Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

magicvinyldigital.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 270 posts

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#171

Post by globular-toast »

esikich wrote: post #12
pimeys wrote: post #11

I don't understand why they still release super compressed and loud masterings when most of the modern headphones are so good you don't really need to master for the old cheap stereo sets. And isn't headphones with Spotify the most common medium for music nowadays?

It's much less of a problem than it used to be because streaming platforms normalize the tracks anyway so it's been fading away for a while now.

All things being equal, the compressed tracks will still sound louder even after normalisation, unfortunately. I haven't seen any sign of dynamics returning to pop music since Spotify/YouTube.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#172

Post by globular-toast »

esikich wrote: post #55
Slow_Hand wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. The loudness is an aesthetic choice. The reason it was backed off for the vinyl master is most likely due to physical limitations of the medium. If the audio channels are too loud (wide) there is risk that the needle will jump out of the groove.

This is exactly why vinyl is inferior to tape and digital.

It's worse for recording arbitrary waveforms, sure. It's very well suited for music, though.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#174

Post by brazzy »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #125
chownie wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wants the thing. He does not value the thing at 1300 dollars so he would not buy it for 1300 dollars. He found it for a lower value, he kept it because the point at the start was he wanted the thing. On the topic of HN users, is it our collective first day on earth?

> He does not value the thing at 1300 dollars If you decline to sell a thing for an easy 1300, doesn't that mean you value it at 1300 or more?

Only if you actually need the 1300 cash, or think that you won't be able to sell it in the future.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#175

Post by breezybottom »

functionmouse wrote: post #139
breezybottom wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why it's so bizarre that CDs are generally less dynamic than vinyl. There's no technical reason that should be the case.

CDs were most commonly played in cars on the loud highway

That's a good point. CD mastering was very dynamic until around the mid-90s, and that probably correlates with CD players becoming a standard option in cars.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#176

Post by ryanmcbride »

I've been collecting physical music my whole life and there were times that I tried to get everything on CD, times I tried to get everything on vinyl, times I've tried to go fully digital, and the pattern I've fallen into now in my late 30s is buying music on whatever medium was popular when it came out.

I've now got a pretty mixed collection of records, tapes, CDs, digital music, and even a rockbox modded ipod. An added facet of fun for me when I find new music is to decide what the most thematically appropriate format to own it is.

For example I own the CD for Imaginal Disk by Magdalena Bay because there's a CD in the art, and it feels like a very 00s album, but for vaporwave I almost exclusively buy cassettes.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#177

Post by danadam »

IshKebab wrote: post #162

> Here are samples from the original and remastered vinyl versions to compare the difference in sound rendering. Where? The critical bit is missing!

Wayback Machine still has them:

https://web.archive.org/web/20260208100527/https://magicviny...

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#178

Post by pier25 »

killerstorm wrote: post #166
pier25 wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is a false way of saying it As an audio engineer I'm well aware of how decibels work and why we use them. You're talking about subjective perception but I'm talking about objective measurements.

Objectively we care about the amount of information in the signal, not air movement. Air movement is just a medium which conveys information. It's not just "subjective perception", it's the meaning of the process.

I'm stating an objective measurable fact not arguing about semantics or meaning, whatever that is for you.

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#179

Post by GuinansEyebrows »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #125
chownie wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wants the thing. He does not value the thing at 1300 dollars so he would not buy it for 1300 dollars. He found it for a lower value, he kept it because the point at the start was he wanted the thing. On the topic of HN users, is it our collective first day on earth?

> He does not value the thing at 1300 dollars If you decline to sell a thing for an easy 1300, doesn't that mean you value it at 1300 or more?

it could simply be that you value owning the object in terms other than money. sentimental reasons, completionism tendencies, novelty, some other "non-rational"/emotional reason; any of these can have a stronger pull on the mind than $1300 to someone who doesn't immediately need the cash for survival. i have some records like this (not in that price-range but still) along with a few other collectible items (some rare handmade keycaps that were going for over $500 a piece at one point) that I refuse to part with for money because i just... like them :)

Re: Vinyl succumbs to Loudness War: more than just collateral damage (2025)

#180

Post by GuinansEyebrows »

breezybottom wrote: post #122
bigbuppo wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And just wait until they find out that compressor/limiters came about for reasons other than shaping the dynamics of music. If you're not slammed against the wall, your AM broadcast signal isn't going far.

Why the snark? Who expects high quality audio from AM radio?

i didn't read that as snark. they're just saying compressors were/are used to maximize the broadcast range of a source over AM radio. without them, the broadcast range is shorter, which means fewer people hear the ads on the radio show, which means fewer dollars for the radio station producing or broadcasting the show.
Post reply on HN