Why vinyl?

03-15-08: Inpepinnovations asked:
"Dave, ever try recording 72 brass + 25 percussion of drum & bugle corps? I perfectly understand your need for 130+ db dynamic range in recording!! Do the microphones even have that range?
I feel that the preent state of digital, recording and playback has more potential to do justice to the recorded event, but unfortunately, not many recordings are done with quality in mind, just loud sounds."

No, I haven't recorded a DC, but I've heard it up close, when I helped provide the side for one of the Texas Region regionals. Florida State now marches 430+ in their marching band and I've been 20-feet from the front line. AMAZING. Next November I hope to record over 100 trumpets at the Rocky Mountain Trumpet Fest. I love the BIG sounds and nothing beats being right in the middle of it.

Yes, my AKG condensor mics have 130dB and that's it. It works for just about anything recorded at any distance. I've got a 20dB pad in case I want to record trumpet with the mic right in the bell or a drum close up.

I'm hearing a lot of good all-digital recordings, by the likes of Diana Krall, Jane Monheit, Rebecca Pidgeon, Dave Gruisin, many Concord artists and others. Playback in 2-channel SACD or DVD-A is stunning. I even bought a Radiohead album in vinyl that was DDA and found it amazing and only 16-bucks.

So, I think there's hope for all formats. Digital playback is progrssing so fast (32-bit will be readily available at responsible prices within a few months) that the digital-to-vinyl gap is disappearing quickly.

I'm very happy that'll I'll be able to buy a true hi-rez harddrive, music server by the end of this year that'll do justice to my D2D recordings that I've been collecting since the 1970s. BTW, I will NOT be sending $20k Linn's way. (What a crock).

Dave

I don't believe digital is inherently more accurate. It has its strengths but is has its flaws. It takes an analogue signal and chops it up into little digital packets where to play back a microprocessor tries to reassemble the packets to recreate an analogue wave form.

I've been trying to think of a visual analogy so if I may.

16 bit digital is like looking through a screen door. You see the outside world image but the screen effectively blocks the image into little packets invariably obscuring the cleanliness of what the real world image should look like. Higher rez digital just has a less apparent screen door effect. Your mind sees the outside world image and can understand it but the mesh is acting like an A to D converter effectively breaks the image into its little block pattern. I hope this makes sense. Analogue recording is like looking out a window without screen but through a pane of glass that may not be perfectly crystal clear and may even have a film of dust and dirt on it. You see the outside world image. Your brain can understand it but its imperfections in the window glass and maybe the film of dust obscures it from perfection. Both formats suffer inaccuracies but maybe different ones. IMO we humans are more willing and accept and maybe even enjoy the inaccuracies of the typical analogue playback over inaccuracies over the digital ones.

Where digital can be quieter and can have expansive dynamic range etc it also in the A to D and D to A process suffers and loses things humans not only can hear but can sense.

Fact is whether one records on analogue or digital from the master on down to the final consumer product we must accept errors and inaccuracies in the final sound.

There are certain luxuries for a engineer to record in digital but so to there are luxuries to record in analogue. Its about what compromises you are willing to accept.

Just one point to compare in this simple regard:

Push a signal above digital 0db and you run out of bits and instant massive clipped distortion. Go too far into the red on an analogue recording and you get a general but progressively higher distortion.

Pick your poison I guess.

Les, you're talking about OLD digital technology.

Using DSD @ 5.6MHz the "packets" are as dense as the oxide particles on tape and dozens of times denser than the 16-bit technology you're using as a reference. I agree with you about old 16-bit with harse filters and other shortcomings, but the new digital is leaping forward by an order of magnitude every few months. Your arguement no longer holds water.

A DSD, i-bit, 5.6MHz sample does NOT lose data in replication. It's truly archival. Using professional-level programs you can copy the file and it will be "bit-perfect" in ALL generations. This issues you address have all been addressed and corrected.

With 130dB of headroom I hardly need to worry about overload; however, if I am worried I can add attenuation or a filter. The 130dB is only the starting point, but it gives the recordist tons of options to never reach clipping.

Let me think a little. I've read some good summaries of today's state of the art. You seem interested enough that if I can find you some links you'll start getting up to date. Have you heard good DVD-A? It's not as good as DSD, which has twice the resolution, but it'll give you some idea of what's possible in the digital domain.

Please note, I still have a very good TT, tube, phono-preamp and a big library of LPs. I believe that digital is just now catching up with analog, but, based on what I hear, it's the gap has disappeared. Unfortunately, you can't buy much at the highest possible resolutions.

Dave

"I believe that digital is just now catching up with analog, but, based on what I hear, it's the gap has disappeared. Unfortunately, you can't buy much at the highest possible resolutions."

I totally agree with this statement. To me, standard redbook audio is inherently flawed due to its low resolution. When the redbook standard was invented, the ability to fit 650 MB/60-70 minutes of audio on a small plastic disc was amazing, considering hard drives at the time could store about 10 megabytes. They most likely chose 16 bit 44.1 kHz because it allowed a full 60-70 minutes of audio on this 650 megabyte disc, and also because they found that that sampling rate still captured the frequency range of normal human hearing. If they would have had the technology to put more than 650 megabytes onto a disc at that time, they most likely would have chosen a much higher sampling rate.

Dave,

Yes I have heard DVD-A and it is generally quite nice. I find it still has an edge to it that sounds not quite right but if I never was into good quality vinyl playback and was willing to re-buy my digital CD library in DVD-A it would be a good choice. I'll say the same with SACD but both formats are all but dead.

The DSD you talk about is obviously not a format for consumers (yet if ever at all). But if it is as good as you say it will be very nice with only one caveat. It again requires the listener to re-buy their libraries in this format. Add to that untold millions of records that where produced on vinyl and even cassette tape will likely never see this format. It will probably be pricey if/when it becomes a consumer format and will suffer the potential of it falling on its face as SACD and DVD-A has.

Sadly all too many consumers have been brainwashed and PURE LIED TO that lossy MP3 and iPod type sound is as good as even CD sound. So they accept it given no real test of reference to even a good CD sound let alone quality vinyl DVD-A, SACD. So the industry has cut its nose to spite itself (nothing new with the recording industry) and it will likely do the same if this DSD type format becomes a consumer format. It will cut its nose off again because it will price it too high for the general consumer to want to buy into.

The magic of vinyl regardless of it being a digital or an anlogue master is the used library world wide is MASSIVE! New vinyl is being made as a niche (GREAT!) and it has a sensation to it in ways digital media seems to lack.

As I said if a master is made of a great high-rez digital format and then cut a vinyl disc from it I'm 100% fine with it. If they make an affordable optical discs from it that can be easily played (not likely going to happen) then great too. But short of what will be a niche market even high-rez digital is in trouble today.

I appreciate you educating me some basics of DSD stuff you note and if it can capture and recreate the nuance of audio/sounds as a mastering format so that it is as good or better than the best analogue masters and can then be used to cut new vinyl from personally I WILL LOVE IT!!! because it requires me not to have to buy a new playback unit or whatever to hear it.