A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire • Hacker News Board

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#151

Post by dekhn » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:41 PM UTC

ryukoposting wrote: post #103

kstrauser wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That whole line of thinking just blows me away. It's possible to accurately sample and reproduce any vinyl recording in the digital realm. It's absolutely not possible to accurately record every digital recording onto vinyl. For instance, it's not hard at all to make bass so loud that it causes the needle to leap out of the track, or treble so high that the needle can't accurately track the high frequency vibrations.…

I absolutely despise most of the vinyl community. Don't get me wrong, I love my records. I have hundreds of them and I play them regularly. For some reason, almost everyone I come by has this delusion that vinyl is objectively better than a good digital recording. Anyone who dissents from that narrative gets gaslit: "oh what kind of turntable do you have? oh that's not good enough, there's your problem right there."…

There definitely was a short period in college where I needed to spend money I barely had to upgrade my system. This was when CDs first came out. I could tell, when listening through my stereo (as compared to plugging my headphones into the CD player) that there was a ton of extra noise/distortion and most importantly, a very high noise level (audible hiss). Ended up having to go to Salvation Army to buy a $25 used receiver and the speaker store to buy a pair of $200 speakers before I got decent results. Even after that, I had no end of problems with the analog cable. it took a long time to switch to digital.

Nowadays I can get excellent audio quality watching good Youtube videos or streaming from my preferred music site (I only listen through headphones now).

I'm super glad I was able to get to the quality level I liked for fairly cheap.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#152

Post by analog31 » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:41 PM UTC

kstrauser wrote: post #5

gwern wrote: post #2

"The fallout of the MoFi revelation has thrown the audiophile community into something of an existential crisis. The quality of digitized music has long been criticized because of how much data was stripped out of files so MP3s could fit on mobile devices. But these days, with the right equipment, digital recordings can be so good they can fool even the best ears. Many of MoFi’s now-exposed records were on Fremer and…

That whole line of thinking just blows me away. It's possible to accurately sample and reproduce any vinyl recording in the digital realm. It's absolutely not possible to accurately record every digital recording onto vinyl. For instance, it's not hard at all to make bass so loud that it causes the needle to leap out of the track, or treble so high that the needle can't accurately track the high frequency vibrations.…

There's no a priori reason why any recording medium needs to have a flat response curve, so long as the curve is known so it can be reversed. The reason for the RIAA curve is that most sound has an inverse relationship between amplitude and frequency. The RIAA recording curve limits the overall amplitude of the groove, allowing for better management of dynamic range and distortion in the cutting and playback processes. The slight lumps in the curve are a concession to practical filter technology of the 1950s.

Other analog broadcast and recording media have similar curves, called pre- and de-emphasis.

Digital doesn't need it because it has effectively zero distortion, and dynamic range to spare.

An advantage of vinyl is that there's a physical deliverable, making it possible to monetize it. I think that's why a lot of indie bands use vinyl.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#153

Post by christkv » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:42 PM UTC

jrajav wrote: post #16

kstrauser wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That whole line of thinking just blows me away. It's possible to accurately sample and reproduce any vinyl recording in the digital realm. It's absolutely not possible to accurately record every digital recording onto vinyl. For instance, it's not hard at all to make bass so loud that it causes the needle to leap out of the track, or treble so high that the needle can't accurately track the high frequency vibrations.…

Most of the time people will argue that vinyl has "warmth" and this makes it subjectively better. This is true, but it's actually because of the pleasing distortion record players add to the music. Being distortion, even if it improves your listening experience (and this depends on genre, though it generally does), it is certainly objectively worse in terms of accurate reproduction.

Reminds me of the tube vs transistor amplifiers discussions where tube amplifiers are supposed to have a warmer sound.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#154

Post by bigbillheck » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:43 PM UTC

kstrauser wrote: post #5

gwern wrote: post #2

"The fallout of the MoFi revelation has thrown the audiophile community into something of an existential crisis. The quality of digitized music has long been criticized because of how much data was stripped out of files so MP3s could fit on mobile devices. But these days, with the right equipment, digital recordings can be so good they can fool even the best ears. Many of MoFi’s now-exposed records were on Fremer and…

That whole line of thinking just blows me away. It's possible to accurately sample and reproduce any vinyl recording in the digital realm. It's absolutely not possible to accurately record every digital recording onto vinyl. For instance, it's not hard at all to make bass so loud that it causes the needle to leap out of the track, or treble so high that the needle can't accurately track the high frequency vibrations.…

> It's absolutely, 100% fine for someone to say that they subjectively prefer the sound quality of a record player to a CD.

There's a lot of weirdos out there, but these ones aren't hurting anybody.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#155

Post by KennyBlanken » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:46 PM UTC

mrandish wrote: post #100

mod wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't the warmth just be reproduced in a digital player anyway?

You can also bake analog sounding warmth into your hi-res digital master and it's done all the time. There are a wide variety of different digital mastering plug-ins which do remarkably sophisticated analog modeling. Ultimately, this boils down to signal which vibrates speakers. As a thought experiment, if you use some kind of theoretically perfect surface-sampling laser to capture every movement of the speaker surfa…

> Individuals can prefer different sonic characteristics encoded in an output but that's an aesthetic choice.

I find that listening to one of three different sources (earbuds, gaming headset which is EQ'd via open source software, and inexpensive-but-fancy headphones) causes me to adjust to that particular set of headphones' sound. It seems to be like the equivalent of our brain continuously auto-white-balancing our vision.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#156

Post by cwillu » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:49 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #139

cwillu wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“I prefer bit of oregano on my pasta.” “Not without a double-blind test you don't!”

"The pasta you just said was the best pasta you ever had didn't have any oregano on it."

There was no cilantro in the dish you just said was delicious: we substituted dove-brand soap shavings.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#157

Post by jgust » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:49 PM UTC

ryukoposting wrote: post #103

kstrauser wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That whole line of thinking just blows me away. It's possible to accurately sample and reproduce any vinyl recording in the digital realm. It's absolutely not possible to accurately record every digital recording onto vinyl. For instance, it's not hard at all to make bass so loud that it causes the needle to leap out of the track, or treble so high that the needle can't accurately track the high frequency vibrations.…

I absolutely despise most of the vinyl community. Don't get me wrong, I love my records. I have hundreds of them and I play them regularly. For some reason, almost everyone I come by has this delusion that vinyl is objectively better than a good digital recording. Anyone who dissents from that narrative gets gaslit: "oh what kind of turntable do you have? oh that's not good enough, there's your problem right there."…

There is a certain ceremony involved with choosing and playing vinyl that cannot be recreated with digital media. That, to me, is the magic. In modern times a full digital setup is going to provide a more "faithful recreation" than anything analog.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#158

Post by JJMcJ » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:53 PM UTC

jgust wrote: post #157

ryukoposting wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I absolutely despise most of the vinyl community. Don't get me wrong, I love my records. I have hundreds of them and I play them regularly. For some reason, almost everyone I come by has this delusion that vinyl is objectively better than a good digital recording. Anyone who dissents from that narrative gets gaslit: "oh what kind of turntable do you have? oh that's not good enough, there's your problem right there."…

There is a certain ceremony involved with choosing and playing vinyl that cannot be recreated with digital media. That, to me, is the magic. In modern times a full digital setup is going to provide a more "faithful recreation" than anything analog.

There is also some with CDs, but vinyl's the real deal. The record cleaner brush. Inspect the needle for dust. Be sure the record is properly seated. Sit back and enjoy.

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#159

Post by conradfr » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:53 PM UTC

smnc wrote: post #147

conradfr wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although for some reasons 2021 was a great year for distortion/saturation plugins.

Any recommendations?

The hotly debated P42 https://www.pulsarmodular.com/product/p42-climax-line-amp/

The popular Kelvin Tone Shaper https://www.toneprojects.com/kelvin-tone-shaper.html

Maybe you want tape? London Acoustics Tapei https://www.londonacoustics.com/product/taipei-studio-tape-r...

As for freeware, the comeback of Variety of Sound with https://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/2021/11/30/tesslase-mki... or the less subtle https://kitplugins.com/pages/burier-free

This is just a part of (good) saturation plugins from 2021...

Re: A Phoenix record store owner set the audiophile world on fire

#160

Post by jgust » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 9:53 PM UTC

JJMcJ wrote: post #158

jgust wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a certain ceremony involved with choosing and playing vinyl that cannot be recreated with digital media. That, to me, is the magic. In modern times a full digital setup is going to provide a more "faithful recreation" than anything analog.

There is also some with CDs, but vinyl's the real deal. The record cleaner brush. Inspect the needle for dust. Be sure the record is properly seated. Sit back and enjoy.

Just watching the record spin is so incredibly satisfying.