Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
pfarrell;290781 Wrote: darrenyeats wrote:[color=green] Who would trust software to keep planes in the air? You do know that it was decades before the commercial folks accepted the idea. So what? It was a while before they adopted jet engines too I would imagine. There's nothing wrong with taking time to evaluate new technologies. But comp.risks has many articles about teething problems on Airbus computer systems. And I can find plenty of reports of problems with early suspension bridges, early cars, early planes, early spacecraft, etc etc. Software is not special in that regard. When you develop something new it won't be as reliable as it will be in 50 years time. There will be teething problems. Actually, life support systems software is way special. Yes and no. It's still software, and it's still written by developers. Sure things are done differently and to different standards than your typical word processor, but the electronics in the ECG box are engineered differently than those in my TV too...again nothing different here. Fey, Engineers (PEs) who use computers are Engineers, not computer people. They are 'computer users'. Their domain knowledge is engineering, not computers. Sure engineers who use computers are engineers. Engineers who build computers are also engineers, and engineers who write software are engineers. I have to say that until today I didn't know anything about the whole PE thing, being British. But according to this page (http://www.engology.com/engpg2faq.htm) (and several others I found) PE is the same as Chartered Engineer. And I can certainly become a Chartered Engineer as a programmer (http://www.bcs.org/server.php?show=conWebDoc.1075). What is also interesting is that the NSPE accept memberships from people with equivalent international memberships...so I wonder what would happen if a CEng who happened to be a software guy showed up :) Anyway, looks like it'll all be moot soon as the NSPE are talking about licensing software devs (http://www.nspe.org/PEmagazine/pe_1207_Software_License.html). -- radish radish's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=77 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
It's true that software development is not the same as mechanical engineering. :) The stringency of the process is generally somewhere between mechanical engineering and film producing. However, SW dev is different to both and the exact kind of process used depends on the application. For firmware used in nuclear weapons or flight control systems more strict processes are used. You will find that the project management, requirements management, design, testing and configuration management processes used are quite different in aerospace and military applications than in commercial development. BTW I come from a configuration management background. If you're a manufacturing engineer you'll know its equivalent as Product Data Management. In general, Pat is right to view software the way he does - it's played faster and looser 99% of the time than in mechanical engineering. Just like not all engineering is Engineering, not all software development is alike. But it makes no commercial sense to implement very strict processes when time-to-market, functionality and aesthetics are what counts to customers. It depends on the domain. Darren -- darrenyeats SB3 / Inguz - Krell KAV-300i (pre bypass) - PMC AB-1 Dell laptop - JVC UX-C30 mini system darrenyeats's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10799 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
opaqueice wrote: There is no such thing as proof in science, and there is no distinction between positive and negative statements in hypothesis testing. Close. There is no such thing as absolute proof in physical science. Mathematics is all about proof. A proof may depend on postulates, and you can argue the postulates, but once you accept the postulates, the proof is either solid or not Engineering, and all other science (chemistry, physics, astronomy, etc.) have theories and do experiments to validate them. Sometimes it takes centuries to show that what was accepted is not really true. F = MA is one, that while 400 years old, and true in any case we care about, its not true at quantum levels. What 99% of the world considers as a scientific proof is not. Its about rejecting the hypothesis with high confidence. Opaque's example of 99.9% confidence is very high, better than the chance that a meteorite will hit me in the head when I walk out to get the morning paper, but there is a real, non-zero chance of a meteorite strike even with a 99.9% confidence against it. There is a reason that every graduate student in science and engineering at every university in the planet is required to take a term of statistics. You have to understand what these experiments show, an what they don't show. I've been looking, and I have seen zero science that says there is anything delivered in hi-res commercial recordings that can be detected by humans. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon;290526 Wrote: I respect your opions -- you guys have far more experience with computer audio than I. You want to believe in digital, and that all this manipulation of bytes will have no effect on the final sound-- it's just information after all, which can be lossless. Theoretically perhaps it is, but that is not what I've found listening carefully. You want to believe that FLAC is FLAC, whether created by EAC's algorhythms or the SB3's. Are you certain? Sure it's possible that some app produces broken FLAC files, but it's trivial to test. Simply take a WAV file, encode it to FLAC, decode it back to WAV, and compare. If they're identical the implementation is sound. The reference FLAC impl (which is used in 99% of apps I believe) has a huge suite of tests which is run against every new version to prove it's working properly. If there's a track which you think FLAC does a bad job of compressing, let's see it. Josh (who designed FLAC) hangs around here sometimes, I'm sure he'd be interested :) There are a lot of uncontrolled variables here, despite all the claims to science being thrown around (including by me). I think one of the biggest which has not been mentioned is the DACs in the SB3 vs. an SACD player. I love Burr-Brown and I think the SB3 is a phenomenally well-designed box, but you would have to agree that even if you have identical source material (e.g. a CD ripped as wav into the server playing through the SB3 vs. the CD on the 555es) that these will inevitably lead to different reproduced sounds. Of course they will, but I don't agree that DACs are not mentioned - they're probably discussed in 80% of the threads in this forum. But whether you have Burr-Brown or whatever else down the chain, whether the original file was WAV or FLAC won't make any difference. There are many parts in these systems, all of which contribute to the final result. Change one and you pretty much always change the end result, to some degree (audible or not). But assuming you use properly lossless formats, anything prior to the first DAC should be irrelevant. As a new member here it really makes me wonder about the value of voicing a minority opinion on these forums, or posting at all for that matter. The audiophile forum is a lion's den, and most people seem to like it that way as strict moderation has been rejected. Everyone's free to voice an opinion (or should be) but don't expect others to not voice their own right back at you, new member or old timer. The rest of the board is generally a lot friendlier :) -- radish radish's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=77 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
pfarrell;290610 Wrote: Close. There is no such thing as absolute proof in physical science. Mathematics is all about proof. It's debatable whether mathematics should be considered science, but otherwise I agree. I've been looking, and I have seen zero science that says there is anything delivered in hi-res commercial recordings that can be detected by humans. Yeah, I don't think there is any. Moreover what we know of human hearing says the difference shouldn't be audible. So anyone that thinks otherwise has the burden of proof on them (IMO), and the failure of hi-res formats is probably at least in part due to the fact that they don't actually sound any better than redbook. rhizomaticon;290526 Wrote: I respect your opions -- you guys have far more experience with computer audio than I. You want to believe in digital, and that all this manipulation of bytes will have no effect on the final sound-- it's just information after all, which can be lossless. Theoretically perhaps it is, but that is not what I've found listening carefully. You want to believe that FLAC is FLAC, whether created by EAC's algorhythms or the SB3's. Are you certain? I have to ask you again - did you set slimserver not to transcode WAV to FLAC when you did these listening tests? -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
opaqueice wrote: It's debatable whether mathematics should be considered science, but otherwise I agree. Hey, my BS degree says Mathematics from the College of Arts and Science and I'm not going to let you argue that Math is an art. :-) My Masters degree says Computer Science and a lot of scientists claim that there is no 'science' in computer science. the failure of hi-res formats is probably at least in part due to the fact that they don't actually sound any better than redbook. The stupid beta/vhs format war didn't help. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
pfarrell;290672 Wrote: Hey, my BS degree says Mathematics from the College of Arts and Science and I'm not going to let you argue that Math is an art. :-) I've got a Bachelor of Arts in physics. :-) I think my masters (in physics) is in arts too, but I'd have to check. And then I'm a Doctor of Philosophy in Physics... not a lot of logic to be found there! -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
I have a number of LPs from Speakers Corner, Classic Records, MoFi, and Diverse Records. What all of these have in common is that they have been lovingly mastered to get the best out of the medium, and unlike some of the original pressings they have been pressed on pristine vinyl. (Maybe better vinyl = high res for analogue!!) If by buying SACDs and DVDAs I also get recordings that have been lovingly mastered to get the best out of the medium (not always the case I know) then I will buy them in the same way I buy the audiophile LPs - and frankly I don't care, in the end, if they sound good because of the mastering or the format. By the same token I am currently ripping all my DVDV's that have LPCM tracks, also with good results. At least it's one way round the loudness wars. -- bigfool1956 David Ayers Music is what counts, hifi just helps us enjoy it more bigfool1956's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13782 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
opaqueice;290688 Wrote: I've got a Bachelor of Arts in physics. :-) I think my masters (in physics) is in arts too, but I'd have to check. And then I'm a Doctor of Philosophy in Physics... not a lot of logic to be found there! Can I join in? Master of Engineering in Computer Science here :) -- radish radish's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=77 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
radish wrote: Can I join in? Master of Engineering in Computer Science here :) We are going way OT what kind of degree is that??!?!?! Computer science is not engineering. Engineering is Power, or Civil or Military Chem E, EE, Mech E. Did you Masters of E allow you to sit for EIT? -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
opaqueice;290665 Wrote: It's debatable whether mathematics should be considered science, but otherwise I agree... What??? From now on you are going to have me on your case like Patrick Dixon. (well, almost like Patrick Dixon) :) :) . My degree comes from School of Mathematics (in European school system it is a separate faculty, grouped with natural sciences). One of the first things I learned there is that 'mathematics doesn't trust senses'. Everything is proof. However, I believe it is both art and science, depending how one chooses to go about it. Sorry for 'off-topick-ing'. K -- slimkid The sound stage will open up, bass will tighten and the imaging will improve. DVD performance will also increase substantially. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iAj2aPdQnk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvMNuuFSvN0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDRhRv4q_SI http://youtube.com/watch?v=nlrpe8Ig5m8 http://youtube.com/watch?v=dC9tGlwPln8 slimkid's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=8881 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
pfarrell;290717 Wrote: Did you Masters of E allow you to sit for EIT? That's a US thing, right? No idea, my degree is from the UK. It does qualify me to become a Chartered Engineer (CEng - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chartered_Engineer_%28UK%29) as the British Computer Society is an accrediting body - I believe that CEng is the UK equivalent of PE. I'm also an Associate of the City Guilds Institute which is related to the Engineering Council UK. In general, it seems that most computing related fields are considered Engineering disciplines in the UK. -- radish radish's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=77 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
SACD and DVD-A are dead, there is no doubt about this. There are already a couple of new high res. formats, but the focus more on movies and not on music and I dont want to install a 10.2 super surround setup in order listen to music in audiophile quality. I still prefer stereo for music. Im more afraid of CD quality becoming worse. Not because of the technology, just because there is a trend to optimize the mastering for compressed formats. A German hifi magazine has recently analyzed the dynamic of a classic rock album that was originally sold as vinyl records, later on CD and than remastered twice. The result was that the vinyl record had a dynamic of 40 dB, the first CD has the same (even though the CD could do 90 DB), the last remastered one was extremely load, but the dynamic was reduced to 5 dB only (good for radio and iPod, but not for me). Since I have my transporter, I would prefer music download, instead of ripping CDs. Unfortunately there are only a few providers who offer uncompressed music. I like the Linn master recordings, but the offers are quite limited. -- MacMini MacMini's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=14466 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
MacMini;290216 Wrote: SACD and DVD-A are dead, there is no doubt about this. snip Im more afraid of CD quality becoming worse. Not because of the technology, just because there is a trend to optimize the mastering for compressed formats. I don't mourn SACD or DVD-A's passing, because I happen to think CD is enough. However the crappy efforts put into mastering are definitely not enough. My blood boils when remasters turn out to be compressed versions of the old etc. The real problem about the red book vs hi-rez debate is it takes attention away from the really big problem...quality of recordings. But it's easier to market hi-rez, or debate hi-rez, or add more and more sampling frequency or bit depth to hi-rez, than go out and -produce really stunning recordings-. Darren -- darrenyeats SB3 / Inguz - Krell KAV-300i (pre bypass) - PMC AB-1 Dell laptop - JVC UX-C30 mini system darrenyeats's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10799 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
The most recent issue of MIX MAGAZINE had an article where they did double-blind listening tests between 24bit/96kHz stereo and 16bit/44.1kHz stereo. The results based on demographic is quite interesting, but it really comes down to the fact that you could guess which one you were listening to by the toss of a coin...no one knew for sure. 50% of the time, listeners were correct but they couldn't tell you why. Anyway, interesting article, yet I'd LOVE to hear a test between 192k and 44.1k!! Of the engineers I've talked to, most say that's where you hear the difference. 96k just isn't enough of a difference to warrant the disk space and bandwidth. Of course, we're talking 24bit in ALL cases!! If CDs could ever move to 24bit/44.1k... -- Eric Seaberg Eric Seaberg - San Diego - [EMAIL PROTECTED] __ Mac MINI server w/ 500GB external - Multiple SB3s and Transporter Tannoy and Genelec Bi Tri-Amped Studio Monitors - 5.1 Surround Recording Engineer/Producer since 1971 - Member AES, SPARS, SMPTE and NARAS Eric Seaberg's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7896 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Eric Seaberg wrote: 16bit/44.1kHz stereo. The results based on demographic is quite interesting, but it really comes down to the fact that you could guess which one you were listening to by the toss of a coin...no one knew for sure. 50% of the time, listeners were correct but they couldn't tell you why. Normally, to be 'significant' you want to probability of it being random to be rejected at the 95% level. Even 80% is too close to random for science. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Phil Leigh;290388 Wrote: I just don't understand why people never consider the example of movies. Once you get to about 25fps, you can't see the frames... Because people like to flatter themselves and believe they see and hear more than they can... ignoring that their head contains an incredibly fast and powerful (and totally capricious) analog signal processor called the brain. It manipulates and twists everything we see and hear. Usually this is for our 'good'.. but sometimes it just behaves in what appears to be a random manner: coloring our senses wrongly because our mood is different.. or we had too much or not enough coffee, or we are mad at the kids on the lawn... I don't get why people insist their ears are so golden but don't admit that perhaps their brain is even more golden, detecting subtle differences in the way the tester says, okay, what does this sound like? and using that to infer what the source material is with no effort at all. The brain is really scary sometimes at the signals it picks up, processes, and uses to taint everything, all subconsciously. -- snarlydwarf snarlydwarf's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1179 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
darrenyeats;290355 Wrote: Certainly the study doesn't prove anything (you can't prove a negative). You can't prove a positive either. What that study showed is that the hypothesis that any of the 500 or so people that took part could hear the difference between 16/44.1 and hi-res on any of four hi-end systems used can be rejected with high confidence. From which we can conclude that if there are ever audible differences between hi-res and redbook, they are extremely subtle. -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
opaqueice;290472 Wrote: You can't prove a positive either. Sorry... but you're wrong, you can prove a positive. If a single person can repeatably and correctly hear a difference, then you have proven a positive. That's the difference. To prove a positive, you only have to find that one person. To prove a negative you have to test everybody. As for the whole CD vs hiRes format argument, I often wonder how much old prejudices color the opinions. The early CD sales pitch was perfect sound, but the early players were far from perfect. Today we argue if 16 or 24 bits is enough, but the first CD players on the market only had a single 14 bit DAC, that was shared between the left and right channel, using an analog sample and hold circuit! So one channel was always slightly behind the other! Over time, the technology has advanced, and the technical shortcomings of early designs have been corrected, but there is still a deep distrust in the audiophile community. And all the time we are thinking about such things, we aren't paying enough attention to the really important bit. The thing that got us all into this quest in the first place The music! Gotta go listen now! Dave -- DCtoDaylight DCtoDaylight's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7284 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
I respect your opions -- you guys have far more experience with computer audio than I. You want to believe in digital, and that all this manipulation of bytes will have no effect on the final sound-- it's just information after all, which can be lossless. Theoretically perhaps it is, but that is not what I've found listening carefully. You want to believe that FLAC is FLAC, whether created by EAC's algorhythms or the SB3's. Are you certain? There are a lot of uncontrolled variables here, despite all the claims to science being thrown around (including by me). I think one of the biggest which has not been mentioned is the DACs in the SB3 vs. an SACD player. I love Burr-Brown and I think the SB3 is a phenomenally well-designed box, but you would have to agree that even if you have identical source material (e.g. a CD ripped as wav into the server playing through the SB3 vs. the CD on the 555es) that these will inevitably lead to different reproduced sounds. Another variable is the system. As I said, I have ScanSpeak tweets that if I remember right are not 3 dB down until 40hz, have a moving mass of 25 grams, are crossed over with a single Musicap, and are driven by an amplifier that is rated pretty flat out to almost 100khz. These are the realms where digital's drawbacks are most noticeable, not in the low end. I know you want to write off those of us who claim to hear differences as self-flatterers with your pop-psychology snarlydwarf, but how about considering the possibility that people are actually different and hear differently? Could it be that SACD is 'dead' because the vast majority of people cannot hear the quality of sound produced, and therefore are understandably not going to pay for it? MP3s etc. are the Walmart of audio. I think folks of the iPod generation believe that small and compressed and quantity are good things, sleek, slick, slender, 80 gigs in a little white case. Just because something 'dies' in the market does not mean it has no value to some people, unless you are a market fundamentalist. And if I can try some of my own pop psychology, maybe people want to believe that they can buy some cheap computer speakers and that the music coming through them is all the same, because, after all, FLAC is FLAC. That leads me to one last thing. I have always only stated my opinion as such and never belittled anyone for theirs. I am clearly in the minority here and you guys have presented more than a hint of nastiness which unfortunately is cliche in online debates where folks seem to throw courtesy out the window because they are not face to face. As a new member here it really makes me wonder about the value of voicing a minority opinion on these forums, or posting at all for that matter. Enjoy your music, B -- rhizomaticon SB3 + DIY FreeNAS server w/SlimNAS + SqueezeCenter 7.0 Sony C555ES CD/SACD Creek 0BH-12 Musical Fidelity A3CR Hafler 500 4-way DIY transmission line towers with Scan-Speak Tweets, rest Peerless (Bi-Amped) rhizomaticon's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=15312 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon;290526 Wrote: Enjoy your music, B Isn't that what it's about? Who cares about your 40kHz tweets or someone elses 192kHz DAC? BLAH-BLAH-BLAH!! That's the beauty of music and the 'business' it entails. NO ONE can tell you you're wrong because it's SUBJECTIVE and based on what YOU LIKE. If you don't like what I like, keep shopping and find something that works for you. If you don't like the record I just mixed, don't buy it (even though it just went triple platinum...someone likes it). These forums SHOULDN'T be used to say YOUR SYSTEM SUCKS AND MINE DOESN'T BECAUSE... but should be used to help folks get the most they can from the money they just spent on Slim's gear!! Now, shut up and listen to the music!! -- Eric Seaberg Eric Seaberg - San Diego - [EMAIL PROTECTED] __ Mac MINI server w/ 500GB external - Multiple SB3s and Transporter Tannoy and Genelec Bi Tri-Amped Studio Monitors - 5.1 Surround Recording Engineer/Producer since 1971 - Member AES, SPARS, SMPTE and NARAS Eric Seaberg's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7896 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
DCtoDaylight;290522 Wrote: Sorry... but you're wrong, you can prove a positive. If a single person can repeatably and correctly hear a difference, then you have proven a positive. Nope. If someone hears the difference correctly 10/10 times, you can reject the hypothesis that that person cannot hear the difference with 99.9% confidence. That's all. There is no such thing as proof in science, and there is no distinction between positive and negative statements in hypothesis testing. To prove a negative you have to test everybody. What I said in my post was accurate (although I added one word I forgot before): What that study showed is that the hypothesis that any of the 500 or so people that took part could reliably hear the difference between 16/44.1 and hi-res on any of four hi-end systems used can be rejected with high confidence. -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Gentlemen, what matters is what you hear, and I hear a difference. Some SACDs I own are from recording from the 50s -- do they 'sound' better than a CD recording from the last couple years? No, but unfortunately you can't hear Leontyne Price or Maria Callas or Thelonious Monk from a fresh recording and mastering from the last couple years. I never appreciated Bob Dylan until I bought the remasterings on SACD. This is not due to the euphonic distortion of tubes or anything, but due to the utterly involving, highly accurate sound that allows one to understand Dylan's musical choices in all their subtlety (I never thought I would say that!). In other words, as in all things audio, there is art and science, and I find you gentlemen quoting the science without addressing the art or given evidence based on careful listening--what we are all ultimately here for. RE: SACD is just DRM. Science: what happens when you filter at 22.05 khz vs. the higher frequencies of the hi res formats? I have 3/4 ScanSpeak tweets and trust me they can reproduce the ringing and glassy grain you get from the low pass filtering of CD. SACD is by definition a DRM format because the file sizes are too large to easily copy, download, etc. unlike those wonderfully sounding compressed MP3 files. FLAC may be lossless in a technical sense but an easy AB test through your SB should illustrate the differences. At least they do on my system. If not on yours, then by all means go with FLAC. For those of us who have a philosophy of interfering as little as possible with sound, why compress at all, 'lossless' or otherwise? And if the issue is merely file size and frankly storage is really cheap (500gb SATA HDDs are now below $100), why on earth not just record the music that matters to you in a true 1 for 1 copy? I have never bogged down my network with SqueezeCenter. Not to mention the fact that it is a faster rip in EAC without the compression step. DSD does chop the waveform, but by doing it in 1 bit, 1 or 0, representing the waveform every 1/2.8 millionth of a second as ascending or descending, it follows the original analog waveform far more closely than attempting to represent it entirely by only 24 or 20 or 16 bits (a compression) at whatever sample frequency is chosen. It is NOT a simple math problem, but a fundamentally different approach. Maybe marketing hype, but one can say that for the entire history of CD, no? Our vinyl buddies would say so. Perfect Sound Forever... :-) My .03. B -- rhizomaticon SB3 + DIY FreeNAS server w/SlimNAS + SqueezeCenter 7.0 Sony C555ES CD/SACD Creek 0BH-12 Musical Fidelity A3CR Hafler 500 4-way DIY transmission line towers with Scan-Speak Tweets, rest Peerless (Bi-Amped) rhizomaticon's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=15312 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
It's called lossless not lossless. On other words, no quotes. It is literally lossless. If you hear differences, and I believe you do, there must be some other reason (more/less network traffic or more/less processing on board or placebo effect). They are surely not due to the format itself. As for SACD vs CD I recommend some of the earlier posts which discuss mastering vs format. This explains why SACDs may sound better...but that doesn't mean the SACD format sounds better. :) Darren -- darrenyeats SB3 / Inguz - Krell KAV-300i (pre bypass) - PMC AB-1 Dell laptop - JVC UX-C30 mini system darrenyeats's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10799 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
My experience is that the disk format is of minor importance. If you really want to test the difference, go to Linn an buy the same sond in high res and normal CD format. I'm sure that you will hear a difference but this is only why the original master is of excellent quality. Unfortunately you don't get this normally. I think that you here 99% mastering and 1% format. -- MacMini MacMini's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=14466 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
After extensive Blind Testing of streamed FLAC vs WAV (documented elsewhere) USING AN EXTERNAL DAC with an SB3 I found no (zero) difference in resultant sound quality. I'm quite happy for your mileage to vary, I'm just reporting my findings. Personally this is a dead line of enquiry. The digital output is audibly and visually (on a good scope) identical to me. The final nail in the coffin is that WAV as a storage format has no worthwhile tagging. So storing the data as FLAC (or equivalent) is the only sensible option. For wireless transmission, server side decoding to WAV makes no sense from a network data bandwidth point-of-view. I can't hear ANY difference between streamed WAV vs streamed FLAC. I have some of the Linn masters and they sound great. They sound great downsampled to 48/24. They don't sound any different to me at 88.2 (or 96) / 24. I know you won't agree, but IMHO SACD just isn't that much better to enough people to make it a commercial success. Personally, if the Red Book standard had been 44.1/24, I don't think we would have ever gone to the higher resolution formats. -- Phil Leigh You want to see the signal path BEFORE it gets onto a CD/vinyl...it ain't what you'd call minimal...SB3+Stontronics PSU - Altmann JISCO/UPCI - TACT RCS 2.2X with Good Vibrations S/W - MF X-DAC V3/X-PSU/X-10 buffer (Audiocomm full mods)- Linn 5103 - Linn Aktiv 5.1 system (6x LK140's, ESPEK/TRIKAN/KATAN/SEIZMIK 10.5), Townsend Supertweeters, Kimber Chord cables Phil Leigh's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=85 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon;289727 Wrote: FLAC may be lossless in a technical sense but an easy AB test through your SB should illustrate the differences. At least they do on my system. Were you aware of the fact that slimserver, at least with default settings, compresses WAV files to FLAC before sending them to the squeezebox/transporter? If you heard differences between files encoded on your server as WAV versus FLAC, with the default SS settings, they were a figment of your imagination.* *Unless you believe that the extra processing on the -server- affects your sound quality, in which case I advise you to take tidal forces from the moon into consideration as well. -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Yes, I should have been clearer. I can hear a difference between flac and wave on my TP when using the unbalanced analogue out. Oh, and both my son and I prefer flac. -- bigfool1956 David Ayers Music is what counts, hifi just helps us enjoy it more bigfool1956's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13782 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
DCtoDaylight;287823 Wrote: The big problem though, is more likely to be source material. Most people think MP3's sound good enough, which is part of the reason SACD's and DVD-A's have never really caught on. The High res audio market is really a small niche market, so there's little incentive for the big guys to get into it. Of course, I would love to be proven wrong about that! Cheers, Dave I was at the Audio Engineering Society Convention last October in NYC. One of the meetings was different 5.1 mixes played by the guys that engineered them talking about all of the things they had to do thinking in that 5.1 world. One of the questions that came up was specifically about how much longer it's going to take for consumers to pickup on SACD or DVD-A. It's already dead...the labels know it won't sell and don't want to waste the time producing these superior versions. If there's anything still being done, it's because of the artist's or engineer's love for that project and doing it on their own. It's really too bad!! -- Eric Seaberg Eric Seaberg - San Diego - [EMAIL PROTECTED] __ Mac MINI server w/ 500GB external - Multiple SB3s and Transporter Tannoy and Genelec Bi Tri-Amped Studio Monitors - 5.1 Surround Recording Engineer/Producer since 1971 - Member AES, SPARS, SMPTE and NARAS Eric Seaberg's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7896 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Many people on here have reported a difference in sound between playing waves and flacs. I've observed this myself on my TP. Clearly, as the flac is decoded to a perfect copy of the wave, there are other factors to take into account. To rhizomaticon, you do realise that you can store all your music in flac, and get SqueezeCenter to decode it before streaming to the SB. -- bigfool1956 David Ayers Music is what counts, hifi just helps us enjoy it more bigfool1956's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13782 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
The format discussion is always muddied by the mastering angle, as Pat said. Unless you are comparing exactly the same recording in the different formats, comparisons are not valid. Some SACDs are not encoded from the same master as their CD equivalents. In other words you can't assume that, because an SACD sounds better than its CD equivalent, SACD is a better format. Whether or not the differences in mastering are intentional (conspiracy theorists can jump in at this point) Sony and other hi-rez vendors are rubbing their hands every time mastering differences are assumed to be format differences. In terms of published evidence I've not read a shred of evidence that hi-rez is audibly better than red book as a format, and there is at least one study I know of that suggests there is no audible difference. That's why I believe hi-rez formats are all about DRM and I don't worry about red book when I sit down to play some tunes. Darren -- darrenyeats SB3 / Inguz - Krell KAV-300i (pre bypass) - PMC AB-1 Dell laptop - JVC UX-C30 mini system darrenyeats's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10799 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
darrenyeats wrote: In terms of published evidence I've not read a shred of evidence that hi-rez is audibly better than red book as a format, and there is at least one study I know of that suggests there is no audible difference. That's why I believe hi-rez formats are all about DRM and I don't worry about red book when I sit down to play some tunes. Back when SACD and DVD-A were alive, Stereophile did a spectral analysis of the music, and most (all?) of the 'high res' recordings had no content above 22kHz or 24 kHz, which implies that they were recorded initially at 44.1 or 48 kHz. In practice, all of the steps in the recording chain, from mic to preamp, to 2 tape machines are not designed to deliver much about 20-20kHz. I too am convinced that Sony's push for SACD was purely for DRM, all the claims about DSD being superior just marketing spin. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
pfarrell;288261 Wrote: Back when SACD and DVD-A were alive, Stereophile did a spectral analysis of the music, and most (all?) of the 'high res' recordings had no content above 22kHz or 24 kHz, which implies that they were recorded initially at 44.1 or 48 kHz. In practice, all of the steps in the recording chain, from mic to preamp, to 2 tape machines are not designed to deliver much about 20-20kHz. I too am convinced that Sony's push for SACD was purely for DRM, all the claims about DSD being superior just marketing spin. That's in accord with the results of that recent study Meyers/Moran. IIRC there was only a single SACD that had a noise floor below the redbook threshold, and that was the only one which could be distinguished from a ADC-DAC processed version at 44.1/16 (and that one only by cranking the volume on a silent passage and listening to the noise floor). -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
morris_minor wrote: rhizomaticon;288213 Wrote: With this in mind, when it comes to my CD collection I've decided to rip all rock/electrically amplified music as FLAC, with a few exceptions. Typically, unremastered rock CDs that I've had for years are fine in FLAC. All jazz and classical goes in as full WAV. Doesn't a decoded FLAC give a perfect bit-for-bit copy of the original? What's the advantage of streaming a WAV file over a FLAC file? I'm not 'rhizomaticon' but yes, FLAC generates bit perfect output. All that a WAV/PCM file has is twice the size flying over the network. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon;288213 Wrote: SACD is that it is not a PCM format like CD or DVD-A or MP3 but completely different. All PCM formats I would argue are fundamentally flawed in the way they sample the analogue waveform - they literally chop it up, and regardless of the bitsize or rate, you are always going to get that digital edge and grain with PCM. SACD's approach is called Direct Stream Digital (DSD), which samples 1 bit at 2.8 MHz, allowing a far greater approximation of an analogue waveform which one could conceptualize as a 0 bit with an infinite sample rate (?). Ummm Sorry, but you're wrong. DCD chops up the analog waveform, just like PCM, only faster and with far less precision. With the correct software, it's possible to convert back and forth between the two formats. In fact, most SACD's are mixed in the PCM format, and then converted to DSD in the final mastering stages. -- DCtoDaylight DCtoDaylight's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7284 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon wrote: The important thing to remember about SACD is that it is not a PCM format like CD or DVD-A or MP3 but completely different. [snip] SACD's approach is called Direct Stream Digital (DSD), which samples 1 bit at 2.8 MHz, allowing a far greater approximation of an analogue waveform which one could conceptualize as a 0 bit with an infinite sample rate (?). At least that's how I understand it so it may very well be wrong. You are wrong. DSD is only slightly different than PCM, it too samples the waveform, it just does one bit samples at a higher rate. your 2.something mHz rate is not much different than 24 bit PCM at 96kHz the arithmetic is simple, 24 * 96,000 == 2304000 or with commas 2,304,000 Sony did nothing outside of what Shannon and Nyquist predicted. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
rhizomaticon;288213 Wrote: FLAC is great, but is actually noticeably inferior to WAV/CD -- the tonality of instruments is quite good to my ear, but the soundstage shrinks and flattens out. I think you're loosing too much of the higher harmonics/overtones that are nearly imperceptible but still give us our spacial cues (think of how you can actually hear objects/space when you close your eyes or have the lights out even though they aren't emitting sound). This is wrong. FLAC is lossless. You're not losing anything from the original WAV. Steve. -- SteveEast SteveEast's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4193 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
[SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
Has anyone done any extensive listening tests comparing the various CD formats..SACD, HDCD, and JVC's XRCD?? I suppose now that BlueRay has won the format wars that IT will become the new audiophile standards for digital music. -- mmg_fan mmg_fan's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=9157 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
The short answer: HDCD and XRCD are mastering techniques that create CDs playable on any player. HDCD is a proprietary mechanism for getting 20 bits of resolution on the 16 bit sample by using the least significant bits. It was developed by a company, bought by Microsoft, and then basically disappeared. XRCD is by JVC, and seems to be more of a process to ensure maximum resolution of the analog-to-digital transfer. SACD is completely different--an HD format allowing higher bitrates and frequency sampling, and such things as 5.1 sound. It has had limited success, especially in the US, and there are few players. Most SACDs are in fact DualDisc which means a single disc has both SACD and CD layers, to ensure maximum compatibility. I don't know much about Blu-Ray's use as a music-only disc, but you may be right. -- mrfantasy --Mike mrfantasy's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1127 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
The Blue Ray spec allows for Hi Res digital audio formats, similar to the DVD-Audio spec. Like DVD-A, Meridian Lossless Packing is used to compress the higher bit rate audio, and rates up to 192/24 are supported. Also like DVD-A, the data is encrypted, and this encryption will need to be cracked before you can rip it. The big problem though, is more likely to be source material. Most people think MP3's sound good enough, which is part of the reason SACD's and DVD-A's have never really caught on. The High res audio market is really a small niche market, so there's little incentive for the big guys to get into it. Of course, I would love to be proven wrong about that! Cheers, Dave -- DCtoDaylight DCtoDaylight's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7284 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
With the limited appeal and market of high resolution audio, I can't imagine are physical format taking off. Linn are having some success with their high resolution downloads it would seem. Personally I think this kind of specialist service has a definite market appeal. There isn't really a need to DRM it either. Their target audience is going to buy the material as long at is reasonably priced (and it doesn't need to be as low as CD because the target market also recognises the value in the increased quality). So I would imagine it could be a very profitable niche for the right company. -- funkstar funkstar's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2335 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Q: 'Alternative' CD formats..SACD, HDCD, XRCD
mrfantasy;287772 Wrote: HDCD and XRCD are mastering techniques that create CDs playable on any player. The end results are 'compatible' with red book audio. So the real impact is that disks released in these formats tend to be mastered with audiophile concerns in mind, rather than mindless Loudness Wars (tm). So they tend to actually sound pretty good. -- pfarrell Pat http://www.pfarrell.com/music/slimserver/slimsoftware.html pfarrell's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=200 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=45839 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
