When is digital going to get the soul of music?

Alex, -- "takes a great deal of effort to approach analog quality with digital" -- yes, I agree, it is simply easier to get pleasant sound from a TT than frequently the typical at home CD setup. But that is not the fault of the CD medium itself, but IS the fault of the CD playback mechanism. Simply put, it is injecting too much unpleasant distortion directly into the signal, AND adversely affecting the following amplifier stages. Subtle distortion, yes, but very unpleasant.

So, again, I emphasise, it is at the actual moment that the digital recording is being played, running through the DAC when the damage is done. Let's consider those tests you did:

1) Vinyl to top line AKM ADC encoded at 192/24: Recording 24
1) Same vinyl to top line AKM ADC encoded at 44.1/16: Recording 16

Now, from my point of view, Recording 16 is effectively the same quality as Recording 24, assuming the AKM device is top line as you say.

Now let's play them back -- for argument's sake in a SACD player. Oh dear, Recording 24 is much better than Recording 16! You would say, just what I expected. But I would say, what's happening is that the mechanism in the SACD player is much better at its job of playing back Recording 24 than it is of Recording 16; in other words, at the point of playback more "nasty" distortion is being generated directly and indirectly by the SACD player when ACTUALLY PLAYING 44.1/16 material than when PLAYING 192/24 material, even if it is of the same original audio!

So, in simple terms, the CD sound is lousy because the CD playback is not working properly, or at least not as well as the SACD playback ...

Frank

Albertporter, I'm sorry, it appears at the moment that you're starting to come from the direction of "conspiracy" theories, and definitely we are too far apart in our thinking. Thanks for the input anyway and cheers ...

Frank

I wish there was a CD player that allowed me to listen without being constantly reminded of it's flaws.

Same here but its very difficult creating such beast. :-)

That being said I have heard positive things about your players if you're the Alex Peychev that does all the digital work.

Yep, same Alex Peychev. :-) Thank you for the nice words!

My friend Joe Harley who's behind the Blue Note Jazz Vinyl Reissues at Music Matters was also responsible for the JVC HRCD project. Joe and I have been friends for 30+ years, he has an incredible ear !

Joe told me that the best digital, sitting on the drive in the studio was enough to make analog guys like he and I appreciate what digital can do. He then explained that every time It’s moved or transferred, reclocked or down sampled it takes a huge hit.

I respect Joe Harley, although I don't know him in person. I agree with him because my experience is similar.

I think there is a lot going on with digital clock speed, error rate and bit problems that really screw with the sound. Eventually this problem will be solved but I'm not going to wait.

Absolutely, clocking and data transfer are very important, but there is more. :-)

When digital gets where it should be and for a price I can justify, I'll jump on board. I have digital right now but it's an Oppo.

Oppo is "OK" at best, but priced like a used interconnect here at Audiogon :^). So, the fact it has flaws is acceptable for price paid.

I don't blame you! With analog sources like yours it will be next to impossible not to find digital flaws.

The problem is many players that cost $15K, 20K $45K and more beats the stuffings out of the Oppo but still gets creamed by my Studer and turntable. With that much invested in digital I'd be pissed.

Sure, but in my experience there are also recordings available on high-res digital media that, for some reason, sound better than the analog release, so I guess good digital is not a bad thing to have around.

Hope I live long enough for it to be fixed. I think the technology is there but like I've posted here at Audiogon a dozen times, as long as Apple is making hundreds of millions selling MP3, the guys capable of issuing (true) high resolution digital are not even looking.

Maybe you would consider auditioning my NWO-M digital player, and I'd be thrilled if Joe Harley can hear it too!!

Best,
Alex Peychev

Sorry my mid fi digital rig has out performed some very expensive analog rigs iv'e heard lately . I'm wondering what a very hi end dig rig in a properly synergized system would do for music . A friend who has spent an amazing amount of time and money on his analog set up , not to mention building and voicing is entire system around that rig , recently purchased a mid fi Cd player and often comments on it not being close to analog . The cost is about one tenth the analog rig and little has been done to voice the set up . What can I say .

Folks have been saying that digital is poor-sounding compared to their old vinyl. I'm wondering if the big problem isn't that digital sounds bad, per se, but maybe a a lot of the problem is that most recordings are mixed and mastered by engineers who don't care about the sounds of the end result, and only want to mix it really loud and get it out the door.

I have also read that mastering of recordings has changed, for the worse, since the days of vinyl, before CD. I listen to rock, jazz, jazz/fusion a lot and I am finding that practically every CD in these genres that comes out these days are heavily compressed and in general sound like crap.

So maybe a lot of the problem is in the mastering for CD?

I am getting disheartened. So maybe CDs in my favorite genres sounds like crap that I'm almost thinking of getting out of the game.