Raul, Is it your thesis therefore that you and we ought to be listening to digital sound reproduction? But the digital process, both A to D and D to A, brings with it its own set of distortions, ones that apparently are far more noticeable and irritating to the human brain. That's the brain we are stuck with. In fact, the whole premise that measured distortion ought to be a determinant of what we listen to and how we listen is flawed, because we already know that most of our methods for measuring distortion, starting with THD and going on from there, do not describe what it is or isn't that makes an audio system sound "real" or not real. So, while I admit it's an imperfect way to go through life, subjective judgement is relevant, especially when there is collective majority agreement on the subject of analog vs digital sound reproduction.
My private thesis is as follows:
(1) Real instruments and voices in real time produce harmonics.
(2) Microphones fail more or less to pick up these harmonics in their fullest extent. More is lost during processing of the resulting signal, and some irritating distortions can be added, too.
(3) Reproduced music from which such low level harmonics have been stripped sounds less real because of the loss of harmonics.
(4) Thus, a little bit of added harmonic distortion at the end of the chain results in music that is perceived as more real than if no or less harmonic distortion is present.
And again, digital does other things that are not favorable. That said, "modern" digital reproduction is certainly become very excellent. I don't close the door on anything I would otherwise like.
My private thesis is as follows:
(1) Real instruments and voices in real time produce harmonics.
(2) Microphones fail more or less to pick up these harmonics in their fullest extent. More is lost during processing of the resulting signal, and some irritating distortions can be added, too.
(3) Reproduced music from which such low level harmonics have been stripped sounds less real because of the loss of harmonics.
(4) Thus, a little bit of added harmonic distortion at the end of the chain results in music that is perceived as more real than if no or less harmonic distortion is present.
And again, digital does other things that are not favorable. That said, "modern" digital reproduction is certainly become very excellent. I don't close the door on anything I would otherwise like.