CD: A Lie Repeated Often Enough Becomes Truth

[Beck]

No, you couldn't be more wrong... well, unless we should round up some of your other rambling posts for comparison, to see which is the most wrong. It might be close.

It’s very simple, If you evaluate a high-quality stereo cassette (Nak maybe or whatever) and a high quality Compact disc player in the same system, the change in the width of the sound stage will be obvious, even if your ears are old and tired.

Try the tape first. It would be best if you then record the tape to the CD. When you play the recording on the CD the right and left periphery will be markedly narrowed.

Like the 20k cutoff in frequency response, this phenomenon is measurable and repeatable. it’s the nature of the beast. It’s a well-known limitation of digi.

You can do this experiment in a number of different ways:

You can record the same LP to a good type II cassette and a CD. You can also purchase a commercial CD that is the same as an older tape you’ve had since back in the day (Wednesday?).

Any analog source, including cassette will appear as though the music is actually outside the physical limits of the speakers. CD will seem cropped by comparison. Works with headphones too.

After reading about the phenomenon in the mid 80’s I’ve been privy to several experiments confirming it.

What Beck says here is nonsense. Demonstrably so. High quality cassette's stereo soundstage is poor in analog terms, without any reference to digital.

eh... ehm... The point of the post was that even the lowly cassette has a better sound stage IN REFERENCE TO DIGITAL!

 

[Dr ZEE]

...I’ve been privy to several experiments confirming ...cassette has a better sound stage IN REFERENCE TO DIGITAL!

on that note , may I suggest El Cassetto'Macho from San Diego , three some hour left and countin'down

 

[Tim Gillett]

No, you couldn't be more wrong... well, unless we should round up some of your other rambling posts for comparison, to see which is the most wrong. It might be close.

It’s very simple, If you evaluate a high-quality stereo cassette (Nak maybe or whatever) and a high quality Compact disc player in the same system, the change in the width of the sound stage will be obvious, even if your ears are old and tired.

Try the tape first. It would be best if you then record the tape to the CD. When you play the recording on the CD the right and left periphery will be markedly narrowed.

Like the 20k cutoff in frequency response, this phenomenon is measurable and repeatable. it’s the nature of the beast. It’s a well-known limitation of digi.

You can do this experiment in a number of different ways:

You can record the same LP to a good type II cassette and a CD. You can also purchase a commercial CD that is the same as an older tape you’ve had since back in the day (Wednesday?).

Any analog source, including cassette will appear as though the music is actually outside the physical limits of the speakers. CD will seem cropped by comparison. Works with headphones too.

After reading about the phenomenon in the mid 80’s I’ve been privy to several experiments confirming it.



eh... ehm... The point of the post was that even the lowly cassette has a better sound stage IN REFERENCE TO DIGITAL!

Again, as per our previous discussions what is the point of reference? The original source? If so, are you saying that the cassette widens the image, or just doesnt narrow it? If the cassette widens the original image then isnt that a failure to be true to the source?

If the only measure of high fidelity is ability to broaden the stereo image, then the cassette might win hands down as it's so vulnerable to azimuth tracking errors. But that's not what hi fi is about, and if it was, the greater the cassette's tracking errors, the better it would be.

The humble cassette, with a good tape, recorded on a good machine, well aligned (you mentioned the classic Nak, an excellent design) can give quite good results, including phase accuracy. But that is to say it doesnt artificially broaden the stereo image but preserves it. If the image was wide, it keeps it wide. If it is narrow, even straight mono out of both speakers, it preserves that too.

Again the cassette's tendency to artificially "broaden" the stereo image is something people like Nakamichi worked so hard to eliminate! The fact is the better the quality of cassette recording, the less it exhibits the very fault you seem to praise. The cassette will always have some phase errors, which may show up as a slightly shaky stereo image. High speed reel to reel machines will normally be much better in this repect.

Perhaps we need to clarify what you mean by "a better soundstage". You seem to speak in terms of broadness, and sounds emanating from beyond the speakers. But that's confusing. What if the source material is mono? Where should the sound be coming from then?


Hifi reproduction is not about how wide or how narrow the stereo image is but how true to the original, in every respect. A provocative statement, or just common sense?


Tim G

 

[Beck]

Timmy,

I wouldn’t characterize your “reasoning” as provocative or as common sense.

You regularly miss the core of what someone has said, and then proceed to unleash a barrage of wasted wordage while climbing the wrong tree, blissfully unaware.

Were you in an accident of some kind? You don’t have to answer that here. Just keep in mind if your mother, your teachers, your doctor and I think you have a comprehension problem, maybe it's painfully obvious, even here in cyberspace.

CD narrows the right – left soundstage in a stereo recording.

There’s nothing in that statement that seasoned recording engineers and producers haven’t always known. I say it for the benefit of newer members and those newer to recording in general, but then you step in it, as though there is some kind of debate.

You also try to fit everything into your high-speed cassette duplication box. Perhaps that’s because it’s the only box you have. Sometimes it just doesn’t fit, so try to restrain yourself and you might end up with more boxes, or in digital terminology… Higher Resolution.

Does anyone else think it would be a good idea to have a forum called “ The Teachers Lounge?” One would have to read at least a years worth of posts before you could post and be accepted by the core members.

We have a separate Newbies forum, but all the forums tend to become newbies forums to some degree. There really isn’t a place for people to converse without having to teach a mini-course on the fundamentals for every thread. It gets a little old and it’s a lot to ask when you think about it.

It’s not that we would all agree in the teachers lounge… that wouldn’t be the point, but we could have more productive discussions at a higher level without interference or heckling from amateurs and trolls. Just a thought.

 

[Tim Gillett]

CD narrows the right – left soundstage in a stereo recording.

.

Why not post this assertion on any number of the other forums on this homerecording website.

Tim G

 

[Beck]

Gillett! Klaatu barada nikto!

 

[cjacek]

What if the source material is mono? Where should the sound be coming from then?

Listen to a CD recording of Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited and the same on LP Vinyl, both mono from the original tapes and you'll soon toss your CD aside. The depth and lifelike sound on the LP is something to be heard to be believed. It's like you're in the studio with the artist.

There's so much more to a linear analog recording than any spec sheet for any digital format.

 

[Tim Gillett]

Listen to a CD recording of Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited and the same on LP Vinyl, both mono from the original tapes and you'll soon toss your CD aside. The depth and lifelike sound on the LP is something to be heard to be believed. It's like you're in the studio with the artist.

There's so much more to a linear analog recording than any spec sheet for any digital format.

As a kid in grade school I saved up my pocket money and bought the CBS single Like a rolling stone/Gates of Eden. (I'm a bit older than you) Then soon after I bought Positively 4th St/From a Buick Six. I loved Dylan's music and still do.

In those days the singles released here were all in mono even though the albums could be either mono or stereo versions.

You say the vinyl album and the CD re release are both in mono. Well the original album could have been mono vinyl if that was the version bought, but the album was recorded also for stereo. I checked by listening to an mp3 on a Dylan website and though the sound was crappy low bitrate mp3, it was sure stereo, as I had thought it was.

I'm not aware of any mono CD version and would very much doubt its existence since the original album could be had in stereo so why remaster it to CD in mono? So what can I say to your suggestion of comparing mono vinyl to the mono CD? Are you sure of your facts?

Cheers Tim G

 

[jpmorris]

CD narrows the right – left soundstage in a stereo recording.

To be perfectly frank, I find that hard to believe given that CD stereo is implemented as two independent data channels. What's the mechanism by which this narrowing occurs? What would prevent a 2-track R2R do this as well?

 

[cjacek]

I'm not aware of any mono CD version and would very much doubt its existence since the original album could be had in stereo so why remaster it to CD in mono? So what can I say to your suggestion of comparing mono vinyl to the mono CD? Are you sure of your facts?

Just to clarify that I meant pumping both out in mono and not that the CD was originally stamped in mono. I didn't express myself as I intended. My bad.

The point I was trying to make, more important than mono vs stereo, was that the CD or any digital format leaves lots to be desired from a depth and stage point of view. CD or DVD, to me, sounds like an incomplete work. It's not multi-dimensional like a purely analog recording. It also does not resolve the instrument's sound as good. Stuff tends to go missing. One just doesn't feel the song as much as with a good analog recording. There are so many frequencies that we can sense (and not neccessarily hear), that are responsible for the way we perceive the natural world, that when you take them away, as digital does above a certain value, that we get lost and wonder what's up. It's like, "hell, I hear music playing and it's nice but there's something wrong" .... That's how I used to listen to my CD's and DVD's.

 

[Beck]

To be perfectly frank, I find that hard to believe given that CD stereo is implemented as two independent data channels. What's the mechanism by which this narrowing occurs? What would prevent a 2-track R2R do this as well?

That’s a good observation, JP, and this is a fascinating aspect of sound perception, near and dear to my heart. (But what isn’t if it has anything to do with acoustics or even more stimulating… psychoacoustics).

THE SOCIAL & HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE:

First to be clear, at one time it was well known among engineers and audiophiles that a narrowed stereo field was an issue with stereo CD. There really is no such thing as a free lunch. The narrowed field was/is accepted by many that believe the benefits of CD outweigh it… namely, zero background noise and dynamic range.

What I find so fascinating is that with the passage of time the disadvantages of CD have largely been lost to the public’s collective mind. Now instead of using CD with knowledge of its drawbacks, people are unaware, or deny they exist or ever did exist. The marketing deception is complete. This so beautifully drives home the title of this thread and the article that inspired it.

THE TECHNICAL SIDE:

Consider how different compact disc is from previous playback mediums. Stereophonic tape has two separate physical tracks; stereophonic records have a stylus for pick-up of two separate (right/left) areas of the groove. With analog the left/right balance is amplitude and delay-based.

Not so with CD… even the stereo field is virtual.

There is only one optical pickup in a CD player… there aren’t two physical right and left tracks. Stereophonic material is interpreted by an algorithm from a single (though non-contiguous) stream of data, redrawn and converted back into the analog realm where sound and our ears actually live. There is nothing analogous on a CD. Everything is encoded to 1’s and 0’s – amplitude, frequency, timing, spatial information, error correction, etc.

People should remember that Redbook CD was thought by many to be a compromise. It does a lot of things, but nothing optimally. You won’t see the limitations of CD listed in a spec sheet or a marketing brochure. The term CD-quality has not only been repeated, but also presented in such a way as to be stored in the same part of our brains as the words peace, love, truth and happiness.

PERCEPTIONS:

Subjectively, analog stereo can be to the ears as coming out of a tunnel is for the eyes. We can hear what is equivalent to a spectacular panoramic view. Humans can tell the general size of a room even blindfolded.

In the realm of music recording/reproduction this is of course based on ideal listening conditions. In a club or in a car it may not mater to most people. But for those of us that still listen to music as an activity with headphones or in the sweet spot with a decent pair of speakers, the A/B test between CD and any stereo tape format is remarkable. The phenomenon is evident with natural “true stereo” material as well as with stereo doubling and chorusing effects.

I suppose the issue is somewhat genre specific. Some music just won’t benefit from this or any other attribute of analog tape.

We can talk about digital vs. analog one track at a time, but stereophony is a completely different aspect, worthy of it’s own chapter, if not an entire book.

Tim

 

[jpmorris]

So what you seem to be saying is that the time difference between pulling the left and right channels from the datastream is causing some kind of phase issue? That's possible I suppose, although we're talking a time difference of under 1/44100th of a second - it shouldn't be too hard to do that on a tape deck too if you have any amount of azimuth error.
I would also imagine it depends on the exact design of the DSP system - if I was doing it, I'd do some kind of buffered sample-and-hold until we get both channels and only release it to the DAC then. I suspect most of them have FIFO queues anyway these days.

 

[Slowrider]

Stereo?

A true stereo mix depends on the mixing engineer and what kind of mood he's in that particular day...or night. Some studios made us sound gREAT AND SOME SO=SO. I still say it's in the MOOD of the mixdown dude.