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HD greedsters - it ain't rock'n'roll old chum

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discrete badger View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote discrete badger Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 Feb 2020 at 7:28am
Originally posted by Aussie Mick Aussie Mick wrote:

I’ve become totally unconcerned by why some versions sound better than others. I find my favorite and I listen. Music is the best. 
Mick.

It is indeed all about the music; and I've lived this maxim, having not bought a piece of audio equipment for nearly a decade, and been simply enjoying my home speaker system and my home (Solo UL powered) and portable (Voyager powered) headphone rigs.

But the recent experiences with hi-res have suggested to me that I have been missing out on some of the music. This is not just an "it sounds nicer" statement of sound quality woolliness, although it does sound nicer. 

It is more objective than that : there are inner parts in some pieces of music which I simply haven't heard before, and if they were included by the composer/artist, then they have a part to play in the music, and should be heard.

I should have investigated this a long time ago. Likewise, I should never have tolerated lossy OGG rips of my CD collection - another cause of major missing out. But storage was much more expensive back then.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Graham Slee Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 Feb 2020 at 8:32am
There are indeed "inner parts," and I have been trying to encourage others to discover them for the past 21 years Wink
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote kgilroy Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2020 at 5:53pm
Originally posted by patientot patientot wrote:

Originally posted by kgilroy kgilroy wrote:

This hi-res discussion can become a bit like going down the proverbial rabbit hole. I have DSD files, 96/24, 88/24, 192/24, 44/16 and have come to the conclusion that it all comes down to the mastering engineer and what they think sounds good.
Goes without saying that the recording has to be good to start with.


Pretty much my conclusion as well. I may have mentioned this before but awhile back I experimented with some pure/native DSD files (e.g. music actually recorded in DSD and not converted to anything else afterwards). Generally these are only available as classical solo instruments as it's not that easy to edit or mix music in DSD without converting to PCM first. 

Conclusion: although the files sounded very nice and I do not regret purchasing the albums, there is nothing at all special about the DSD format, at least where 2 channel audio is concerned. I could easily convert the files to PCM and would probably not be able to tell the difference in blind test, nor do I think anyone else could with repeatable, controlled blind testing. 

The only reason I would buy DSD files in the future would be due to special mastering not available on another format. 

Oh, and one thing that really rubbed me the wrong way about DSD was a download store's advertising offer of "upsampled" 512 DSD rate files (at an additional charge of course). Never mind the fact that the source material was often recorded at a lower rate like 256 or 128 DSD, and that these rates already capture audio information well beyond the threshold of human hearing!LOL

It seems that we have very similar experiences. I have become agnostic about PCM vs DSD although you can find lots of discussion online about the merits of both. I don’t own a DSD Dac so I convert to PCM on my computer.
With regards to CD’s I only buy if that is the only way to get a particular piece of music with one exception. The XRCD24 Blue Note discs I have are very detailed and exciting to listen to which tends to support my view that it is not so much the sampling frequency/bit depth but the way the music is mastered to the medium that most determines sound quality.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote patientot Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Feb 2020 at 6:28pm
Originally posted by kgilroy kgilroy wrote:


It seems that we have very similar experiences. I have become agnostic about PCM vs DSD although you can find lots of discussion online about the merits of both. I don’t own a DSD Dac so I convert to PCM on my computer.
With regards to CD’s I only buy if that is the only way to get a particular piece of music with one exception. The XRCD24 Blue Note discs I have are very detailed and exciting to listen to which tends to support my view that it is not so much the sampling frequency/bit depth but the way the music is mastered to the medium that most determines sound quality.

Right, lots of camps online re: what they prefer. I do have a few different DACs that will play DSD without converting to PCM - two use an ESS chip, the other one is AKM. No difference that's audible. I mainly bought the DSD albums out of pure curiosity. 

I don't have any of those XRCD BN releases but I do have other older BN CDs that sound quite nice (old McMaster, Connoisseur Series, Japan TOCP, etc.). Often the mastering presentation is different across different versions if I have more than one. Certainly most mastering engineers have their own preferences and way of doing things and they are not always working with the same exact tapes either.  
SL-1200 MK7 (modified) + Reflex M + PSU-1 used with AT150-40ML, AT VM95ML, Stanton 680mkII + Ogura, and Shure M35X cartridges.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote kgilroy Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Feb 2020 at 12:34pm
Originally posted by patientot patientot wrote:

Originally posted by kgilroy kgilroy wrote:


It seems that we have very similar experiences. I have become agnostic about PCM vs DSD although you can find lots of discussion online about the merits of both. I don’t own a DSD Dac so I convert to PCM on my computer.
With regards to CD’s I only buy if that is the only way to get a particular piece of music with one exception. The XRCD24 Blue Note discs I have are very detailed and exciting to listen to which tends to support my view that it is not so much the sampling frequency/bit depth but the way the music is mastered to the medium that most determines sound quality.


Right, lots of camps online re: what they prefer. I do have a few different DACs that will play DSD without converting to PCM - two use an ESS chip, the other one is AKM. No difference that's audible. I mainly bought the DSD albums out of pure curiosity. 

I don't have any of those XRCD BN releases but I do have other older BN CDs that sound quite nice (old McMaster, Connoisseur Series, Japan TOCP, etc.). Often the mastering presentation is different across different versions if I have more than one. Certainly most mastering engineers have their own preferences and way of doing things and they are not always working with the same exact tapes either.  


Do you know anything about these - DSD flat transfers?

https://store.acousticsounds.com/d/149032/Kenny_Burrell-Midnight_Blue-DSD_Single_Rate_28MHz64fs_Download
Keith

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote patientot Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Feb 2020 at 10:36pm
Originally posted by kgilroy kgilroy wrote:

 
Do you know anything about these - DSD flat transfers?

https://store.acousticsounds.com/d/149032/Kenny_Burrell-Midnight_Blue-DSD_Single_Rate_28MHz64fs_Download

Unfortunately no. And given the price and considering I have the MM33 LP and the old McMaster BN CD I doubt I really need it. How it sounds likely depends on the condition of the source tape used. Info in the listing is very scant. Not sure when those transfers were done. Possibly around the time of the AP SACD Blue Note campaign? I'd be curious how a flat version sounds compared to one EQ'd by a mastering engineer. Then again, not curious enough to drop $25 on this download. 
SL-1200 MK7 (modified) + Reflex M + PSU-1 used with AT150-40ML, AT VM95ML, Stanton 680mkII + Ogura, and Shure M35X cartridges.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote lfc jon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Nov 2021 at 1:11pm
Didn't know where to put this post, so as it's HD I put it here.
As anybody heard anymore about HD Vinyl records it was supposed to be the next best thing in Vinyl, Hi-res audio in analogue and it was supposed to make producing ordinary records cheaper. I do know people were not for it as it was done digitally "but most new vinyl is now a days" It was the cheaper to produce that looking forward to. "Ha Ha" like that was going to happen.
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