In rec.audio.tech Serge Auckland wrote:
Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Glenn Richards wrote:
Arny Krueger wrote:

Back in the 1980s when people used to buy the LP and the CD of the
same album, play them both and compare the results, they weren't
really comparing the two media. Instead, they were comparing the
(generally quite separate) mastering decisions--EQ, limiting,
etc.--behind the two products, plus the particular characteristics of
their LP and CD playback equipment.

So what that posting is basically saying is that CD is capable of far
better quality sound than vinyl, but due to sloppy mastering (loudness
wars anyone?) vinyl generally sounds better? Because it hasn't been
compressed to within an inch of its life?

You can't generalise. Indeed in my experience this isn't the case - but
then I stopped buying LPs when I got my first CD player. This 'loudness
wars' thingie with CD mastering is relatively recent and mainly applies to
some pop releases.

(Bit of a vinyl fan myself actually...)

But then there are the inherent problems with vinyl which no mastering can
get round. So you're not starting from an even playing field.


Sadly, the loudness stupidity isn't just limited to pop releases. Over
the weekend, I was making some measurements, and decided to leave my
bitstream analyser connected whilst listening to music. I was astounded
at how many of my CDs regularly clip. Amy Winehouse "Frank" lights the
0dBFS light on almost every beat, Diana Krall Love Scenes clips often
per song, as does Norah Jones.

'Jazz' releases aimed at the mass market will tend to have mass market
mastering. So will the 'pop' classical CDs.

But note too that reaching 0 dB does not necessarily mean clipping.
'Classic' digital Clipping would appear as consecutive runs of 0dB samples
-- some say we can hear as little as three, others say more like 10-13.
Modern mastering engineers also sometimes 'cheat' by creating clipped
files then lowering the overall level, so you'd never see the same-sample
runs at '0 dB' -- this is probably because some CD players don't behave
well when offered full-scale samples.


I just don't understand why these sorts of CDs need to be mastered into
clipping. I can understand a CD being normalised to 0dBFS, but that
would mean one hit at 0dBFS once per CD, or at worse once per track, if
tracks are mastered individually. There's just no excuse for it.

It's a fad -- one that I hope goes away eventually.

However, try as I might, I can't hear the clipping in the Diana Krall
and Norah Jones, even sighted, knowing when it takes place. The Amy
Winehouse is , however, very obvious.

Psychoacoustically, it takes a lot of samples relatively close
together, or a run of consecutive 0 db samples, to 'sound' like clipping.



___
-S
"As human beings, we understand the world through simile, analogy,
metaphor, narrative and, sometimes, claymation." - B. Mason