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Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

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Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#361

Post by C1sc0cat »

emcq wrote: post #332
electrograv wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that if we’re pursuing sheer audio fidelity, CD quality is objectively superior to vinyl in every way. However (as others mention), many vinyl listeners are not after objective sound fidelity perfection: For them, the flaws are part of their “retro” charm. However, one note about CD quality — it may not be as perfect as you think! A peer-reviewed meta-analysis has shown that humans can hear the difference bet…

16 bits per sample can provide 96dB dynamic range [0]. If you were listening to music at that volume, it would generally be considered unsafe, and you would potentially have hearing loss beyond 37 minutes [1] 16 bits is plenty. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_bit_depth [1] https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/noise/default.html

I think you confusing Range with the loudness here - a good sound card like my Foucsrite Clarett has a range of up to 119 db.

And 96 to 119 is huge improvement.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#362

Post by stinos »

emcq wrote: post #332
electrograv wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that if we’re pursuing sheer audio fidelity, CD quality is objectively superior to vinyl in every way. However (as others mention), many vinyl listeners are not after objective sound fidelity perfection: For them, the flaws are part of their “retro” charm. However, one note about CD quality — it may not be as perfect as you think! A peer-reviewed meta-analysis has shown that humans can hear the difference bet…

16 bits per sample can provide 96dB dynamic range [0]. If you were listening to music at that volume, it would generally be considered unsafe, and you would potentially have hearing loss beyond 37 minutes [1] 16 bits is plenty. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_bit_depth [1] https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/noise/default.html

You miss an important part of the sentence in the second link: "The NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limit (REL) for occupational noise exposure is 85 decibels, A-weighted".

dB expresses the ratio of one value to another. So without knowing what the other value is, it's rather meaningless. But it is unfortunately an often-made mistake: how many times haven't you heard or read just dB as such? Anyway, this means you cannot simply compare dB dynamic range with dB used to express sound pressure level of which 'A-Weighted' is just one standard which gets used. Those are completely different things. Simply said, you can play 96dB dynamic range music at sound pressure levels which you won't even hear. Or at sound pressure levels which damage your ears nearly instantly.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#364

Post by Semaphor »

andybak wrote: post #355
tzs wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can carry backups of every CD ever made on a flashdrive that fits in your jeans pocket Gracenote had 3 598 785 CDs in their database in 2005 [1], so I'll take that as a lower bound on the number of CDs ever made. I don't know what the largest flash drive that will fit in a jeans pocket is, but the largest I was able to find is 2 TB, but SanDisk showed a 4 TB prototype at CES 2019, so I'll go with that. Assuming…

Perceptually lossless and mathematically lossless are two different things. I'd be happy with the former.

But for a backup, you’d want actual lossless compression, wouldn’t you? Not for listening, but for re-encoding.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#365

Post by filleokus »

tzs wrote: post #326
Godel_unicode wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also make an infinite number of perfect replicas of your CDs. You can carry backups of every CD ever made on a flashdrive that fits in your jeans pocket, then recreate any of them at any time with no degradation in quality. There are some quasi-plausible arguments for vinyl, but arguing that durability is one of them is hilariously myopic.

> You can carry backups of every CD ever made on a flashdrive that fits in your jeans pocket Gracenote had 3 598 785 CDs in their database in 2005 [1], so I'll take that as a lower bound on the number of CDs ever made. I don't know what the largest flash drive that will fit in a jeans pocket is, but the largest I was able to find is 2 TB, but SanDisk showed a 4 TB prototype at CES 2019, so I'll go with that. Assuming…

If we move the goal post slightly, we could perhaps conceivably fit all 3.5 million CDs (compressed losslessly) on micro SD cards that would fit inside of the volume of a jewel CD case:

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=177.5+cm%5E3%2F%28%28%...

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#366

Post by tripzilch »

So I've been thinking a lot about this video recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ2czFuIYmQ

It talks about, demonstrates and measures the air quality around vinyl. Apparently the things are leaching dangerous compounds into the air constantly, especially when being played. It made his air quality measuring device give an alarm, instead of just reporting the number of particles or something.

I'm not sure, maybe it's just one of those thousands of every day life things which are technically carcinogenic, or not. It made me pause personally though, having recently lost a friend, who worked at a record store, died at a young age to cancer, had otherwise always been a strong healthy man. I'm actually more comfortable talking about this here, semi-anonymously, I don't think it'd be wise to bring this up IRL with anyone, on account of it possibly not having to do with anything. I kind of half-wish I hadn't seen the video.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#367

Post by msla »

S_A_P wrote: post #276
linuxftw wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Objectively inferior ability to reproduce sounds" is my statement. CD's are an objectively superior way to encode sound in every measurable way. > A hi end turntable playing vinyl that is clean and well cared for is surprisingly difficult to tell apart from digital audio. It doesn't snap crackle pop if its clean and cared for. I agree, and I'm sure if someone spends the same amount on a loss-less audio setup (or eve…

You may be right there, and it’s annoying. But sometimes you just have to let someone “know better” than you. :)

And the person you're talking to definitely knows better than you.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#368

Post by amaranth »

dagw wrote: post #352
msla wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CDs have better fidelity than vinyl. Vinyl sounds more like vinyl than CDs do, until a specific piece of vinyl is reduced to a shambles by time. People who really like vinyl have a bad habit of equivocating between the above two statements, using "better" to mean either "greater fidelity" (which is wrong) or "sounds more like vinyl" (which is a tautology) without signalling which meaning they mean. https://wiki.hydro…

The other aspect is that, especially for older music (say anything recording over 30 years old), the CD master is often different than the Vinyl master. In some cases this difference in mastering can lead to people preferring the vinyl over the CD and claiming vinyl "sounds better", when in fact all it is is they prefer the way the vinyl was mastered.

The vinyl almost always has better mastering. CDs and digital audio in general still get mastered for the loudness war while vinyls are often mastered to have higher dynamic range. That'll make the CD sound better for radio or club play but the vinyl will sound better when you're listening at home.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#369

Post by skohan »

tripzilch wrote: post #366

So I've been thinking a lot about this video recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ2czFuIYmQ It talks about, demonstrates and measures the air quality around vinyl. Apparently the things are leaching dangerous compounds into the air constantly, especially when being played. It made his air quality measuring device give an alarm, instead of just reporting the number of particles or something. I'm not sure, maybe…

I lost my dad to cancer last year, and I think it can be maddening to try to unwind the causes. I think when you lose somebody, the natural impulse can be to reach out for a cause, at least so you can understand it, and there's a tendency to seize on any evidence or theory, no matter how weak, just to have somewhere to lay down the blame.

So you might be right that vinyl records are dangerous, or maybe that had no impact. In my opinion it's best for one's mental health to trust scientific inquiry to tell us what's dangerous or not, and to leave everything else as an open question.

Re: Vinyl set to outsell CDs for first time since 1986

#370

Post by sigmos »

lagadu wrote: post #353
simias wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd have to come up with a good source to convince me that 16bits per sample is not good enough for consumer audio (or that you could tell the difference even in perfect conditions. So might be able to hear it, the vast majority of people won't) but beyond that it doesn't really matter in this discussion because vinyls have a much worse fidelity. If you sample vinyl audio at more than 16bits you'll just be sampling…

> A true audiophile I see, anything consumer-grade is "garbage" in order to justify the purchase of ridiculously overpriced equipment. Actually I'm rather fond of the $80 SDAC and it stands tall among other, more expensive stuff I have (I'm listening to it as type this in fact). It's miles ahead of any CD player DAC. Seriously, a CD transport into a cheap DAC will sound very noticeably better. Admittedly I've only sa…

I have a thought it’s the composers’ intention to how listeners will hear. There was once I spent a long time tweaking frequencies to my taste, it’s clear we have too many parts to just to get the right pitch and nuance details.
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