CD audio (44.1/16) Club

[Mart68]

Set your self up with a quality vinyl setup up, spend time with it, and you'll see.

done that, I think a lot of people here have. Whilst there's individual exceptions, on balance it's not as good, is a continuing expense, it is a hassle to use and maintain.

 

[Mart68]

C'mon. it's not that much hassle. We're not that lazy yet are we?

Yes!

In truth I still have a deck and 600 or so LPs and will probably set it all up again at some point. Some of the LPs do sound great but it was the inconsistency in pressing quality that mostly irritated me. Plus a new stylus for my cartridge is now pushing £300 GBP. That's the equivalent of 30 new albums on CD or 60-odd bought second hand.

The game's not worth the candle.

 

[Mnyb]

My pow is that for production sure use more resolution to allow for the production tools and human error and just some safety margin , record and produce at as a high rez as possible. recording format and content delivery format need not to be the same .
This discussion is about content delivery ? I will assume that in my reply.

The limits of the CD system ? more bit's always gives lower noise floor it's theoretically within our hearing limits with absurd gain or something . our dynamic cabablities are better than 96dB even if not many recordings have this high dynamics in practice , but theoretically its not at the human limit.

But hearing more than 20kHz is not possible so 44.1 is perfectly capable of preserving all fidelity bellow <20kHz higher sampling frequency does not improve resolution <20kHz it's already at the theoretical limit it's just gives you more frequencies .

SO i now i cant hear better than 16/44.1 on music at survivable listening levels .

But in todays world I'm happily content buying new music at 24/48 or at best 24/96 , 24/48 would enclose whats possible useful for an end consumer .
then we can encode all frequncies humans can hear and the noise floor 144dB/24 is better than any equipment is currently capable of .

But yes yet another rerelease of dark side of the moon would need more bits or higher sample rate

The state of most popular recordings sadly is that they are not at the limit of almost any format we have , so if CD resolution is better than the intrinsic resolution of whatever you are listening to even more bits would not help.

New master of old stuff tend to be released in new hi rez formats , this is for marketing, it gets more sales this way . Remastered is such a destroyed property in the CD market that almost no one would notice a new version (they are usually all worse historically ) . But if you anounce a new version on HD-tracks or similar places it gets traction and sales, a new CD version even if actually improved and worthwhile would not catch attention anymoore ?

 

[Mnyb]

Why 24/48 or 24/96 ? it's my understanding that is common to many DAW software used for music production and you can then omit the conversion to 16/44.1 which probably can be done transparently but in practice this can be another possibility for errors to creep in if not done right.

 

[Sal1950]

In truth I still have a deck and 600 or so LPs and will probably set it all up again at some point.

Are you crazy?
I doubt LP value will ever be at a higher point.
Make a list, call a couple wholesale buyers, and put the cash in the bank for further system improvements.
A 7.4.4 Atmos rig if you don't already have it.
Now there's SOTA music listening.

 

[Sal1950]

Although I respectfully disagree ..

On what basis?
Please supply the evidence and hard numbers that show a LP can even come close to a CD?
Must I list all the compromises needed just to get a good analog tape or digital source ready for cutting?

 

[julian_hughes]

I'm 56 and now have tinnitus (which varies a lot) and I think my hearing of high frequencies has finally gone well below 15kHz. CD sounds great to me! But it always did. When I've heard differences between "Hi-Res" and Red Book I've been able to identify this as simply a difference in level between the DSD and PCM on my hybrid SACDs. See https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...d-is-it-of-any-value.10682/page-3#post-756813

I subscribe to Qobuz for streaming and occasionally downloading and even purchasing. They offer Hi-Res but you can get all the same stuff as 16-bit/44.1kHz so that's what I choose when I download. It's also useful for older audio players like my ancient iRiver players which can play back 16-bit only, 44.1 or 48kHz without resampling. And any player with Rockbox on it is running an OS designed for 16-bit only and will truncate anything over 16-bit and resample anything not at the player's default sample rate.

Those guys at Sony and Philips made some very good choices for physical media, and unless you want multi-channel then stereo 16-bit/44.1 is still a good format 40 years on in an era of streaming and lossless compression.

 

[Mart68]

Are you crazy?
I doubt LP value will ever be at a higher point.
Make a list, call a couple wholesale buyers, and put the cash in the bank for further system improvements.
A 7.4.4 Atmos rig if you don't already have it.
Now there's SOTA music listening.

Crazy like a fox

if I needed the money I would have sold them but I don't so I haven't - and the value just keeps going up...

Must confess I have never had a listen to a 7.4.4 Atmos rig, might be better if I don't.

 

[tomtoo]

I'm in my 40s, and I got curious how my hearing was these days. I can't hear the mosquito tone anymore (17+kHz), and I can't hear below -70db, according to https://www.audiocheck.net. I can hear a 14khz tone, but not pass the 14kHz low-pass filter test.

So, CD resolution is definitely good enough for me.

Comment below if you would like to join my little club.

Cheers,

You are not in a little club. There are just many that overestimate there hearing.

 

[Sal1950]

You are not in a little club. There are just many that overestimate there hearing.

For sure, I know this guy who's initials are MF, he's 76, a high end HiFi reviewer, and thinks he has multi gold level hearing .
ROTFLMAO

 

[jsrtheta]

Peter Aczel (The Audio Critic) wrote this in 2015, as one key thing he had learned after 60 years in audio:
“7) We should all be grateful to the founding fathers of CD at Sony and Philips for their fight some 35 years ago on behalf of 16-bit, instead of 14-bit, word depth on CDs and 44.1 kHz sampling rate. Losing that fight would have retarded digital media by several decades. As it turned out, the 16-bit/44.1-kHz standard has stood the test of time; after all these years it still sounds subjectively equal to today’s HD techniques—if executed with the utmost precision. I am not saying that 24-bit/192-kHz technology is not a good thing, since it provides considerably more options, flexibility, and ease; I am saying that a SNR of 98.08 dB and a frequency response up to 22.05 kHz, if both are actually achieved, will be audibly equal to 146.24 dB and 96 kHz, which in the real world are never achieved, in any case. The same goes for 1-bit/2.8224 MHz DSD. If your ear is so sensitive, so fine, that you can hear the difference, go ahead and prove it with an ABX test, don’t just say it.”

I learned a lot from him and still enjoy his writing. And, as far as I am concerned, his closing point still stands!

He saved me from a lot of idiocy. Plus, he was a cranky old fart like me.

 

[jsrtheta]

Yes!

In truth I still have a deck and 600 or so LPs and will probably set it all up again at some point. Some of the LPs do sound great but it was the inconsistency in pressing quality that mostly irritated me. Plus a new stylus for my cartridge is now pushing £300 GBP. That's the equivalent of 30 new albums on CD or 60-odd bought second hand.

The game's not worth the candle.

When I moved from Chicago to the Rockies, I started packing up my vinyl. Then it struck me: Why?

I pulled out the few LPs that weren't then available on CD, called a buddy who was local, and asked if he wanted my vinyl.

We loaded the vinyl into the trunk of his car. There was a CLUNK! as the back end dropped a few inches, and he motored off happy.

I have never regretted it.

 

[Ricardus]

I'm in my 40s, and I got curious how my hearing was these days. I can't hear the mosquito tone anymore (17+kHz), and I can't hear below -70db, according to https://www.audiocheck.net. I can hear a 14khz tone, but not pass the 14kHz low-pass filter test.

So, CD resolution is definitely good enough for me.

Comment below if you would like to join my little club.

Cheers,

I've been right here with you, even when my hearing was much better.

 

[subframe]

Why 24/48 or 24/96 ? it's my understanding that is common to many DAW software used for music production and you can then omit the conversion to 16/44.1 which probably can be done transparently but in practice this can be another possibility for errors to creep in if not done right.

Modern DAWs are going to process in 32-bit float internally. Users can choose whatever bit depth they want to record audio to. 24-bit recording lets you record with lots of headroom; you can record at -18dB or whatever to prevent any chance of clipping and still not have to worry about noise floor at all.

 

[pablolie]

I'm in my 40s, and I got curious how my hearing was these days. I can't hear the mosquito tone anymore (17+kHz), and I can't hear below -70db, according to https://www.audiocheck.net. I can hear a 14khz tone, but not pass the 14kHz low-pass filter test.

So, CD resolution is definitely good enough for me.

Comment below if you would like to join my little club.

Cheers,

In what way does CD resolution limit you even if you still had the hearing of a 2 year old? 20hz-20kHz is in no way ever the issue with 16/44, if there are any.

 

[SuicideSquid]

I'm in my 40s, and I got curious how my hearing was these days. I can't hear the mosquito tone anymore (17+kHz), and I can't hear below -70db, according to https://www.audiocheck.net. I can hear a 14khz tone, but not pass the 14kHz low-pass filter test.

So, CD resolution is definitely good enough for me.

Comment below if you would like to join my little club.

Cheers,

Not only is CD resolution enough for you, MP3 and other decent lossy compression is enough for you.

 

[SuicideSquid]

Why 24/48 or 24/96 ? it's my understanding that is common to many DAW software used for music production and you can then omit the conversion to 16/44.1 which probably can be done transparently but in practice this can be another possibility for errors to creep in if not done right.

r8brain is free, perfect, and built into most modern DAWs so errors from sample rate conversion are not really something you need to be worried about.

 

[pablolie]

I am mid-50s, I can still hear a little something around 17k and definitely can hear 16k. It's also established that even with perfect hearing we barely perceive the tones above 15kHz, unlike out pets. It is such a silly high pitch that I doubt anyone draws additional musical enjoyment out of it.

I totally understand why in a studio setting the higher bitcounts and sampling rates may be beneficial. It's a totally lost cause to claim they make a difference in SQ when listening for musical enjoyment, and that has been proven so often in testing that it is downright silly to dispute it. By all means I invite you all to buy 24/192 versions of your fav music to support the artists, and hey, maybe for archival and historical preservation purposes it makes sense if another studio is as negligent and stupid as Universal... but to claim one can hear a difference is pure clowning.

 

[Multicore]

56 and I can hear 13 kHz.

 

[Sal1950]

I pulled out the few LPs that weren't then available on CD, called a buddy who was local, and asked if he wanted my vinyl.

Now there's a good buddy considering the value of todays squashed hockey pucks
I did the same when I moved from Chicago to FL, only I called a couple buyers and gave them my lists.
The batch went to the highest bidder.