I'm not sure which period the really compressed ones are from. I have some RVG Edition CDs that were definitely made to have a louder overall level than the older 1980s CD remasters.
I bought one of those LPs with the free CD inside of McCoy Tyner's "The Real McCoy" that obviously had been subjected to the Loudness Wars treatment. That one is copyright 2008.
But the ones that shocked me are from later, around 2013. The one I heard recently that really sounds smashed is the 2013 remaster of Grant Green's "Street Of Dreams" (https://www.hdtracks.com/#/album/5df273a80bee25c09bc1e30d).
If you have either of those, and you have the older 1980s CDs, listen to them side by side and see if you can hear what I'm talking about.
Of course, it could be that I'm more sensitive to the sound of those mastering limiters and others like the effect more than I do.
I bought one of those LPs with the free CD inside of McCoy Tyner's "The Real McCoy" that obviously had been subjected to the Loudness Wars treatment. That one is copyright 2008.
But the ones that shocked me are from later, around 2013. The one I heard recently that really sounds smashed is the 2013 remaster of Grant Green's "Street Of Dreams" (https://www.hdtracks.com/#/album/5df273a80bee25c09bc1e30d).
If you have either of those, and you have the older 1980s CDs, listen to them side by side and see if you can hear what I'm talking about.
Of course, it could be that I'm more sensitive to the sound of those mastering limiters and others like the effect more than I do.
Really? The Redbook format has always been 16 bits....
Done properly, resolution as low as 12 bits (72 dB without dither, more with dither) can actually sound very good. 72 dB is still better than vinyl records.
I heard long ago that the earliest CDs were 14 bits. I presume the ADCs only gave 14 bits of signal and two extra bits of zeroes were added as the least significant bits to make each sample 16 bits on the CD.
Perhaps i shouldn't comment on sound of 14 bits undithered, but perhaps the only saving grace was accidental dithering from tape noise.
I'll point out something else I recall from decades ago, new technology such as digital isn't always better, but it gives entirely new ways to mess up sound, such as distortion going up as signal level goes down (with an undithered signal, common back then) and dare I mention mp3.
Perhaps i shouldn't comment on sound of 14 bits undithered, but perhaps the only saving grace was accidental dithering from tape noise.
I'll point out something else I recall from decades ago, new technology such as digital isn't always better, but it gives entirely new ways to mess up sound, such as distortion going up as signal level goes down (with an undithered signal, common back then) and dare I mention mp3.
A bit off topic here but still pertinent I think? Anyway I don't know where to ask this question. As I've mentioned, the sound coming out of my laptop is remarkable near field, I mean on my chest on the couch. I've been listening to Youtube music on my premium acct. Not sure if that has anything to do with it but no matter what I play, all classic rock 60's-90's, it's phenomenal. Doesn't matter what it is, even recordings I considered poor over the years is awesome. I've been hearing some of this music for 40 years through many different systems and it's always been very familiar in terms of content and character quality wise. On virtually everything I put on, I'm hearing a lot of information for the first time. It's like another track was added. I can tell you my hearing isn't getting any better and I have tinnitus in both ears. My hearing tops out at 9K. Low level resolution is fantastic but that's beside the point. Something else is going on. Is it that the music is so compressed that it brings out all of the quietest parts into the foreground?
I know what you mean; when I'm doing compilations, if I'm too lazy to drag the CD out of the cupboard I'll just record it from YouTube; sometimes it's hard to hear the difference. Sometimes there seems to be more bass, but maybe that's compression at work? On the downside, cymbals sometimes sound tinny.
Perhaps some of it has to do with near field listening: I find when I play music in the car, which has a good system, I hear stuff which I don't hear through the home stereo.
Geoff
Perhaps some of it has to do with near field listening: I find when I play music in the car, which has a good system, I hear stuff which I don't hear through the home stereo.
Geoff
I think it was some players (Philips) that where 14 bits only. All CD records was 16 bit.
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The TDA1540 used in some of the early Philips players was indeed a 14 bit DAC. The later 1541 was 16 bits.
I once saw an early Philips car cd player that had a switch allowing you to choose between 14 and 16 bits. According to the manual the dynamic range of 16 bit could be too much for car use, so you could reduce the dynamics by setting it to 14 bit.
I once saw an early Philips car cd player that had a switch allowing you to choose between 14 and 16 bits. According to the manual the dynamic range of 16 bit could be too much for car use, so you could reduce the dynamics by setting it to 14 bit.
Philips originally intended CD to be 14 bit, but Sony insisted on 16 bit. Hence, Philips had to come up with a trick to squeeze 16 bit performance out of the 14 bit DAC chip they had developped. They did that by making a digital filter with four times oversampling and a very basic form of noise shaping.
As a result, early Philips CD players had a nearly linear phase response, while most of the other brands had quite nonlinear phase responses, which was a big marketing advantage for Philips.
Back on topic, I dislike the sound of Sting's recording of John Dowland songs. He sings them very well and I like the fact that he recorded them at all, but the compression on the microphone spoils it.
Another recording that comes to mind is my partner's compact cassette of Dink, Cops are baffled, that she bought after a concert. There is far too little treble in the recording. At least they were honest about it, they warned her and were very surprised that she bought a copy anyway.
As a result, early Philips CD players had a nearly linear phase response, while most of the other brands had quite nonlinear phase responses, which was a big marketing advantage for Philips.
Back on topic, I dislike the sound of Sting's recording of John Dowland songs. He sings them very well and I like the fact that he recorded them at all, but the compression on the microphone spoils it.
Another recording that comes to mind is my partner's compact cassette of Dink, Cops are baffled, that she bought after a concert. There is far too little treble in the recording. At least they were honest about it, they warned her and were very surprised that she bought a copy anyway.
Disco-Pete - The ABBA songs on Youtube sound much better than on the record I have. The mastering is different between the two versions.
Laptop speakers have single-driver coherency but no bass. They emphasize the midrange.
I find that Youtube's lossy compression adds a hashiness that accompanies all music. It is hard to listen to Youtube at more than background levels on my main system.
Ed
Laptop speakers have single-driver coherency but no bass. They emphasize the midrange.
I find that Youtube's lossy compression adds a hashiness that accompanies all music. It is hard to listen to Youtube at more than background levels on my main system.
Ed
Maybe you experience the benefits of 'leveling' implemented into Youtube: all tracks are played at an equivalent average level ( rms) so no one is really louder than the others and as such differences in overall output level are erased ( making you feel you hear new 'things' withing tracks).
Classic rock usually have a DR of circa 14db or more which is nicely taylored to what Youtube accept without triggering any internal treatments ( limiting).
I have a "Youtube Music" app on my phone. Only licensed music can be found here; no bootlegs or mashed up home made youtube videos. I like the format because it's only music and the ads come at the beginning and not in the middle of the song.
I was recently looking for a specific live performance on my Youtube Music app. Everything but that one performance came up. So, I went to regular youtube and it came up right away. While I was there I briefly surfed some other music, and that's when I realized just how much youtube colors the sound. It's mixed to sound good on tiny computer speakers. On a good system it sounds so bassy, loud, gritty, and just bad. However, the Youtube Music app does no such thing to the music; it has a much lighter touch with compression and enhancement settings.
I was recently looking for a specific live performance on my Youtube Music app. Everything but that one performance came up. So, I went to regular youtube and it came up right away. While I was there I briefly surfed some other music, and that's when I realized just how much youtube colors the sound. It's mixed to sound good on tiny computer speakers. On a good system it sounds so bassy, loud, gritty, and just bad. However, the Youtube Music app does no such thing to the music; it has a much lighter touch with compression and enhancement settings.
The rather pricey IK Multimedia "I Loud" powered studio monitor speakers on my PC have white "power" LEDs on them that blink red when you enter the distortion zone. They will play well into that zone while increasing the volume control before the distortion becomes obnoxious. Turning the volume up further to nearly continuous red will cause the speakers to shut down (light and sound turn off) for a few seconds.
I can crank most of the 10000 days CD well into the blinking red light zone or nearly continuous read light zone without invoking shutdown.
If I play this old YouTube video, at around the 1:50 mark the speakers will go from white light to shut down immediately with no red or only a brief red blink. The smaller I Louds did this at a very listenable volume level, so after several conversations with their support people, and sending them my speakers, an agreement was reached. They "could not reproduce the issue" but agreed to upgrade me to the bigger I Louds for a reasonable fee. Guess what. The big ones do it too. They have a power supply inside each speaker instead of the shared unit in the smaller speakers. The left channel seems to get hit more than the right.
I have tried them on 3 completely different PCs with the same result. The difference is that the volume required to initiate shutdown with the bigger I Louds is quite loud, far louder than I would usually play them. Oddly plugging my bass guitar into the Focusrite and cranking it through the I Louds with no compression or limiting does not invoke shutdown. I can also play this YouTube video through any one of several of my DIY tube amps and not see any issues or considerable increase in cathode current beyond what I can get with a CD or any of my guitars at the same level of clipping as viewed with a scope channel across the speaker and the other across a resistor in the cathode of an output tube.
It would be interesting to see if this video sends your amp into "protect."
I bought my copy in '79 so it sounds pretty good.
I think I also got a MoFi version...
If you buy the third remastered CD version with Becker and Fagen notes, they confirm what an article in Rolling Stone said, as well as a Tape Op magazine interview of the Dan engineer Roger Nichols said: an early version of dBX pro noise reduction system was used, and the system was provided to the Dan in a mis-aligned state. DBX notified Nichols only after tracking was completed. In the third remaster, Nichols attempted to compensate for the damage but it was really beyond repair. So that is why the sound is both compressed and “flat.” I had the MoFi pressing and it sounded really good compared to even the third remastered CD; esp the phasing in Daddy Don’t Live in NY City. The CD does not match the depth and frequency highs of the MoFi disc, at least on my system back then versus what I have now. Not fair comparison, but that is what my experience was.
Or the fact that no (or very few) compression is added by an automatic treatment AND you listen to a continuous stream with levels which doesn't vary between tracks ( 'the leveler' effect i talked about, which analyze the rms value of track and then lower the overall level if it is too loud but not using compression, just an automated level knob whose setting is defined by rms value of track ( it's a bit oversimplified but you got the idea).
Basically a kind of calibrated monitoring but at playback.
I found in re-mastering old 1/4" master /copy master tapes to DAT, that one of the biggest problems
was masters encoded with DBX & Dolby A.
The simple reference level tone was not always enough for a good transfer. The worst cases I found were Dolby A.
After obviously determining IEC / NAB EQ , there were occasions where PRE-DECODING equalization was needed
to solve 'tonal balance pumping'. This is quite different to post decoding test-tone alignment.
After DBX entered the SEMI-PRO domain, it turned out that there was a total of 3 different decoders to pick from,
you just had to find the right one
( I think after hearing different pressings of some identical albums, remastering requires a passion plus 'golden ears' )
was masters encoded with DBX & Dolby A.
The simple reference level tone was not always enough for a good transfer. The worst cases I found were Dolby A.
After obviously determining IEC / NAB EQ , there were occasions where PRE-DECODING equalization was needed
to solve 'tonal balance pumping'. This is quite different to post decoding test-tone alignment.
After DBX entered the SEMI-PRO domain, it turned out that there was a total of 3 different decoders to pick from,
you just had to find the right one
( I think after hearing different pressings of some identical albums, remastering requires a passion plus 'golden ears' )
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