replacing, etc.)). But different strokes for different folks.....

[RichP714 3,152]

 

 

Is that a trace of the sample levels (bytes) or output from the DAC? I did say audio signal. Hard for me to believe that is the analog output from a DAC (a cheap one?). Does not a DAC "smooth out" or "curve fit" the samplings to end up with nice smooth analog output? If not' date=' then I stand corrected! But what is the time scale? If that whole trace is a few milliseconds, then it would obviously look a lot smoother in a more compressed time scale.[/quote']

 

Yes, the anti-alias filter will smooth out the stairsteps, so an output to a speaker won't have the abrupt stairs, but it still sounds grundgy, and the info on disc IS stair-stepped, which is why it sounds grungy (there's no information between the quanta)

 

The trace is from 3.07 to 3.08 seconds so about 10 milliseconds worth of the sample

[RichP714 3,152]

 

 

I.....Not sure what Sir Rich was showing (perhaps the "concrete sequence of impulses", but it obviously not what I was referring to (analog output from a DAC)!

 

 

 

Yes, the output to the speakers from the player's DAC will be anti-aliased, but that's not the point. You said

 

 

 

show me a graph/trace of your imaginary "stair step" "digitized" audio signal.

 

and that's what I did. If you have 2^16 discrete steps with which to chop up an analog signal, you can represent it with finer fidelity if you utilize all of the steps. If you only utilize 2^6 steps the analog signal will be notched.....the information is lost. Yes, it comes out of the speakers 'interpolated' by the anti-aliasing filter, but as you see in the two traces, one is severely an approximation of the other (there are errors in amplitude, time AND trending.

 

Listen to the samples, you can HEAR how CD quantization loses fine detail (or 'grunges' it).

[elgrau 84]

"and the info on disc IS stair-stepped".

 

Nope, I disagree.

The info on the disk are SAMPLES of the original musical signal and never intended to be converted back to analog in a "stairstep" fashion (although that might define the most basic of DAC's!). These samples are used (with a lot of higher order math and signal processing technology) to RECONSTRUCT the original analog signal to the DAC's best ability (obviously a function of the DAC's cost!).

Yes, fidelity is lost as you get down in the noise floor, but this is true for "analog" as well!

I still maintain these are issues that are common to ANY system and they are "resolved" in both worlds by the common "solution" of throwing more $'s at these "2nd order" problems (which are still overshadowed by any of the 8 "1st order" issues I listed earlier). mahalo!

[RichP714 3,152]

I agree with most of your comments re expediency of format, higher order issues, overall enjoyment v. time spent 'tweaking and adjusting' etc., but a low level signal on CD, the sample of the original music, IS stair stepped because there's a greatly diminished number of samples available in the amplitude domain with which to sample it.

 

Sample 1Khz with a million amplitude steps and you'll get a fair approximation (sample).

Sample 1Khz with 100 amplitude steps and you'll get a staircase sample.

 

Now, play BOTH through the DAC and it's interpolation and the staircase will no longer be a building block of square waves (the interpolator takes that out) but it will still sound bad, it will still be a worse approximation of the original and it CAN't replace information that's been thrown away during quantization, it can only smooth out the steps between them.

 

So the samples on disc at low levels ARE stepped; the anti-alias filter will do it's best to recover what the original analog waveform WAS, but it can't know what happened BETWEEN quanta, it can only interpolate between what's there

 

with regards to the original topic, I think this has more than something to do with it

[elgrau 84]

"Sample 1Khz with a million amplitude steps and you'll get a fair approximation (sample).

Sample 1Khz with 100 amplitude steps and you'll get a staircase sample."

 

And (like I said) this "issue" is resolved by throwing $'s at it (higher sampling rate and larger byte size of SACD?, e.g. = more $'s).

 

Plus, this sampling is all "geared" to be "enough" to do the "audible" (reality!) frequency band (20 to 20K max and more like 30 to 13k for most folks/systems!). Yes, cost is a factor (as in analog systems/players), but just as in analog, the more you spend, the better you get!

 

I liked an article that your arch nemisis (pardon me!) F1nut posted a while ago (even a blind pig sometimes finds the acorn! I kid, F1, I kid :dd ). It explained how PERHAPS digitals main "problem" was one of timing: the properly sampled data is there, it's just not being "played" at PRECISELY the exact instant in time that it needs to be (extremely small timing errors lead to "audible" errors - as in "digital harshness"?). Analog records/tapes essentially "freeze out" these timing errors (especially relative to one instant to the next) and effectively do away with the time dimension (as long as you spin the record at 331/3 RPM, all of these random (in the digital world) timing issues go away (even if you are spinning it at 33.334 RPM, the relative time between the "waves" is fixed (forever!). I think these "timing" issues are the real "achilles heal" of digital. Not samples per second (adequate) or bits per sample (dynamic range already better then analog records!).

[BillD 239]

Well, that's why we sample PCM at 192kHz (or, on CDs 44.1kHz). Each sample is 16 to 24 bits long. There is a reason that modern DACs are going to 24/192. DSD uses 1-bit samples at 64 times the 44.1kHz rage (2.8224MHz).

[RichP714 3,152]

 

 

"Sample 1Khz with a million amplitude steps and you'll get a fair approximation (sample).

Sample 1Khz with 100 amplitude steps and you'll get a staircase sample."

 

And (like I said) this "issue" is resolved by throwing $'s at it (higher sampling rate and larger byte size of SACD?, e.g. = more $'s).

 

Plus, this sampling is all "geared" to be "enough" to do the "audible" (reality!) frequency band (20 to 20K max and more like 30 to 13k for most folks/systems!). Yes, cost is a factor (as in analog systems/players), but just as in analog, the more you spend, the better you get!

 

The issue is ameliorated by throwing money at it, (smoother DAC filtering/alternate methods) but you can't add information that isn't there in the first place. Yes, the 44.1Khz sampling rate was chosen to be 'good enough', but 'good enough' doesn't seem to cut the mustard, hence the drive to higher sampling rates.

 

So I'm not talking about throwing money at the 'problem' per se, just trying to address the topic; why the same source will sound 'better' on Vinyl than Digital (as in Steve's experience with the swirling guitars). My $0.02 is that it has SOMETHING to do with low level detail loss due to quantization noise, a loss that $$$ won't recover, just (perhaps) filter more smoothly. Again, this is comparing Vinyl to CD, not saying that higher sampling rates (more $$) won't get better, just that low level detail at the CD sampling rate is different than on vinyl.

 

 

 

 

.....I liked an article that your arch nemisis (pardon me!) F1nut posted a while ago (even a blind pig sometimes finds the acorn! I kid' date=' F1, I kid :dd ). It explained how PERHAPS digitals main "problem" was one of timing:.....[/quote']

 

That's another aspect of the digital domain that makes it different than vinyl, given the same source, and one that surprises me VERY much. I'd NEVER have thought that jitter differences on the order of 50 or so PICOseconds could be audible, but apparently they are, and very much so.

[SteveFord 1,060]

I think that you guys are explaining why Mark (RadioEng2) was so excited about that PS Audio Digital Server.

What's on the horizon is what's been missing?

If so, will our CD players go the way of the 8 track and cassette deck?

Obi mentioned tubes vs transistors as being sort of like analog vs digital and I can't help but feel that when an old technology is replaced by the new one it's kind of like Italian motorcycles: one step forward, one step backwards and two steps sideways. It's an improvement, maybe!

[elgrau 84]

Agree, agree...Peace! Nice talk, RichP! :dd

[snarffydoggy 1]

:-k So Perfection is on the wayo:) o:) o:)

[elgrau 84]

"......by numerous other "1st order effects" like:

1. The quality of the original recording. How well was the music recorded/engineered and stored onto master tape (or digital media?)."

 

Along these lines has anyone else noticed how great the Sun Records (?) Elvis recordings were/are? Been listening to a lot of "The King" lately in my "oldies" section of CD's on my system and have been noticing how superior the individual drums/guitars/vocals stand out in these recordings and how SUPER clear and detailed they are! I guess if you are "The King" you demand only the absolute best (studio muscians, audio engineers, equipment) be used. And I'm sure he had access to the $'s to pay for all of this! But also that he was dedicated to his music enough to insist on this! Am I going nuts, or was he really as great as a lot of folks have been saying? :dd Never really "dug" him that much growing up; but lately....

[snow 207]

 

 

"......by numerous other "1st order effects" like:

1. The quality of the original recording. How well was the music recorded/engineered and stored onto master tape (or digital media?)."

 

Along these lines has anyone else noticed how great the Sun Records (?) Elvis recordings were/are? Been listening to a lot of "The King" lately in my "oldies" section of CD's on my system and have been noticing how superior the individual drums/guitars/vocals stand out in these recordings and how SUPER clear and detailed they are! I guess if you are "The King" you demand only the absolute best (studio muscians, audio engineers, equipment) be used. And I'm sure he had access to the $'s to pay for all of this! But also that he was dedicated to his music enough to insist on this! Am I going nuts, or was he really as great as a lot of folks have been saying? :dd Never really "dug" him that much growing up; but lately....

You know I dont think I have ever agreed with anything you have ever wrote :dd but in this case I will have to concede the point and say yes you are right. :ddd

 

Elvis love him or hate him was a true talent. Movies records done back in the 50's 60's of his sound pretty damn good musically and there are a few artists even today that if they put out an album it's going to sound good it has to be not only there personal talent but desire to produce the best quality movies/albums as possible.

 

 

 

REGARDS SNOW

[elgrau 84]

Yeah; even though his music was mostly just about pussy (nothing wrong with that of course!* :dd ), been noticing that it is also GREAT MUSIC. A lot of the stuff is very complex musically. Wonder how much (if any?) of the actual music he wrote or even the lyrics? I'm not an Elvis expert....

 

*for example, my old "standby" Neil Young, probably only about 50% of his music is about pussy! :dd