96Khz vs 192Khz

[par4ken]

Another myth. Also, to simply refer to 'MP3' as if there were not a range of quality level options for encoding, is misleading.

NO myth just use your ears. Higher rates like 320Kbps can sound rather good but not nearly as good as uncompressed wav files. Low rated like 96Kbps are downright painful to listen to,.

 

[par4ken]

That's what I was trying to explain earlier with the 64 bit floating point mix engine most modern DAWs use. You're finally getting it!

If that earlier comment where you literally suggested a clipped 24 bit recording could be unclipped if you recorded it to a 32 bit container was miscommunication, then fair enough. That was a mighty false statement there!

Correct I never said or knowing meant to infer that.

 

[Owen Smith]

I have a few albums in both formats. To me, the big difference is probably in the mastering. There is also the navigation menu on the DVD.

The navigation menu on DVD-A/V can be a good thing or a bad thing. I've got some where the menus are so difficult to drive I wish it was an SACD, or a DVD-A/V without menus that just plays (which is entirely possible).

 

[Owen Smith]

NO myth just use your ears. Higher rates like 320Kbps can sound rather good but not nearly as good as uncompressed wav files. Low rated like 96Kbps are downright painful to listen to,.

I've done that test creating my own 320Kbps MP3s from FLAC rips of CDs and comparing them blind. Sometimes I can tell which is which, but more often than not I can't.

And do not try to claim it is because I used FLAC rather than uncompressed WAV. They are identical at the point they go into the DAC which is all that matters.

 

[par4ken]

Low rez 120Kbps MP3's were fine back in the days of Napster. I used that site and others as a way to discover new (mostly old) music, much like radio listening. For anything that I really liked I bought the CD or if not available the LP. MP3's usually have a bit of a gritty sound to them. If you can't notice that then your system is not hi-rez enough. HD audio sounds better than CD audio by about the same margin. Obviously that higher resolution means nothing if the release was mastered poorly. Rolling Stones "Sticky Fingers" on HDtracks comes to mind.

I used to pay for downloads of complete albums in MP3 for a monthly subscription. For those selections that I really liked I ended up eventually buying the CD. I burned many/most of those to CD to save space on my (small by today's standards) hard drive. I still have most of them.

I always found that wma sounded better than mp3 for the same file size. Very few people would argue that flac is not as good as wav, the only way that there could be any difference at all is if you are using a very old slow computer that can't decompress the files fast enough. That actually happened to me years ago, wav,mp3 all played fine but lossless compressed files like flac and ape would stutter, pause or skip. I upgraded my motherboard and processor shortly thereafter.

 

[4-earredwonder]

DXD 352.8kHz/32 bit versus PUNY 192 or 96/24 ..... NOW, THAT'S WHAT I CALL A SONIC UPGRADE

DXD .... Don't Leave Home WITHOUT IT!

 

[audiomaster]

I got you covered. Take some!

Yes, but is yours the dry kind where the salt falls off to the bottom of the cup? or the kind in the big tub drenched in butter that makes the popcorn salt stick to it? Otherwise known as "Roger Ebert's Tub of Death"!

 

[audiomaster]

DXD 352.8kHz/32 bit versus PUNY 192 or 96/24 ..... NOW, THAT'S WHAT I CALL A SONIC UPGRADE

DXD .... Don't Leave Home WITHOUT IT!

With or without Atmos?

 

[Owen Smith]

Low rez 120Kbps MP3's were fine back in the days of Napster. I used that site and others as a way to discover new (mostly old) music, much like radio listening. For anything that I really liked I bought the CD or if not available the LP. MP3's usually have a bit of a gritty sound to them. If you can't notice that then your system is not hi-rez enough. HD audio sounds better than CD audio by about the same margin.

You are making things up, or suffering from confirmation bias ie. you aren't doing your testing blind. MP3 at 320Kbps (I'm not interested in anything lower) sounds often as good as the CD and certainly does not sound gritty. Sometimes it is lacking a little something, usually spaciousness I find (difficult to describe), but not gritty. And the difference between HD and CD audio is even more marginal, assuming they are well mastered. I'm not talking about what is used for recording and audio workstations, I am talking about the final delivery medium.

 

[par4ken]

You are making things up, or suffering from confirmation bias ie. you aren't doing your testing blind. MP3 at 320Kbps (I'm not interested in anything lower) sounds often as good as the CD and certainly does not sound gritty. Sometimes it is lacking a little something, usually spaciousness I find (difficult to describe), but not gritty. And the difference between HD and CD audio is even more marginal, assuming they are well mastered. I'm not talking about what is used for recording and audio workstations, I am talking about the final delivery medium.

You are wrong. I'm sick and tired of people telling me that I can't be hearing what I clearly am hearing! MP3's at 320Kbps don't sound that bad but are not a replacement for CD or higher resolution sound. I know that my description of MP3 sound is subjective. It's the best way that I can think to describe the difference in sound that I notice. I stand by it 100%. Yes with talk of MP3's I'm are talking about the final delivery medium. Nobody in their right mind would record and master audio in a lossy format! I don't know why we need to use MP3's at all anymore. Storage space is cheap and internet speeds are fast.

I'm still considering getting a Pono player.

 

[MidiMagic]

Still not clear on what you have done.

Please describe the TT-->preamp-->ADC chain. (include the connectors and the model # of the CD recorder)

Here's a youtube upload of Monster (source format unknown). At what time point do you detect something missing that you hear on your LP?

The experiment was done in 2000 when I bought the CD recorder.

Turntable: Collaro TSC-640-1019
Pickup cartridge Shure M44-E
Tracking force 2.25 gram-equivalent
Antiskate to match tracking force need.
Preamp I designed myself, but it sounds the same on my Dynaco PAT-4
There is passive switching to route the signal to the amplifier, speakers, and recorder.
The CD recorder is a Phillips CDR-200
I varied the input level with the record level control on the recorder.
The record and the CD playback go to the tape input on my Sherwood RD-6106 surround receiver.
The receiver is set to Dolby Pro Logic II.
Speakers are Nubian 345 (four identical) No center channel speaker.

Unfortunately I cannot get to my copy of the record right now. I do not hear the sounds I am listening for in the youtube recording. But I also do not hear the parts of the record grooves they are in. This recording starts with the announcement. The record has several seconds before the announcement begins. And the the other part I remember was after the applause dies out at the end. That is also missing from the youtube recording, It was shortened at both ends.

I do not hear this effect during music, but between songs in live recordings.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

I'm still considering getting a Pono player.

Do they still make those? Or are you talking about getting one on the used market?

 

[par4ken]

Do they still make those? Or are you talking about getting one on the used market?

I don't know if they still make them but at least two are available on Amazon.ca one new and one refurbished. A few on eBay as well but mostly limited editions at high prices.

 

[Sonik Wiz]

I don't know if they still make them but at least two are available on Amazon.ca one new and one refurbished. A few on eBay as well but mostly limited editions at high prices.

Would it actually be desirable to own one? Can you even down load music to put on it?
http://www.noise11.com/news/r-i-p-pono-neil-young-kills-off-his-digital-player-20170423

 

[par4ken]

Would it actually be desirable to own one? Can you even down load music to put on it?
http://www.noise11.com/news/r-i-p-pono-neil-young-kills-off-his-digital-player-20170423

I already have the music to put on it. It's really just a glorified MP3 player, but it does hi rez audio.

About this item

• plays high-resolution music files and other formats better than any portable device.
• Ayre Acoustics DAC
• Supports FLAC, ALAC, WAV, AIFF, Unprotected AAC, DSD
• Lossless playback up to 192/24 bit
• 64GB internal memory

 

[jimfisheye]

Disclaimer: I have not demo'd a Pono.

Assuming the hype is true and it has pro quality DACs. A portable pro DAC with internal storage sounds like a slick device! That would be the selling point: Needing portable storage for your media and wanting a single portable device. And then wanting a pro quality DAC in that.

Otherwise I'd probably snipe up an Apogee Duet on ebay. Pro DAC quality. Bring your own media storage and delivery.

I didn't need portable. So my home system uses an Apogee Rosetta 800/192.

 

[ssully]

The experiment was done in 2000 when I bought the CD recorder.

Turntable: Collaro TSC-640-1019
Pickup cartridge Shure M44-E
Tracking force 2.25 gram-equivalent
Antiskate to match tracking force need.
Preamp I designed myself, but it sounds the same on my Dynaco PAT-4
There is passive switching to route the signal to the amplifier, speakers, and recorder.
The CD recorder is a Phillips CDR-200
I varied the input level with the record level control on the recorder.
The record and the CD playback go to the tape input on my Sherwood RD-6106 surround receiver.
The receiver is set to Dolby Pro Logic II.
Speakers are Nubian 345 (four identical) No center channel speaker.

Unfortunately I cannot get to my copy of the record right now. I do not hear the sounds I am listening for in the youtube recording. But I also do not hear the parts of the record grooves they are in. This recording starts with the announcement. The record has several seconds before the announcement begins. And the the other part I remember was after the applause dies out at the end. That is also missing from the youtube recording, It was shortened at both ends.

I do not hear this effect during music, but between songs in live recordings.

This seems to be a nest of uncontrolled variables, from an experiment done 20 years ago, and relying partly on memory, and still somewhat confusingly described ('parts of the record groove'?)....so me trying to untangle how you 'lost' audible content when simply recording an LP to digital back then is impossible.

I can only suggest digitizing the LP preamp output again with modern ADC, not riding the recording level -- just set it so the hottest LP signal does not clip, and leave it there. 44kHz sample rate is fine. 16bits should be fine, though 24 bits will give you safe headroom in case you still accidentally set the recording level too high.

There is no reason why a properly functioning digitization path under these conditions would 'lose' anything that you can hear from straight LP playback.

 

[scifi]

This goes to the basic question of, what creates “better“ in audio? And is the new different thing necessarily better?

In many cases 192K sounds different than 96K, but is it necessarily better? Too many people in audio, I think, find something that sounds different then what they had before, and automatically assume it is “better“. I’ve been a violinist for over 50 years and played in live orchestras for about that long, and I can guarantee you than sitting in a live orchestra the bass is nowhere as big as when people add a subwoofer, but they swear that a subwoofer is “better“. Or that they must have a perfectly flat 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz system and room response, when the real world is nothing like that. I have never heard a recording reproduced on any system truly sound like a live orchestra that you’re sitting in the middle of, or even sitting in “Row 16 center”. Sound reproduction no matter how good the system, is never the real thing, but to me feels more like something an artist painted that is kind of like the real thing, so that may br about the best you can do. Who doesn’t like a beautiful painting?
And of course the other side of that “better” issue is the status of having “better” gear. Don’t even get me started with that. I DIY power cords and interconnects that are light years beyond some of the expensive stuff you can get. If you have a little imagination and don’t mind rolling your sleeves up, you can have a great result for relatively very little.
Bottom line: if you like it, great. If you can, be happy with that. But if it isn’t quite the real thing, there’s always something that could sound better and you could continually be in that loop of dissatisfaction with the sound, tilting at audio-demon windmills continually trying to find the ultimate sound, which does not exist in reproduced audio once you’ve heard live music or even played it. If you can resist being a junkie audiophile needing the next better “hit“, be happy with being happy with what you have.
You might even try the “audio think method“ and imagine your system is the greatest thing ever and could never be better than that. Yeah, right. Ha ha

Truth be told, a musician in an orchestra rarely gets caught up in the music, and is mostly thinking about how to play better. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Hopeless addicts squirming and squealing
hopeless addicts eaten by worms
give them this day their daily dose
and forgive them their debts
for they are hopeless addicts
lying in the dirt

Crying in pain for their white powder
selling their bodies for another hit
hocking, selling, giving away possesions
for another hit of that nasty white dope

The needle is in and the damage is done
needle tracks all over
human pin cushions
degrading, humiliating
living as a slave to that nasty white powder
without a dollar to spare for their own funeral

www.tinyurl.com/4b72d2ex

 

[MidiMagic]

This seems to be a nest of uncontrolled variables, from an experiment done 20 years ago, and relying partly on memory, and still somewhat confusingly described ('parts of the record groove'?)....so me trying to untangle how you 'lost' audible content when simply recording an LP to digital back then is impossible.

I can only suggest digitizing the LP preamp output again with modern ADC, not riding the recording level -- just set it so the hottest LP signal does not clip, and leave it there. 44kHz sample rate is fine. 16bits should be fine, though 24 bits will give you safe headroom in case you still accidentally set the recording level too high.

There is no reason why a properly functioning digitization path under these conditions would 'lose' anything that you can hear from straight LP playback.

"just set it so the hottest LP signal does not clip, and leave it there"

This was the purpose of my experiment. I was trying to find where this point was on the new equipment I had just bought. I tried different levels because I did not know where that point was on the display. It was by pure chance that I noticed that the one level setting sounded like the CD.

The places where I heard this realism effect I liked were between the songs on the record when everything in the sound was low level. During the song, the effect was drowned out by the music. On the CD, there is much less between the songs.

 

[par4ken]

CD recorders were a rather cool device when they first came out. Sadly they were crippled right from the start. They required the use of special music CD's to which a tax was added for the recording industry. Presumably the tax was to help support the "starving artists" but in reality was likely more to supplement the incomes of the successful artist to make up for the supposed losses due to piracy.

The proliferation of home computers with CD burners and soundcards made the CD recorder obsolete very quickly, almost right away. With a computer you could easily edit your recording, de-click vinyl, normalise etc. You could make digital copies of commercially releases CD's as many times as you wanted. Didn't those standalone CD recorders also limit you to making only a single direct digital copy?

The behavior of the recording industry in those days quite frankly disgusted me.