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Deja Vu all over again

The Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young remastered album is available on Qobuz for streaming at 192kHz 24bit.  It sounds great.  I have the original vinyl that I bought in the late 70s.  This remastered version has a very crisp clean sound with good soundstage depth and width.  I especially like the song, "Almost Cut my Hair". The song seems almost comical to me at the beginning but the mood changes for me as the song continues into a serious and good discussion.
I believe this digital version has little to no compression since I have my preamp volume set at 50 for my normal listening level.  Compare that to some pop albums on Qobuz at 44kHz 16bit that I play at a volume level of 27-33.
I believe the compression level is proportional to the volume level I use for my normal listening level.  For example, ROON shows the dynamic range of each of my CDs that I have ripped as FLAC files into my Library.  I see dynamic range as low as 8 and as high as 18.  The 18 is for a Telarc CD and is exceptional.  I notice my volume level for normal listening level is correlating to this Dynamic Range value.  Of course the higher dynamic range recordings have some nice loud peaks.

128x128tonywinga

Showing 4 responses by tomcy6

tomcy6's avatar
tomcy6
2,541 posts
 
Thanks for the review, tonywinga.  I 'm away from home right now but look forward to hearing this one when I get back.

bigtwin,  They can't get something off the master tape that isn't there, but they can do a better job of getting what is on the master tape off it and onto a  better sounding digital or analog format, or not.  Remasters have to be considered on an individual basis.  Some are major improvements, some major disappointments.

Qobuz gets their digital files from the record companies, not from whatever is lying around.  In this case, the record company probably sent them a copy of the digital file that was downsampled to make the CD.  My guess is that individual systems and taste will determine which version sounds better, the original CD, the remastered CD, or the 192/24 stream.
tomcy6's avatar
tomcy6
2,541 posts
 
George you should read that review again.

According to Tom Fine the new CD sounds better than the previous two releases on CD. He says that this reissue, "kept the original dynamics and tonal qualities."  He says the 1994 reissue "is somewhat dynamics-crunched," but the dynamic range database has two separate entries for the 1994 reissue and even it is not compressed.

I haven’t heard of anyone saying the Qobuz version is compressed and there’s no reason it should be.

Remasters are often crunched, but sometimes they get it right. Older is not always better.



tomcy6's avatar
tomcy6
2,541 posts
 
You're right tony,  The Stereophile review is talking about CD 1 of the 50th Anniversary set as being the best, no doubt there.
tomcy6's avatar
tomcy6
2,541 posts
 
You can find discussion of sound quality along with a lot of other stuff at this link:

CSNY Deja Vu 50th anniversary reissue - May 14, 2021 * | Page 162 | Steve Hoffman Music Forums

The Steve Hoffman Music Forums is where you’ll find the most discussions of sound quality.  People start receiving this album around page 140 of the above thread. 
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