Even when making recordings from vinyl to cassette, in some aspects it sounds better, though overall in this particular example the turntable sounds better than the deck. Tape sound appears to have a flow and continuity that vinyl lacks.
Lol. These speakers are better than thoes... This format is better than that... Artist don’t care how it’s "untended" to be heard. Format is not not part of thier intention, becoming a famous artist, or expressing art or opinion through music is the intention wether live or recored, and cd wasn’t always around to be format "of choice for intention" My Avalon are NOT better than my ADS, MY upgrades Lascala are not BETTER than my Altec model 19 (when comparing orange to orange) There is no bad speaker, or bad stereo, there is only a poor APPLICATION. mp3 has a place, receivers have a place, inexpensive gear has a place ect. Tube vs. Solid state, there is no better or worse. This stuff aint human it can be better or worse. It’s our own individual preference. My OPINION does not make it better or worse because it cant be either. Application Application Application Ever thought we have been chasing a pipe dream with the "best" system? Maybe one is more "accurate" Or smooth, or open, or articulate, or less fatigued, or dynamic, some can be measured. It’s not better, it’s diffetent, and not my preferred sound. I’ve owned, or still own and currently run all the systems I’ve mentioned. Always have 4-6 completely different setups hooked up in my home at different locations. Some are vinyl only, solid state and tube alike. Horn and cone alone. Expensive and inexpensive, not Better and worse. My point, if your all missing it, is the terminology. Incorrect use of the term causes chasing of tail in audio pursuit For ME. So, I’ve decided within myself to use it for what it was INTENDED, Which is my employment. I really like my Lascala setup with tube mono amps, Fisher 400cx preamp, And I thoroughly enjoy a receiver and ADS speakers, For the garage? There is no BETTER application (to me) of gear that a simple cheap integrated and Bluetooth media access to my networks. (Which has 3tb of high res access) cheap and convenient! Btw, I'm not looking for agreement, or cosigners. My OPINION is not a discussion. I've expressed how I feel from 30 years of listening and running (chasing) thousands of pieces and the "better"bug. Dont let the better bug bite, spend your time listening to the music instead. The wheel hasnt been changed in a long time, yup. Round does indeed work best. Still, the fuzz on my ADS domes no longer rules my life, acceptance was not the key. Un-acceptance was. I simply will not accept the better bug, and my life is better for it. Even in aspects OUTSIDE audio. For the most part... cuz I do relapse from time to time..;) Bye
A good example is the Sheffield Labs D2D of Dave Grusin "Discovered Again." Listen to the D2D recording, and then listen the Seffield Labs "Treasury" recording of that same album. The Treasury version is from the backup tape recording of that same session. The D2D record is light years ahead of the tape version, sonically. Absolutely no contest.....
Good vinyl can have as much as 70dB dynamic range on the outer edge.
Its easily higher than that (I run an LP mastering operation); but compression and tape are often the reasons why you don't see that in practice.
Direct to disc recordings will not solve playback problems, one of the reasons why it was virtually abandoned.
Nothing solves playback problems on the record side :)
The reason you don't see much in the way of direct to disk is simply because its really hard to do! Musicians have to play all the tracks on a side perfectly and that's assuming you don't overcut because a performer is playing 10db louder in record than he was when the levels were set!
So its a bit of a trick but when it all comes together its magic.
Bingo! I liken digital to the Porterhouse steak that Jeff Goldblum sent through the transporter pod that came out in the second pod in the movie, The Fly. It was molecularly discombobulated and reassembled. It look like steak, it cooked like steak. But it didn’t taste like Porterhouse steak. It tasted horrible.
Geoffkait, I've been trying to put across the "emotional involvement"(of analog) idea for a long time. I used examples such as: thinking about the next song, or doing something else, and admiring the quality of the sound-all of which is an indication of digital's lack of "emotional involvement". Some people think digital is more accurate. To them I say, if it doesn't get this immeasurable quality, how can you say it's more accurate?
It’s a supreme irony that the single most important advantage that CDs have ON PAPER -dynamic range - which is obviously (on paper) what, 40 or 50 times greater than vinyl or audio cassette? You know what I’m talking about. 90 dB dynamic range and 90 dB Signal to Noise Ratio. It sure sold me. OK, the irony is with all the aggressive dynamic range compression over the past twenty years the dynamic range of the highly touted CD has been compacted down to all red for many CDs, some SACDs, quite a few LPs. One need only take a gander at the Official Dynamic Range Database to see what the industry has wrought. But the situation is even worse than that. Even with uncompressed CDs the sound quality of digital lacks the color, tonality, and fullness in the bass that vinyl and cassettes provide as a matter of course. The King has no clothes.
Now...recovery hopefully...unlimited net bw and disc storage measns no need for compression...mp3..dead and now a new generation and back to 1985 to start again where we left off. The King is dead Long live the King :)
Cd quality is the nearest you can get ro how the artist and engineers n producers wanted it and HEARD it in the control room.....fact. Btw....napster and mp3 is the reason our industry has'nt progressed. We had a whole generation who expectations of sound quality were set lower than cassette....that means no dvd no investment in playback hardware manufacturing no studios recording dvd quality...because their numbers are now so low due to the pc/mac home studio..and of course broadcast...we get DAB.....and thats it...even that is subject to corruption by greedy corps who put 4 stations where 1 was inteded and cut ti bw.! But
Really gentlemen!....many half truths and non scientific bla bla. Who was it said that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing...having worked with sound 30yrs and more to the point here Dolby Labs 7yrs i can only that few here actually know what they are talking about....you at least owe it to fellow forum users to research your topics before launching into heated arguments about what are ...it would appear are personal preferences. Just one more thing..why are we still using CD 16bit 44.1 as a reference when we were promised Digital Versatile Disk as the natuural (DVD)successor...24bit 96k should have followed...and we wouldnt be talking rubbish about retro mediums which somehow have been hyped into fashion(for "fashion"is what it truly is...i mean vinyl ...and i hear cassette is also dragging us back from the future....rediculous...if your Cd sounds worse than vinly then you have either rubbish d to a's or the mastering was a farce......or as is more likely you find dynamucs tiring to listen to.
Yeah, Studer and monoblocks. You may not need a preamp, you've got it in the deck. I think, 7.5 ips two track is also acceptable in many cases. One pair of interconnects and a pair of short speaker cables, and nothing between speakers.
I'm not going to get into why tape sounds, or does not sound, better because I really have no idea why. But I can tell you via first hand experience at many audio shows, R-T-R just sounds excellent. That's why dealers like MBL bring them. You can hear the resolution and air jump up on master tapes played at 15 IPS. At the LAAS, I remember the Evolution Acoustics room with Dartzeel and a Studer playing Peter Frampton's "Lines on my Face" just blew everyone in the room away. So dynamic and beautiful; very live with a ton of air. I also remember that the monobloc amps had power meters on them and though music was playing at perhaps a few watts per channel, there were some peaks in excess of 500 WPC and it just sounded amazing. Never got fatiguing in any way and for me, I just wanted more. It was an amazing demo and it proved the very significant importance of the source and the source media.
The purpose of this thread is to call attention to the tape and tape machines. Whatever anyone has to say. I think, many agree that there is something that makes the tape sound more natural. As for the cut-off frequency extremes that somehow make the sound more pleasing, I disagree. The biggest difference is in the midrange itself. Vinyl playback is a very 'bumpy road' if you imagine the way stylus moves, not to mention the transformation of the mechanical energy into electrical. Tape is quite different, though there is a tape movement. Studers are first of all famous for their transport. I said that I use LAST head preservative when playing cassettes, I didn't say that it slightly improves the playback, you can easily hear it. In a manner of speaking, it improves the transport. I am not sure it's a correct way to put it but tape appears to give more 'sound saturation'.
In order to avoid confusion, why dont you make another thread as this one is stated to be about Cassette tape recordings of Vinyl and how they sound better.
You can't share anything of your vast experience with Geoff (or get him to admit he is wrong) even though your experience with compresion and punch is standard audio industry practice. Geoff is as slippery as the snale oil he purveys liberally on this site.
^ Exactly, Geoff ... My very ´eavy.... very ´umble Uriah Heep Island Tapes, UK c cassettes from the Golden Age of Recording Technology til 1972 before Noise Reduction outperform modern 24 bit digital Japanese UH CDs hands down, both in dynamics (natural flow of music) and details (nuances) not to mention musicality. Despite they are mass produced using high speed copying. They sound quite incredible in a car as well, still after 40+ years. Noise reduction only lessens tape noise (as it was meant to do obviously) but flattens real dynamics. Practically noise reduction on tape is exacly the same thing as backround noise in vinyl play. I never cared either of them, they are just backround noise due to the media in question. The actual signal on tape/record (recorded music) is all I have cared for. I have never used noise reductions whatsoever. That´s other peoples´ fantasy. Furthermore, I never couldn´t stand digital distortions (whatever they may be) but like analog ones because they sound quite natural (right) to my senses. For me noise reduction is just another form of compression. What a bloody waste of time :^ )
french_fries - eggs ackley!! It isn’t really a technical argument in my opinion. If it was a technical argument the CD would always win. That’s what’s so frustrating!! 😛 It’s what you like to listen to. Music soothes the savage breast. By and large CDs are not soothing, they’re irritating. Tape is a natural medium. It breathes. The music is almost always more "beautiful" on tape than CD. CD by comparison, especially untweaked CD, sounds like paper mache, thin, rolled off, airless, thumpy and bland. Let’s compare Heifetz on CD to Heifetz on audio cassette. Same violin concerto. Same recording. What you will find is the CD version sounds super clean but threadbare and lifeless, whereas the humble cassette sounds rich, sweet and full, like Heifetz’ violin really sounds. CD doesn’t do air or sweet very well.
I love tape but i "believe" from a non-technical point of view that due to some smoothing (cut-off) of the high frequencies and excellent midrange and mid-bass response, that the sound is very pleasant and inviting to my ears. Vinyl noise and some flaws in the original recording can often fall more into the background on tape (at a more typical 7.5ips) so 50-15,000Hz. "ends up" being easier on the ears. CD's and vinyl have more extension and dynamics but also are more revealing, and can be more distracting/annoying. I have not as yet heard a FULLY optimized tape front-end though- a second generation copy of a master tape played back on a Studer with specially designed EXTERNAL playback amps, or a UHA tricked-out Tascam Br-20 (unfortunately). The guys at the audio shows are far luckier than I. Again though, i was raised on R-t-Reel tape and I still love it for some strange reason. Like getting out microphones and playing guitar with a friend. Lot's of fun.
Compression is added to get "punch". As a recording engineer I learned this from others and use it myself. If your kick sounds loose and flabby, add compression. It will give it punch. If the bass is a bit defused and lost in the mix, and compression it will give it punch and sit better in the mix.
Compression and punch in audio engineering terms and practice go hand in hand.
Ray
With all due respect I’ll stick with my definition of "punch," which one hears in live performances due to outstanding dynamic range and on recordings that have not (rpt not) been overly compressed dynamic range wise. Your "loose and flabby" and "diffused and lost in the mix" descriptions don’t actually compute for me. No offense. Most likely we’re talking about two different things. When I I hear CDs that have been overly compressed they lack "punch." That’s why I don’t like overly compressed CDs. They are loud, I’ll grant you that. Want some examples of what I’m talking about? Dylan’s Modern Times, Stones’ Bridges to Babalon and Steel Wheels and A Bigger Bang and any Radiohead CD. No Punch! MONODYNAMIC. New word! 😀 In my world music IS dynamics. You seem to be saying that the overly aggressive dynamic range compression of music in the last twenty years is actually a GOOD IDEA. Cases of overly aggressive compression can be confirmed in the Official Dynamic Range Database.
R2R is a different story. R2R using Dolby SR can be argued to be as good as, or better than, hi rez digital. D2D never made it because it is essentially a live recording.
Let's return to real tape machines - open reel decks. In addition, cartridges color the sound like hell. Even if vinyl was better you cannot fully make use of it - no cartridge will be able to extract all the information from the groove and present it as a complete flow as opposed to imperfectly connected elements, and that's plus coloration. It would be interesting to hear what engineers think. Direct to disc recordings will not solve playback problems, one of the reasons why it was virtually abandoned.
Please enjoy your cassette recordings, as that is what it is ultimately all about. However, I could never imagine how a cassette without the use of Dolby would be an improvement in any regard. However, I respect the fact that you do. I have owned many TOTL cassette decks and without the use of Dolby they are an immediate and obvious compromise, IMO.
raymonda, you should've read carefully what I wrote. I didn't say that cassette sounded better in all aspects of the performance. It is not all or nothing, you know. I never use any dolby. I also use top cables when recording and comparing the two. I read there is an idea that vintage equipment is less cable dependent. That appears to be a mythology. I tried five different interconnects that I have and difference varies from moderate to huge. And of course I record directly from the phono, not using tape out of the amp.
Maybe I’m wrong, but if your cassettes sound better than your turntable, then something is wrong with your vinyl set up or hardware. Cassettes can sound good but ultimately I find vinyl better. Now, if Dolby SR was used for all cassette mastering and releases that would be very interesting, indeed. The problem is it wasn’t.
I did an enormous amount of live to two track analog recording back in the day and cassette was only used as a convenience not as SOTA. Hey, but it worked and I made some nice recordings.
Compression is added to get "punch". As a recording engineer I learned this from others and use it myself. If your kick sounds loose and flabby, add compression. It will give it punch. If the bass is a bit defused and lost in the mix, and compression it will give it punch and sit better in the mix.
Compression and punch in audio engineering terms and practice go hand in hand.
Even if direct to disc can theoretically sound slighly better in some respects, I think, tape will still have an edge in smoothness and continuity, perhaps in drive as well. And think of the level of the equipment that you would need to get that out of the groove. Continuum Caliburn with Ypsilon phono and SUT, anyone ?
Yeah, some guys 'bake' the tape, use LAST tape and head preservatives and do other things. I use LAST head preservative that ideally should be applied before playing each cassette. My deck probably has 5000-6000 hours of playtime on it and the head has a minimal wear.
Doug Sax proved the superiority of direct-to-disk LP's over tape recording way back in the early 70's. Take a direct mic feed from a band playing live, record it onto the best tape machine you have (even the best in the world, that of Water Lily's Kavi Alexander), and cut a d-2-d LP at the same time, comparing the two formats to the direct feed. The d-2-d wins, hands down. Compare a d-2-d LP to any tape recording you can name. No contest.
It might be one of the big ironies of audio that tapes degrade, even though I suspect when properly cared for it’s probably not a huge problem, and that’s why digital came along. Another big irony is that solid state replaced tube electronics due to "reliability issues." Cassettes when cared for just a little do not degrade. First, tape has been the first step in most recordings ever since digital first reared its ugly head. Second because digital has been playing second fiddle to vinyl and even cassettes like forever in some VERY important respects such as emotional involvement and musicality. Yes, I know what you’re thinking, "But digital is getting better!" Perfect Sound Forever! Horray! 😛
I have couple of Vertex cassettes that I played more than 500 times. I almost never rewind or fastforward. They still play just as good as when they were new. And this particular tape is Maxell back coated tape that they used it their reels. They might be good for 500 more plays, I'll see. You can also modify decks, add outboard tube playback head amp, have custom headblocks for two track and four track recordings and playback and do other things. Great open reel deck is a true audiophile machine. You can even use it as an active preamp, as I sometimes do.
This is an interesting conversation. The best playback in magnetic tape would be a half track machine running at 15ips and recorded directly from the studio master which most likely would have been 2". Tape (of any sort) also has potential problems such as drop outs (metal particles actually falling off the tape) and having levels set too high during the recording process leading to "print through". I would love to be able to hear music played back from a first generation half track format. Unfortunately, tape degrades over time and is not a stable source. That's why we have digital now.
stringreen Its impossible to get audiophile sound from a car system.
>>>Let’s get real. It’s impossible to get audiophile sound from many HOME SYSTEMS. More to the point, it’s possible to get very good sound from car systems. WITHOUT much effort. Let’s see, you got battery power, no house AC issues, the car is metal so act as as RFI/EMI shield. Obviously you'd want to replace the fuse with an aftermarket fuse and the acoustic space in a car is small, a lot like near field listening, no worries about having to use a lot of acoustic treatment. Maybe a little wouldn’t hurt. One assumes the CD player buffers the data so you don’t have to worry about vibration, anyway the shock absorbers act as a seismic vibration system for very low frequencies. Finally use audio cassettes anyway. They sound better. Problem solved!
BIG SHAME !!! But it's not in museum, there is a number of people very serious about R2R recording and playback. Vinyl is great for archive, though, and back-up.
All important recordings are originally on tapes, R2R. Is it just me who still after all these decades keeps wondering why this best media never came popular. Vinyl records, c cassette tapes, CDs and all that modern digital finally put the R2R into museum, so to speak... Shame, isn´t it ?
Maxell Metal Vertex is the very best cassette tape, and my deck is not even specifically calibrated for it. I'll get Otari or Studer open reel deck in time and then the turntable, any turntable, will not sound better in any aspect. I will also be able to play master tape dubs if I can find them. Yes, I too think the resonances in vinyl playback is a big factor, but I suspect it's not the whole story.
Inna- memory is letting me down. The glory days transferring a fresh from the bin record- recorded to premium cassette for the car, seem like yesterday.
I used most of the popular brands including Maxell. Don’t remember Vertex? is it a chrome or metal? Memory recalls a really well recorded album on regular tape was just as good as the "expensive" cassettes. I knew a few audio guys that were obsessive with making the best recordings for their just introduced "high end car audio" Playing a store bought album on cassette was a crime.
1979/80-hearing a trunk full of Fosgate amps and electronic crossovers feeding drivers in the rear deck and doors changed my idea of amazing sound in a car.
Hearing Floyd "DSOM"/Springsteen "Darkness" AND feeling it was an experience equal to a nice home system.
Huh? You were the one generalizing and preaching about how tape was used for compression. Which in itself is pretty dumb since almost all great recordings in History were recorded on, you guessed it, tape. I was just responding to the ignorant thing you said, which was itself off topic. Tape is a natural medium. It breathes. That’s why the OP reported the tape copy sometimes sounds better than the vinyl original. Case closed.
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