If you could only pick one major advancement in Audio since the mid 80s what would it be?

[DuncanS]

Well I almost cast a vote for a company that makes I.C. chips.
I have to assume (maybe wrongly) that T.S.M.C. limited makes the bulk of chips going in audio gear in that part of the world?

You're most likely correct. TSMC make chips for the majority of the Semiconductor companies. Analogue/RF chips are made by other fabs. What struck me when I was in Taiwan for work (I was working for Semiconductor companies at the time) was the sheer number of huge buildings scattered around Kaohsiung all belonging to well known semiconductor companies.

 

[mandrix]

Looks like Korea is going in big time for chip fab plants. Come to think of, Samsung is there...

 

[DuncanS]

Looks like Korea is going in big time for chip fab plants. Come to think of, Samsung is there...

Samsung also make chips for other companies

 

[Sonik Wiz]

There have been many responses here about things like digital, transmission methods, etc, but not much addressing improvements of naturalness for (eg) music, so my suggestion is ambisonics, which was being supported by several electronics makers in the 80s. I am thinking particularly of B-Format of at least 1st order rather than 2 channel UHJ, of which most are aware.

Ambisonics in general use has fallen by the wayside for home use for a couple of reasons, but it is in extensive use in VR at 3 rd and higher order as it can be encoded for binaural and decoded with head tracking and HRTF to give amazingly good imaging and sense of depth. Its use in music reproduction is extremely good, even at 1 st order, in room. There are a handful of ambisonic 1 st order B-Format releases on Bandcamp, too.

A limit is that speaker rigs for beyond 1 st order increase in size, so beyond 3 rd order (min. 8 horizontal spkrs) becomes impractical in most homes. The limitations of 2 ch UHJ has done it no favours, so it’s a huge pity 3 & 4 (true 3D) channel UHJ never got to market, partly due to the cost of transmission channels in the 80s and the complexity and expense of ‘would be’ analogue decoders, none of which came to market. A lost opportunity, now we’re well into the digital age. Nonetheless, full 1 st order gives fully linear surround with stable imaging and no phasiness, for which hardware & software decoders are available currently.

An ignored technology for home use that just wants someone to pick it up and go with it again, I believe.

I have a love/hate affair with Ambisonics. But I guess that is aside the point as the OP asked about the major audio development in the 80's. And Ambisonics was definitely a child of the 70's.

 

[Sonik Wiz]

Objectively I might say the most important audio development of the 80's might be the CD with digital audio stereo. More selectively and emotionally I would say the most important development was digital audio surround, as a few others have said here.

When I played my first stereo CD it seemed like listening to a brand new, well mastered, analog record. Emotionally when I played DTS CD Alan Parsons On Air it lifted me to a whole new level. Crisp clean sound with perfect surround. It was what we all were waiting for through matrix, CD-4, like tape with no hiss, like LP with no pops. Truly it brought me to watery eyes.

 

[4-earredwonder]

There have been many responses here about things like digital, transmission methods, etc, but not much addressing improvements of naturalness for (eg) music, so my suggestion is ambisonics, which was being supported by several electronics makers in the 80s. I am thinking particularly of B-Format of at least 1st order rather than 2 channel UHJ, of which most are aware.

Ambisonics in general use has fallen by the wayside for home use for a couple of reasons, but it is in extensive use in VR at 3 rd and higher order as it can be encoded for binaural and decoded with head tracking and HRTF to give amazingly good imaging and sense of depth. Its use in music reproduction is extremely good, even at 1 st order, in room. There are a handful of ambisonic 1 st order B-Format releases on Bandcamp, too.

A limit is that speaker rigs for beyond 1 st order increase in size, so beyond 3 rd order (min. 8 horizontal spkrs) becomes impractical in most homes. The limitations of 2 ch UHJ has done it no favours, so it’s a huge pity 3 & 4 (true 3D) channel UHJ never got to market, partly due to the cost of transmission channels in the 80s and the complexity and expense of ‘would be’ analogue decoders, none of which came to market. A lost opportunity, now we’re well into the digital age. Nonetheless, full 1 st order gives fully linear surround with stable imaging and no phasiness, for which hardware & software decoders are available currently.

An ignored technology for home use that just wants someone to pick it up and go with it again, I believe.

Funny you mention UHJ Ambisonics. I recently had my Meridian 861 upgraded to v.8 status which included improved dacs and also incorporates Ambisonic decoding. When I recently upgraded with 4 matching Meridian DSP800 Special Edition matching self amped speakers front and rear I was finally able to hear the full effect of the Ambisonic decoding process and must concur it does sound absolutely brilliant. And it even decodes in my side self amped Meridian speakers which in essence forms a very convincing holographic soundfield.

Classical label Numbus recorded a great deal of their music ambisonically but it never really caught on in popular music save for The Cowboy Junkies whose albums The Trinity Session and Whites off Earth Now were recorded ambisonically with a single Calrec omnidirectional microphone and are sonically stunning with discrete immersion from front to rear!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambisonics

 

[mandrix]

Well on the software side, I used to sometimes use Ambisonics VST's to "smooth out" the sound on upmixes. There are several sites where VST's can be found free, or used to be. Don't know if they have all been upgraded to 64 bit or not.
Never owned any decoding hardware.

 

[stevendive]

I have a love/hate affair with Ambisonics. But I guess that is aside the point as the OP asked about the major audio development in the 80's. And Ambisonics was definitely a child of the 70's.

I suppose one’s expectations will depend on things like experience, especially in ambi, of how correct is the setup, whether you want to feel transported to the musical event, consideration of loudspeakers as being separately recognisable or of being incidental to recreation of the soundfield around you, etc.. UHJ tends, I think, to colour expectations as its phasiness in the rearwards area is sometimes distracting.

I don’t think Nimbus Records has done ambisonics much service, either. Their Nimbus-Halliday mic seems to give poor side-right imaging and many of their recordings are made in very reverberant locations. I’ve had better experience from other labels’ recordings.

What are your thoughts? I believe full B-Format would be the way to go.

 

[stevendive]

Funny you mention UHJ Ambisonics. I recently had my Meridian 861 upgraded to v.8 status which included improved dacs and also incorporates Ambisonic decoding. When I recently upgraded with 4 matching Meridian DSP800 Special Edition matching self amped speakers front and rear I was finally able to hear the full effect of the Ambisonic decoding process and must concur it does sound absolutely brilliant. And it even decodes in my side self amped Meridian speakers which in essence forms a very convincing holographic soundfield.

Classical label Numbus recorded a great deal of their music ambisonically but it never really caught on in popular music save for The Cowboy Junkies whose albums The Trinity Session and Whites off Earth Now were recorded ambisonically with a single Calrec omnidirection microphone and are sonically stunning with discrete immersion from front to rear!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambisonics

The Calrec mic recordings are great, and newer ones are too (eg, CoreSound, Eigemmic), although I think these are being used mainly in academic settings at the moment.

Your Meridian system sounds awesome. Mine’s based on Quad ESL63s and Meridian G61RSL DSP.

 

[CINERAMAX]

 

[Sal1950]

Apples security system of having to run for the phone and add a security number is a huge PITA !Why can't they recognize my IP provider number and just leave me the hell alone.
Everyone is doing this crap today and I'm sick of it, there should be a way to opt out.

 

[Sonik Wiz]

Apples security system of having to run for the phone and add a security number is a huge PITA !Why can't they recognize my IP provider number and just leave me the hell alone.
Everyone is doing this crap today and I'm sick of it, there should be a way to opt out.

This seems like the antithesis of the question, most important advancement in audio of the 80's. Is your comment even relevant to the 80's? Or audio? Other than that I agree that's why I do as little as possible with Apple tech or iphones.

 

[Sal1950]

This seems like the antithesis of the question, most important advancement in audio of the 80's. Is your comment even relevant to the 80's? Or audio? Other than that I agree that's why I do as little as possible with Apple tech or iphones.

Yep, I went OT. Sorry, but seemed as good a time as any to rant.
And I'm not an Apple guy, my Apple 4k box is the only Apple thing I own.
I bought it strickly to get their Atmos music streaming.

 

[Sonik Wiz]

Yep, I went OT. Sorry, but seemed as good a time as any to rant.
And I'm not an Apple guy, my Apple 4k box is the only Apple thing I own.
I bought it strickly to get their Atmos music streaming.

10-4 good buddy.

 

[barfle]

No mention so far of dbx. Not that I think it was the best thing to come out of the ‘80s (if it was), but I have a handful of dbx encoded LPs, and the difference is notable.

 

[par4ken]

No mention so far of dbx. Not that I think it was the best thing to come out of the ‘80s (if it was), but I have a handful of dbx encoded LPs, and the difference is notable.

In addition to noise reduction dbx championed the idea of expanding dynamic range. Modern so called "remastered" releases usually try to squash out any trace of DR!

 

[barfle]

In addition to noise reduction dbx championed the idea of expanding dynamic range. Modern so called "remastered" releases usually try to squash out any trace of DR!

I thought the dbx 3bx was a pretty cool idea, but it was one of those things that seemed like it was fiddling with the original, and I probably wouldn’t have used it much. Sorta like one of those add-on reverb units.

 

[SeeMoreDigital]

No mention so far of dbx. Not that I think it was the best thing to come out of the ‘80s (if it was), but I have a handful of dbx encoded LPs, and the difference is notable.

Actually, I mentioned "dbx" on Monday (link)

 

[CINERAMAX]

If Apple TV had a DBX 3BX mode and a DBX Subharmonic Synthesizer mode, they would get my $10 a month for the Atmos. As it is, go take a hike, Apple.

 

[mandrix]

As far as disc formats since the mid '80's, we finally are getting away from DVD's and more/mostly Blu Ray discs. That's a major improvement in capacity, and we can get several lossless versions on one disc!
We'll forget for the moment that some discs being turned out are flawed either physically or authored poorly. But that's not the norm.