I am someone from an older Hi Fi era and have heard vinyl at its best. I have still got an ultra hi fi turntable setup and some of the best albums like the Sheffield lab series sounds amazing. (Sheffield lab production was direct from the recording studio to the cutting lathe with nothing in between. Leaves out the tape multitrack and two track machines all together!

Digital at its best now sounds fantastic and just as warm and fat if it needs to but transients wise and noise wise it beats the pants of even the finest vinyl playback medium. As a drummer who has played live in front of an amazing drum set like Sonor and now recording drums digitally I am hearing back how they sound in real life. 

If I did the test to anyone where the A side of a switch box had the turntable analog signal directly and the B Side of the switch had that same signal but passed through 16 Bit 44.1 K A to D and D to A they would not pick it in a million years!

If you have mixed and mastered well, an mp3 file at 320 KBits/sec will sound fine. The thing is to get into the AAC file formats now. It is much superior in sound, much lower files sizes and although they still don't sound as good as wave files they are sounding better than mp3 files and are easily very useful in terms of sending stuff backwards and forwards over the internet while working on a project for example. I would not do it for sending takes of playing back and forth though. Full res files over You Send It etc is a better option. While working on a jingle project recently for example I was sending tons of mixes to directors etc and they were hearing them very well at their end being able to assess and advise me very accurately. Right at the end I sent the fully mastered wave file over You Send It.

drewfx1

the wildman

Vinyl records are still revered as the best even now, long after the 'powers that be' tried to ditch them. And for good reason. 

They are not by any means universally revered. Especially by people who understand the problems (and magnitude thereof) with both vinyl and digital.

Digital is like trying to paint a picture out of small squares.
Digital audio recording builds sound waves out of small squares, but then tries to fool us into thinking that the curves are smooth, whereas Analogue audio recording is building sound waves out of smooth lines that more truly represent the original sound.

The curves output by a DAC are smooth. Google "reconstruction filter" and you will be enlightened.

Thank you for trying to enlighten me, but in a mixed-signal system (analog and digital), a reconstruction filter (or anti-imaging filter) is used to construct a smooth analogue signal from the output of a digital to analogue converter (DAC) or other sampled data output device. A digital audio signal has a stair step type waveform which harbors a great deal of higher frequency energy called "images". A reconstruction ( or anti-imaging filter) is used to reconstruct a smoother representation of the original signal. The filter is similar to and anti-aliasing filter but has a different purpose.


Sampled data reconstruction filters:
The sampling theorem describes why the input of an ADC requires a low-pass analog electronic filter, called the anti-aliasing filter: the sampled input signal must be bandlimited to prevent aliasing (here meaning waves of higher frequency being recorded as a lower frequency). For the same reason, the output of a DAC requires a low-pass analog filter, called a reconstruction filter, as the output signal must be bandlimited, to prevent aliasing (here meaning Fourier coefficients being reconstructed as low frequency waves, not as higher frequency aliases), as in the Whittaker–Shannon interpolation formula.
Ideally, both filters should be brickwall filters, constant phase delay in the pass-band with constant flat frequency response, and zero response from the Nyquist frequency. This is given by a filter with a 'sinc' impulse response.
Implementation Practical filters have non-flat frequency or phase response in the pass band and incomplete suppression of the signal elsewhere, as a sinc waveform has an infinite response to a signal, in both the positive and negative time directions, which is impossible to perform in real time – it would require infinite delay.
In systems that have both, the anti-aliasing filter and a reconstruction filter may be of identical design. For example, both the input and the output for audio equipment is sampled at 44.1 kHz. Both audio filters block as much as possible above 22 kHz and pass as much as possible below 20 kHz. Typically both filters are active op-amp filters, with exactly the same selection of resistors and capacitors.
Whilst in theory a DAC gives a series of impulses, in practice, the output of a DAC is more typically a series of stair-steps – thus the step response of the filter (the integral of the impulse response) is of more interest. The low pass reconstruction filter smooths the stair step (removes the harmonics above the Nyquist limit) to (re)construct the analogue signal corresponding to the digital time sequence.
Hence the reason why musicians and hi-fi buffs alike still rant on about, and use valve and valve emulation products to process, record and listen to music.

Hey...  Does McQ have an alternate login now???

bitflipper


So imagine now that a new codec replaces MP3 as the most-ubiquitous online format. Now fast-forward 20 years...MP3 hardware players are no longer manufactured, and the old software players won't work on Windows 19. Your massive collection of MP3s sits silently on the DVDs you backed them up to back in 2017 - but there are no more DVD players, either. 

Then you have to hope that the ORAL tradition brings the music in time, so that it can be remembered just like Bach was and such! ... by humming, and eventually someone putting it down on paper!
 
Technology has been downword compatible quite well, all things considered, but yeah ... the spark plugs on a model T live in a museum only, now!

Hi,

I have an example of the "non-linear" process in perception, that works, and I used it on the stage in preparing actors during rehearsal. I have wanted to do this with musicians, but it has been impossible since there is no rehearsal time to help put folks in the same arena, and too many egos along the way. This, ALSO, works with painting and I have an example that has also worked.

These will be on a book that I have written already on these experiences, and when it happens, it happens.

Biggest issues? People never believing anything and thinking that the only thing that works is what their mind can grab or understand, which has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of us, and the social mold, but that person can not see the difference, or grasp it. That's why I always say, there is a lot more out there, that I have never seen, and these are the only words I can explain them with ... there is no right or wrong ... there JUST IS what is there, which we do not know or understand ... and sometimes, there is NOTHING to understand ... it's just another "person" with hair, or whatnot!

My exercises, were about two actors communicating and being able to exchange thoughts and ideas that the other person could pick up and see automatically ... and this "psychic" communication is very helpful to characterization and acting on the stage. It helps add a third dimention ... like thinking ... without the actor having to fake it with a hand to the chin, for example! It takes the "mechanical" out of the work!

This can be done with musicians ... but requires a willingness that is not about the notes, or the chords ... it's about studying what is inside your head. This is not about your paranoia that someone can see your closets or crap inside the mind ... this is strictly about the work.

And it can be done with art, and I have shown it. I had a lady draw a few things on a frame that was 24x24 inches ... in the dark, so she could not see anything ... she could touch it, if she wanted ... but not see it ... and when she was done for the night, she had to cover it, and NEVER look at it, until the day that she stated to herself ... I'm done with this one. She can, then, look at it.

The result is different ... it's you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You can not deny that ... but there is no linear link, or design, or thought that will EVER tell you anything about the work (at first) ... that you can understand or relate to ... but just like your furthest sub-conscious that you know exists somewhere in there, you have a feeling for this work ... that you can not define ... but something is there ... right in front of you ... that you recognize, and it is not anything like you thought you were, or saw each morning in front of the mirror. In time, you will see parallels.  You can do this with music, but you do not want to know where the staff is ... so you can comeup with something that is more consistent with your FEEL, than it is with your ideas ... and this is the biggest learning point in all this ... the rest is mechanics and easy! But you won't have a 3rd dimention in the work, even if you think that you made the words askey so folks would never know that the song about asparapuss is about grandma!

Lastly, was something I did with a kid that played goalie in the soccer team. I had him stand on the goal line with his eyes closed, and simply look strait ahead as to where the ball is, when anyone is going to kick a penalty. And keep an "eye" on the ball. After the first 10/15 kicks and the penalty, he was starting to be able to tell at a good 75% clip where the ball was going the minute it was kicked ... the following year, his team lost, but on that game, he saved two penalties ... however, by that time he became dis-enchanted with the game ... because the game had too many ugly people in it, and he lost interest. I've wanted to share this ability with some bigger teams, but JK is not interested in experiments that work ... !!!

For me, these are just about the "person" ... and how much you can bring yourself to something ... as I like to say that many of you here do not like to hear me say it ... it's way above and beyond the notes and the chords and goes into the non-linear areas ... that might, or might not (I admit that!) help you or not!

It's out there ... how much do you want to see or learn? Or do you just want to be the same all the time, locked up in your crib all your life? Here, have a noodle/pacifier!