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CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 3:18:22 PM

Estring

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Here is some audio proof that not only does the quality of music suck nowadays, so does the quality of the recording.

http://funl.blogspot.com/2007/06/loudness-war.html

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 3:56:15 PM

JohnSteed1967

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Your Right, Here's the Record Company's Dirty little secret. Vinyl records cost somewhere in the neighborhood of anywhere from $ 5 Dollars or so to make. Where as Cd's cost about .50.

Also Cd's are a smaller Size so you can't do great graphics that are world of art. Look at U2's Vinyl Version of "Rattle and Hum" this is a two record set with a fold-gate in other words it opens like a greeting card to reveal art work on the inside. This is obviously more expensive for the record company to produce.

Vinyl is produced at Analog sound this is a continuous stream of sound just like the human ear naturally recieves and that the human voice and musical instruments naturally produce. Prouducing a warm and rich sound experiance.

Cds are Digital, groups of sound packets clumped so tightly together that you cannot tell the diffrence. However this sound is not a natural experiance.

Cds were chosen not because of their superior sound quality but because it was cheaper to produce them and provide the record companies with a greater profit margin.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 4:15:03 PM

Estring

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It goes beyond digital vs. analog though. The cds are compressed so much and mixed so loudly that ear fatigue sets in very quickly. The reason this is done is that many nowadays believe louder is better.
I have a large collection of DVD Audio and Sacds and after listening to these and vinyl for that matter, the poor quality of cds becomes very apparent.
I don't think that all cds are recorded this way. It seems to be a new thing.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 4:26:05 PM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Estring

It goes beyond digital vs. analog though. The cds are compressed so much and mixed so loudly that ear fatigue sets in very quickly. The reason this is done is that many nowadays believe louder is better.
I have a large collection of DVD Audio and Sacds and after listening to these and vinyl for that matter, the poor quality of cds becomes very apparent.
I don't think that all cds are recorded this way. It seems to be a new thing.

\

what you say is true, they are companded actually but that is semantics. Another big fake out is that vinyl will produce a pretty good squarewave even above 10khz and digital is clucky to produce one at 20hz LOL

The point is diggital is sampled where as analog is continuous. songs that are encoded by fraunhofer using winamp or whatever are usually 44khz sample rate, so you get 2 saples at 20khz and that is supposed to reproduce a sign wave. ah huh

dbx does make a impact restoration unit but you can never get it all back. That and much of the 80's and 90's music was really bad for using high compression and worse lmiting techniques on their recordings.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 4:42:03 PM

Estring

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So true.

Here is a good article dealing with this:

http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/33549

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/10/2007 6:50:09 PM

farglebargle

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It's been going on for years. And Protools didn't help any.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 5:31:40 AM

Termyn8or

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Talk about preaching to the choir. But I can tell you what is worse, FM radio. If you think they compress a CD, try it on the radio. And it drives me nuts.

I've had a couple of expanders and know how to use them. I was over a buddy's long ago and he had an expander, but had the input gain all the way up. I tried to school the guy but he just wouldn't listen. His expander was nothing but a gain stage. I do admit this much, if things ever really did get quiet it would act as an effective DNR unit. I tried to show him by turning it down and turning the main volume up but he insisted that it belonged all the way up. I got into an argument with the same guy because he said motor and engine meant exactly the same thing.

Guys like this also tend to get a graphic equalizer and just crank all the bands all the way up. What's more they tend to use the high and low filters on their amps, wiping out the octaves that are the most expensive to reproduce. Of course a cranked up EQ will do that as well.

Might as well for the ignorant, make them happy. What makes them happy is when the volume goes say from 0 to 10, at 3 the amp is putting out full power. I swear it seems that the exact same sound sounds better to them when the volume is just cracked a bit. I think some of them think turning it up beyond 5 is unmanly or something.

On the same note as the OT (I do pay attention sometimes), think of the vinyl days before CDs, and the album Moontan by Golden Earring. On the US version is was cut hard and the material went all the way to the exit track. Most turntables sold in the US mistracked especially at the end of a side, so the sound got muddy, especially after alot of plays.

On the import version though it was cut alot quieter, and the grooves were a bit compressed to stay away from the center. The result was alot cleaner sound. Europe seems to have been ahead of the game all the way. Even with FM radio, they reduced the modulation and had a bunch more stations. This required better FM tuners. They builtem.

Anyway, people don't realize what is missing in the sound. Everything non-electronic is clipped almost. I read somewhere that to reproduce a muted trumpet at a realistic level would require tens of thousands of watts. But have a look at the waveform and you see why. Also note that this ten thousand watt amp would be running at an average power of perhaps five watts. It just requires that much peak power to reproduce the peaks.

And the average Joe has no idea. Anything louder is better, so they give the people what they want. Problem is that it is not what I want. I mean to the point where there is not a radio in my house, not even a clock radio. I download everything, and I am getting pleasantly surprised by the quality of some of these oldies, and I mean from the sixties. Even the fifties !

We really have not come a long way.

T

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 5:59:32 AM

Alumbrado

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Easy fix... just buy some zenium filled gold cables, add some sonic attunement stones to the top of your speakers, put the CD player on a bio-alignment pad, Feng Shui your speaker placement, and Voila!

All the missing sound comes back, and then some.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:30:42 AM

farglebargle

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I sometimes wish I was in the smoke-and-mirrors world of Audiophile Exploitation.

But then I realize what that would mean. That I had to deal with fucking Audiophiles.

Here's a little clue. Why bother trying to exceed the performance of the equipment used to MAKE the source material?

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:32:05 AM

Alumbrado

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What source? Beyonce's lungs?

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:33:46 AM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Alumbrado

Easy fix... just buy some zenium filled gold cables, add some sonic attunement stones to the top of your speakers, put the CD player on a bio-alignment pad, Feng Shui your speaker placement, and Voila!

All the missing sound comes back, and then some.

aside from the sarcasm above, a key factor in getting those drums to really sound up is getting the correct equipment and understanding the process.

What i am going to suggest here is not a cheap solution but it works and it works well.

Get a high damping factor amp, like a crown for instance for the bass driver. I use one with a damping factor of 3000.
Get another very low distortion amp with a damping factor around say 500 for the midrange and tweets
Use very large wire, like AWG0 for a 10ft run for the bass and awg 10 for the mid and tweeter and make sure they are the same length even if you only need 3 feet of it to get to the speaker use the same length as the longest run on both.
Use active crossovers and biamp.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:37:54 AM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

I sometimes wish I was in the smoke-and-mirrors world of Audiophile Exploitation.

But then I realize what that would mean. That I had to deal with fucking Audiophiles.

Here's a little clue. Why bother trying to exceed the performance of the equipment used to MAKE the source material?

my music collection is mosly all live concerts simply because they do not do as much to butcher them as in the studio.

Live concerts are really pretty easy to reproduce in as much as acdc and concerts like that because they are all piped through speakers and we at least stand a chance whereas live unamplified instruments are very difficult to sound original.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:38:09 AM

farglebargle

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"What source?"

I was thinking more like the $1500.00 microphone plugged into the $30.00 cable capturing it, and of course the flow through the chain, where the component with the POOREST performance dictates the result.

I'm not sure going AWG0 is needed. 12 Gauge seems to work just fine in any application I've seen. Short runs.

( I am a Crown/JBL fan, myself... )

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:40:27 AM

farglebargle

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Real0ne

quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

I sometimes wish I was in the smoke-and-mirrors world of Audiophile Exploitation.

But then I realize what that would mean. That I had to deal with fucking Audiophiles.

Here's a little clue. Why bother trying to exceed the performance of the equipment used to MAKE the source material?

my music collection is mosly all live concerts simply because they do not do as much to butcher them as in the studio.

Live concerts are really pretty easy to reproduce in as much as acdc and concerts like that because they are all piped through speakers and we at least stand a chance whereas live unamplified instruments are very difficult to sound original.

I dunno. I've seen some live performances compressed so much that recording them was a pointless exercise.

And as for live, unamplified? Hang a Shure SM-81 over it, and it'll sound JUST FINE.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:43:50 AM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

"What source?"

I was thinking more like the $1500.00 microphone plugged into the $30.00 cable capturing it, and of course the flow through the chain, where the component with the POOREST performance dictates the result.

I'm not sure going AWG0 is needed. 12 Gauge seems to work just fine in any application I've seen. Short runs.

( I am a Crown/JBL fan, myself... )

yeh i use them both in/for my horns, i had some nice awg 000 welding cable laying around so us that on the bass which i admit is over kill (even for 4ohm bass units), but it does tickle your noise when they hit the drums.

Yeh using short runs is best. The main thing is to get rid of resistance between the amp and driver. Nothing kills sound like a series coil.

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:46:00 AM

farglebargle

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Now THAT cable is still useful, but for say a few hundred amps of power distro!

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 6:56:36 AM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

Now THAT cable is still useful, but for say a few hundred amps of power distro!

its not the amps, its the resistance........it would only requirte about a number 18 as far as the amps are concerned. the triple0 has a resistance of about .0001 per foot. if i could find an 18 that could do that i would not mess with this heavy crap. but it does give you that super tight drum just like being there sort of thing

< Message edited by Real0ne -- 7/11/2007 6:57:36 AM >

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 7:01:11 AM

Real0ne

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quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

quote:

ORIGINAL: Real0ne

quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

I sometimes wish I was in the smoke-and-mirrors world of Audiophile Exploitation.

But then I realize what that would mean. That I had to deal with fucking Audiophiles.

Here's a little clue. Why bother trying to exceed the performance of the equipment used to MAKE the source material?

my music collection is mosly all live concerts simply because they do not do as much to butcher them as in the studio.

Live concerts are really pretty easy to reproduce in as much as acdc and concerts like that because they are all piped through speakers and we at least stand a chance whereas live unamplified instruments are very difficult to sound original.

I dunno. I've seen some live performances compressed so much that recording them was a pointless exercise.

And as for live, unamplified? Hang a Shure SM-81 over it, and it'll sound JUST FINE.

yes the equipment today has so much dynamic range there is no reason to process it like they do imo. i have to raise the oh above 1500 range a bit to get it to sound as close as possible to the original for the unamplified stuff

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 7:19:21 AM

Termyn8or

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Real, I never got that outrageous, but I like to think I got pretty good sound.If this gets too deep we can go to the other side.

I understand damping factor, and 3000 is out of this world, especially if you're talking into 4 ohms, but hell even 1500 into 4 ohms is out of this world.

As someone who can design, I have the following opinion :

It would make no sense to build a stereo amp with that high of a damping factor. I would build monoblocks and have the amps located right near the speakers and just send the pre-out to them. Then you don't need welding cable.

And it does indeed take welding cable to maintain such a high damping factor even for say a ten foot run.

Also, that is theoretical damping factor. Even if you mount the amp right to the woofer and run bus bars to it, there is still the resistance of the flexwires as well as the voice coil itself. So if you think of it a certain way, that is to say on a different scale, one that approaches reality, a damping factor of infinity could be thought of as a real damping factor of one.

Remember a damping factor number is a ratio to start with. So all you are doing is approaching a real damping factor of one.

I used to be a big fan of amps with a higher damping factor, but that has waned. When not bi-amping most of it is wasted, except for maybe the very low bass. And that's only if the coil in the crossover is very heavy duty. As a result many of the good speakers out there that use a lower bass to mid crossover frequency have better low bass, but there are other reasons for that as well.

Also there is a whole other school of thought, the tube people. With a very low damping (used to be called dampering) factor, the crossover affects the behavior of the amp. Usually at the crossover points the impedance rises a bit, and a low damping amp then puts out a bit more voltage at those frequencies. This might smooth the crossover points and that might be the ju-ne-se-qua (sp) they experience.

However

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RE: CD Sound Is Crap! - 7/11/2007 7:30:43 AM

Termyn8or

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this has a detrimental effect on bass response. Since the woofer is small in comparison to the waves it must produce, it must move more to produce the lower frequencies. A high inductance voice coil, that is with many turns of very heavy wire is an apt solution for this, albeit not a complete one.

A cheaper woofer will have lighter guage wire but with fewer turns. Both could be rated the same nominal impedance, but with one it drops drastically at lower frequencies. This is hard on the amp and that is one of the reasons such better woofers are less common in today's equipment. They seem to have largely given up on that bottom octave for the mass market. Those who want it buy powered subs, , , , subwoofers :-)

Ta ta for now, that is enough on speakers for a thread on CD quality. Although I think it pertinent because speakers are integral to hearing things. And there are speakers out there so shitty the CD quality wouldn't matter anyway.

I will be back, but on topic. There have been options better than CD quality for at least 25 years.

T

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