What The Matrix can teach us about “resolution” in digital audio
 

There are no "stair-steps" in digital audio ! Keanu Reeves will demonstrate...

Very interesting read.

Proceed to debate and air out that horse ;)


Update : 15April 15

http://www.sonicscoop.com/2013/08/29...robably-wrong/
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Dan, can you fix the title "What The Matrix can teach us about “resolution” in digital audio"

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Done!

That one should be a sticky. :banana:

Bill.......Thanks for the very interesting read.

Ok, I'll start....All digital sampling is lossy. It's a matter of temporal degree. The lower the sampling rate, the bigger the loss. :p

One of the coolest things and sometimes hardest to comprehend,(at least to me) is that in a properly designed digital system, where sample rate and depth are properly chosen based on absolute maximum rates of change in the system being measured, what is apparently missing information between all samples, is easily predictable and re-creatable, because Nature itself dictates what the missing information must be in said system... or something like that. :D

Fortunately, the shape of sine waves, and complex combinations of same, no matter what their maximum frequency may be, are absolutely definable and "creatable", strangely enough, the ones created with digital systems & filters, can be identical to the ones Nature might create..or the ones emanating from your favorite musical instrument(s)

Disclaimer: JMHO, YMMV.... Vinyl is perfect, Digital is junk, Nature is perfect, Vinyl stinks, digital is perfect, Rap stinks, Classical rules, Rock is dead. Yadda Yadda. :yes::no::yes::no:

So I'll just throw out what's always been my problem with digital... When the sample rate is at 44.1, and therefore the highest frequency reproduced is 22.5 KHz, you do lose a lot of the upper harmonic information that, while we don't hear it directly, does produce beat notes further down in the frequency spectrum, and which we can hear. I think it's this missing information that always makes digital sound a bit less real to me.

That said, I've got digital and analog recordings that sound great, and others of each that sound lousy. It's as much about the engineering and production behind the recording as the technology used to record and play it. But my best analog stuff still sounds better than the best digital stuff. This is purely my fully subjective opinion.

And that said, I think the article comes at the problem from entirely the wrong direction, starts with the wrong set of assumptions about what makes listening to music enjoyable, and uses an appeal to authority as its anchor. But I do believe, if the 64kb ipod listening kids and streaming don't kill the high-end gear market, that digital will eventually give a more life-like playback of music than the current best analog gear. I just don't think we're quite there yet.

I beg to differ......:thumbsup:

Everyone has their own perspective and many times it is colored by ones business relationships.

I love the interview of Mark Waldrep, President of AIX Records in the April 13 issue of The Absolute Sound.

"I've been advocating for a clear distinction between standard definition and high-definition audio for years. There continues to be a lot of confusion regarding what is and isn't an HD track. Analog tape is a standard definition format, plain and simple. The same holds for vinyl. Lovers of these formats have every right to enjoy the particular flavor of sound that they produce but that doesn't change the fundamental specifications. They are simply not HD audio any more than 8mm movies from the 1950's are HD video. When an author writes that a particular recording is almost as good as "analog" , it perpetuates the myth that analog is the ultimate goal. It is frustrating that labels, mastering engineers, and consumers are not given the opportunity to hear what artists and engineers/producers create in the studio. .........................Thankfully for audiophiles and music lovers, improvements in recording didn;t end with analog tape and vinyl despite the resurgence of those formats."

Amen

Jim, like your comment and quote. (Vinyl and tape is old technology)

Analog is the ultimate goal. Digital to Analog. An analogous of live music is the recording. The matrix tries to parallel the real world. In today's advances we are coming very close to re-creating this environment. Hifi of the future is going to be a moment of where you are convinced you are at the live music event.

Sounding Analog is not the goal for me. :no: Your last sentence is what I seek.

Well, lets get to work on that robot band/orchestra/ensemble with real instruments . :laughin:

Afterthought, Analog what most consider Vinyl/Tape is a generalization. Analog is really a "thing" seen as comparable to another.

Jim...Too true! :laughin:

Aaaaah....The DVD-A man....went Blu-ray & now wants to sell analog tape! :twisted: Check out this quote from Mark Waldrep only last week. It is funny to read both of these quotes side-by-side. :lmao: :lmao:

03-16-2013, 9:52am

"My name is Mark Waldrep. I founded and operate AIX Records in Southern California. I have been a recording engineer for over 40 years and have worked with both analog and digital equipment (both standard definition and HD). I have mastered many hundreds of CDs and DVDs for artists from Diana Ross to Britney Spears. I own a NAGRA IV-S and QGB (the 10.5 reel adaptor) and a fully refurbished AMPEX 440C.

For the past 13 years, I have been recording and releasing new high definition audio products on DVD-Audio and now Blu-ray optical discs. These titles have garnered wonderful reviews (Stereophile gave us "Record of the Month" in November for Albert Lee's Tearing it Up BD disc) and a loyal following. At the suggestion of several audiophile friends, I'm considering offering my stereo tracks as reel to reel releases.

I would be interested in any feedback from this group on whether this idea has merit or not. Let me be clear. The masters from which the tapes would be created are original HD digital masters that were recorded in a live hall at 96 kHz/24-bit PCM using state-of-the-art preamps and ADCs. There is no artificial reverb, no use of EQ or any dynamics processing...just the sound of singers and instruments. We capture everyone at the same session...not overdubs. The sound is unique...open, clear and live.

I believe that an analog reel has a particular sonic signature that is valued AND that a transfer from my master through a new Benchmark DAC2 to my NAGRA at 15 or 7.5 ips 2-track would be roughly the equivalent to a first generation master. It potentially would have more dynamic range and greater frequency response than an analog copy from a dupe master. I'll leave the proof in the hands/ears of this group.

Any ideas, thoughts or comments would be appreciated. You can visit the AIX Records website and see the diversity of our catalog. New releases include The Banda Brothers and Rita Coolidge. I would be making each transfer on a custom order basis and would be able to select any tape type, speed and EQ configuration.

I should be able to send out some samples to a few interested parties in a few weeks.

Thanks in advance for the bandwidth. I'm excited by this prospect and hope that members of this group will be as well.

Mark Waldrep, Ph.D.
AIX Records and iTrax.com"

Some one is looking to make a buck! :wall:

Steve
That is surely a perfect example of my first sentence.

Bill & Jim...Totally... Sounds to me that $600 a reel is more in tune with his true philosophy. :o

There is no spoon.... But is there a fork???


Trust no one except your own ears!!! :D

Well, but sound *is* analog by its very nature, is it not? And what you say you want is natural sound, that feeling of "being there", rather than a feeling of listening to a recording, whatever the format used, yes? Can we agree that sound is not a discrete series of events the way digital records it, even with really high sampling and bit rates?

I ask these questions simply because I don't know you, and you don't know me, and neither of us knows the assumptions and biases the other is starting from, so this is my attempt to understand those details.

And somewhat apropos of the discussion, here's a quote from Neil Gader during an interview a couple of years ago:

The technology, while changing, has not, I think, changed all that much in the last couple of years. His last sentence is though, I think, the most telling:

Full interview starts on page 10 of this document: media.avguide.com/vinyl_buyers_guide_2011.pdf

I point to this mainly because I can't find anything to disagree with in the interview. But as with most anything related to audio, it's simply a set of opinions.

Good read, thank you for the referenced article.

There is money to be had in vinyl and tape, lots.

There is a very solid benefit to the "Album" - artistic and the performance.

For most we just choose the "blue pill."
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-V_V9UEZRCj...-blue-pill.jpg

The last sentence of the article is key to me; the biggest problem with nearly all recordings today isn't the medium, it's the mastering (and I include things like mic placement, etc in the term "mastering")

+1 :yes::yes::yes::yes::yes:

There is more to it than strictly digital vs analog. I believe either media can sound "musical" and "warm" and "natural" to the ear, just depends on the quality of the recording and mastering process. I have been convinced that digital is not all to blame by the XRCDs. Listening to many of my XRCDs is pure pleasure and considering the mastering process and source of the recording it now makes sense to me that digital is not all to blame.

I agree with this. I have CDs I enjoy. But CDs I enjoy are fewer and farther between than purely analog sources. So in addition to the overall quality of the recording/engineering and mastering process, the playback system is also important. And in my experience, "good" sounding analog is a lot less expensive than "good" digital. And by the same token, really stellar analog is more expensive than really stellar digital, or at least I'm not aware of any 200K+ CD transport/DAC combinations.

http://alltheragefaces.com/img/userc...733ac25cce.png


Those last two sentences, with the use of "good" and "stellar" = highly debatable.

Really interesting discussion. I love the distortion and especially the modulation noise that classic reel-to-reel machines add to the sound, just like I love the distortion and background noise vinyl records bring to the table. Maybe they make up for things lost elsewhere in the chain. Dunno. I love the sound of well mastered high bitrate large bit depth files bring to the table. Different for sure, but awesome nonetheless.

Who's to say what's right, when all three, when they're done well, sound so good?

Tom

Forgot to mention - his examples prove the author of the article does not understand the two fundamental processes at work in digital audio - sampling and quantization. That makes the rest of the article 'ahem' questionable.

In my experience, anything related to audio is "highly debatable". I argue with my 20-something daughters over whether the 128k bitrate MP3s over their "they came with the ipod" earbuds actually sound as good as my set up. They actually claim their stuff sounds better. And despite one of them interning as a doctor at a decent teaching hospital and the other being a manager with a national company, I still can't help but feel that I failed as a father. Maybe not in that "their method of earning a living involves a chrome-plated pole and a lot of dollar bills" level of failure, but still, it's failure.

What's actually kind of funny is that old laserdiscs were analog. And contained analog video as well as analog and digital audio sound tracks.

In hind sight maybe that was the future.

As I understand it, the pits and lands on a disc don't need to be constant size as the are on a digital CD (in this case used to the define ones and zeros). An analog signal can actually be encoded on the disc using variable sized pits and lands arranged in linear sequence. A laser can then pick then pickup that analog signal with no D/A conversion required. Pretty much like a turntable, but without the needle and associated wear, dust, static, etc. issues.

EDIT: a little further research on Wikipedia turned up this.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...chsscheibe.jpg
"An earlier analog optical disc recorded in 1935 for Licht-Tone Orgel (sampling organ)"

Sampling is lossless, quantization is not. Nature has chosen 4-bit dna quantization over misty analog copying though for the reproduction of life, so I think that 24-bit is sort of overkill for music reproduction..:D

Very interesting read... It completely changes what I had thought was true from previous reads. Thank you for posting it.

Also you can read the articles Mark Waldrep publishes. He is truly a character in the industry.

Dr. AIX’s POSTS | Real HD-Audio

and

the original Ian Shepherd newsletters can be subscribed or viewed here

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They've even crossed swords a few times.. seen here

Loudness and Normalization | Real HD-Audio

and.. in my opinion, the guy who just knocks it out of the park and makes real HD recordings.

Bob Ludwig
Gateway Mastering & DVD

I did think the walkthrough on the playback of the square wave was a particularly interesting point, i.e. that it tries to convert that into sine waves too, and clearly doesn't do a perfect job.
Back to music, I struggle to believe that real music (which tends to be very complex) is nice and easily seen sine waves. Rather, I'm assuming that it's a combination of sine waves. Implications being that the DAC won't have an nice and easily produced sine wave to playback. So when it tries to draw those little sine waves to describe a complex combination of input signals, doesn't that mean that the higher sampling rate WILL be more accurate?

You a read more about dither through the software that Ian Shepherd was using. They even published a guide for all to read.

https://www.izotope.com/en/support/s...guides/ozone-6

I checked this thread out because I'm a fan of The Matrix films. Alas, I don't quite get the point the author of the linked article is trying to make. Is it just that he doesn't want us to use the word "resolution" any more? Or, at least not in his presence? I admit I am a bit thick with grasping the intent of others sometimes, but I really just don't get it. While his supporting arguments are pretty weak, I do get the technical points he's attempting to make. It just seems like this is another pedestrian attempt to change the long standing definitions of terms used to convey ideas. Then again, like I said, I don't get his point.

Can you spell out for us what you think the point is? :D (I want to answer, your response is sorta vague to me..)

What are the arguments/points that are controversial to you?

I believe the attempted point being made is that redbook distribution of music is good enough, and that these new-fangled hi-res downloads are nothing more than a thinly veiled ploy to separate the buying public from more of its money. Am I anywhere close to your interpretation of the article? I am not necessarily disagreeing with this premise at all.

His hand-in-front-of-the-face example seemed rather bizzare at best, to me. With the staionary hand's fingers blocking out some of the light, he states, "this is sampling." Mmmkay, fair enough, I'll play along in spite of my inability to see this as sampling. Continuing on, he then describes playing back these samples of visible image, and proclaims this to be quantizing. Quantizing and sampling are two different things. You can have sampling without quantizing, but it makes little sense to quantize without sampling.

Ignoring the silly examples, the controversial point, to me, is the claim that there is no such thing as resolution. Let's say we have File A, which is a 16-bit PCM file. And, File B, which is a 24-bit PCM file. If we are forbidden from using the word resolution, because "there is no resolution," how do we differentiate between them? "File A and File B are the same, I just don't know why File B is 50% bigger in size than File A." Or, for another example, let's say Device A is an 8-bit DAC, Device B is a 12-bit DAC, Device C is a 16-bit DAC, and Device D is a 24-bit DAC. Without the word resolution, all these DACs are the same? Should they be making CD players with 8-bit DACs because it has the same resolution as a 16-bit (and for that matter, a 24-bit) DAC? Why stop there? A 4-bit DAC has all the resolution that you'll find in a 24-bit DAC. Heck 2-bit PCM has exactly the same resolution as 24-bit PCM - because there is no resolution. If the goal is to come up with silly examples, I can swim with the best of them.

My point is that there is such a thing as resolution, and that's what I'm having difficulty in understanding the author's point, since he seems to go to great lengths to try and convince us that there is no resolution.

Audio bit depth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read that..

My wife likes digital. Nuff said.

Thanks for the Wiki link. I read through it, and it seems like a good synopsis of what goes on in PCM. Couldn't help but notice it (the Wiki article) is filled with that taboo term of resolution. This seems to directly contradict the claim in the linked article which is the basis of this sticky thread.

So, is resolution real, or is there no resolutuion?