Ever heard the later Quad ELS series?..
I think the problem being alluded to is so much post processing especially compression and dynamic range reduction like what a lot of Radio is these days...
Not quite. Yes whilst vinyl has its sonic distortions a lot of material recorded in the days of vinyl did have a greater dynamic range, the advent of audio processing on radio has changed that..
Vinyl does not have a greater dynamic range. At best you might get 75dB - CD is more than that. 90dB
Not that the average pop track uses more than 2....
Last night, out of curiosity I played a shellac 78rpm record of Kathleen Ferrier on the old portable wind up gramophone from the attic. Using a thorn needle I was surprised at how good it sounded!
This is a deliberate decision by the mastering engineer, influenced by what the suits in marketing tell him/ her to do.
You might want to look up the Loudness Wars. I've mentioned in another group that I made a recording of a symphony orchestra, maintaining full signal at the loud end (0dB), and the complete dynamic range (Down to about -40dB) as used during the performance. The conductor's response was "The recording's too quiet." So I reduced the dynamic range to 15dB, then increased the average level until it peaked at 0dB, and he was happy.
Listening on headphones or in a quiet room at the equivalent sound pressure level to the original performance, the first version was scarily realistic.
The latter was better for listening to in the car.
You are preaching to the converted.
+1
I want the music to involve me, not behave a audio wallpaper...
She had a truly remarkable voice. There are transfers onto CD of a lot of old material some at budget prices for what were very fine performances. ISTR Naxos started the ball rolling but EMI followed.
The one thing I had forgotten when connecting up my turntable was just how tetchy they are about ground loops, wiring paths and problems with acoustic pickup from the furniture they are sat on.
Ugh.
You're not alone. Music has shifted from quality to convenience. Everything is about MP3 players and portability. Kids are happy to listen to music on crappy mobile phones, whereas I can't bear music at this low quality.
CDs have varied considerably in quality. I have some early CDs that sound amazing, and much better than anything done today. I wish one could buy the original albums still, rather than the badly "re mastered" offerings we get now.
Going back to DAB, I think it's better than AM but inferior to FM. Maybe DAB+ would be better, if implemented, but we'd need to throw away out extant DAB receivers and buy new ones.
The last bit is what makes the Thorens range so good. The turntable and pickup are on a separate sub chassis acoustically insulated from the rest of the deck. A decent cover also helps prevent acoustic feedback. The disk and the pickup make a form of crude microphone. If the disk is influenced by other sounds or vibrations it will be heard - often just as colouration to the wanted sound.
I also have a dedicated disk pre-amp mounted close to the pickup and send out to the main amp at normal line level. Pickup co-ax is one of the few cases where the cable can influence the sound, due to the low levels and high impedances involved.
DAB was quite acceptable with the original bitrates. But it seems no authority can let well alone. They have to reduce such things to where they are unacceptable to many. Exactly as has happened with HD TV. So they can then sell a super improved version a couple of years down the line.
Just keep the cartridge wiring un-earthed at the gram end and you will be fine...
As top acoustic pickup mass is yer friend;)..
I thought that would get misinterpreted!, Nope course vinyl has nowhere near the range of CD its just that decent wider dynamic range recordings were made when vinyl was the medium of the day...
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote: [snip]
I still regret swapping my Thorens for a car.
Mark wrote: [snip]
You still can, if you are willing to pay the price and if a publisher has decide to offer what you are interested in.
Some publishers also offer lossless downloads that are better quality than CD.
For example:
DAB was acceptable for the brief period when it was transmitted at 320kbps. However since then some twit at the BBC decided "never mind the quality, feel the width" and decided that loads of stations was more important than the quality of transmission.
Not sure it was 'at the BBC'. Commercial stations are at least as bad - and some worse. If the BBC still owned their own transmitters and had some control over allocated frequencies, who knows?
Still got my Thorens deck. I hadn't used it for years but it worked fine when I tried it a few weeks ago.
It won't be any better, just more stuff will be crammed in..
That must have been very brief, AFAIR it only went up to 256 K..
Ofcom let them do it;(..
In article , Dave Plowman (News) scribeth thus
Well you can't blame them DAB is very expensive to transmit on. Its charged by the capacity unit, i.e. more bits cost more..
Indeed they sold it off to fund digital TV expansion..
>
that's one story. Another is that they didn't want engineers. They abolished the post of Director of Engineering some 5 years before they sold the transmitters.
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