A new analog medium

I think analog vs digital is missing the point. We should use whatever medium is best able to capture and reproduce music. DVD-A looked to be a good standard on paper to me, but unfortunately the buying public were not interested.

Anyone who tells you that because digital involves sampling and quantization it automatically loses information is totally ignorant of the underlying science and should be ignored.

we are seeing a lot of this ignore-the-anti-digital in the analog forums these days.

I would say listen for yourself and don't ignore what you hear.

There is dogma but if analog is better you will actually hear that. I hear it.

BTW, quantization does lose 'data'. It is synthesizes.

I see your point but I didn't want to turn this into another digital vs. analog discussion.
I do happen to think that a properly implemented optical analog format would be superior to any optical digital format, however.

The economics won't work for manufacturing laserdiscs. While the sonics could be quite good, there would be a very limited market since consumers would have to buy a new player. No major manufacturer will get on board now since it would further confuse the Blue-Ray/HD DVD issue. You might as well bring back Elcaset.

Any new format that doesn't address computer and internet usage and rights management is DOA. Unfortunately a new analog medium falls in this category by definition.

No one will expend the money to develop a new media for a niche market.

The Nyquist-Shannon theorem states that exact reconstruction of a continuous-time baseband signal from its samples is possible if the signal is bandlimited and the sampling frequency is greater than twice the signal bandwidth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampling_theorem

Of course, real world implementatiosn of math suffers from some approximation....you can't have "infinity" in the real world (unless you are Buzz Lightyear). In practice designers build digital gear to a level that they believe makes the imperfections inaudible. Some engineers believe that digital audio is now into marketing hype territory (192 KHz, 24 bit and SACD formats are overkill) and that further improvements are not justfiable, as redbook CD imperfections are already dwarfed by other factors, such as the speakers and electronic imperfections. The popularity of lossy MP3, shows that many consumers must share his view.

Perfect analog, if it were possible in the real world, would no doubt be slightly better than the current digital implementations. However, in practice, given the current view of engineers and consumers, it seems unlikely that a new analog medium will be forthcoming. Necessity is the mother of invention....and the need just doesn't seem to be there.

I agree; the economics wouldn't work.
No large company would take this on with the intention of making money.

When I see the time, effort, and money spent by audiophile DIYers on technologies that could best be discribed as niche (horn speakers with field coil magnetics, for instance) simply because they have a passion for it; I would have assumed that a new analog format would have emerged from the 'grassroots.'
In other words, someone would do it just because it can be done.

Do you have any idea what it cost to manufacture a laserdisc? It's vastly more complicated and expensive than putting a driver in a box. Not to say it can't be done, so why aren't you doing it if it's so worthwhile?

Onhwy61,
Relax.