Explain me High Resolution

Hi Iver,

No I don't have a similar experience, as I have so few hi-res files and usually no comparable CD rip (I use dB too). I am wondering if your hi-res file is sourced from a red book standard master ie. lower bit rate and resolution. There are music review magazines in the UK that examine the spectra of hi-res recordings and pronounce on the possible real quality of the original material.

Having said all that Norah Jones is not likely to cause many hi-fis to break into a sweat. I have a copy on NAS and it is 'modern' sounding, meaning (to me) it seems like all the EQ & fader positions were preset before she arrived!

Hi Hafler,

To be honoust, I doubt the quality of the files too. However, I purchased them from the HdTracks website !

strange !

Iver

As ever Ivor, providence is all. I've got some 16/44 files that sound better than anything I've got in HiRes. However, I do have some 16/44 and 24/96/192 twins and although some sound the same (or different but not necessarily better), in my case the HiRes stuff sounds better in the majority of cases. I have noticed a tendency for complex material rendered in 24Bit to resolve better and sound more coherent and dynamic, e.g. big orchestral pieces and Prog Rock - which account for 80%+ of my listening.  More simply arranged and recorded stuff, I'm not so sure.

I've had a bad HiRes day, now you bring it up. Against my better judgement I bought a remix of an awfully recorded albumn and after scouring the forums went for the 24/96. Not only is it the same dynamically brick walled disaster it has ever been (and I don't like the remix but that's another discussion), the frequency plot also brick walled at 20KHz. So what use is 44.1, let alone 96? 

Ah well.....

Do they offer a "satisfaction or your money back guarantee"? I'd make a discreet enquiry.

Having said all that I think I'm going to make hi-res a target for my top 50 recordings only, the ones that have survived 40+ years of music collecting, and delete the rips. That way I can have peace of mind that I cannot 'look back and get turned into a pillar of salt'  , I can put my feet up safe in the knowledge I know no better!

Knowing your tastes Harry, this is Vapor Trails Remixed ! It's a miss then ? From what I've read David Bottrill seemed to have done the best he could to get something out of the original mess, and on the SH forums some tend to agree.

(Sorry for the digression Iver. I'm afraid I cannot really contribute, I don't have enough hi-res albums to have duplicates yet, and I try to avoid that anyway.)

Hey Wat,

tx for your feedback ! What don't you agree with me ? Is your High-Res better sounding than the original CD? Could be that my system is not capable of showing the difference, and yours is. Could of course be my ears ? did you also buy thr high res from HdTracks.

I also agree with Harry that in the majority of the cases, my high res albums sound better than the original, but certainly not in all cases.

cheers,

iver

Yeah. Not much deduction necessary

It sounded promising if still somewhat leden in the office and I made a point of not doing any analysis until I'd sent it to the NAS and grabbed the iPad. But it sounded bloody awful on the posh system for a number of reasons, not least the still appalling lack of DR.

I should have known better. No, scratch that - I DO know better. But it's Rush. I mean, what can I say?! I had to do it.

Hi Harry,

Yes, still compressed but less distorted, perhaps? I haven't had a chance to listen properly as it's been Steven Wilson Week here (Bristol Colston Hall gig was fab). I've ordered it on vinyl but couldn't resist the CD at £5.99 in HMV.

HDTracks merely sell what the labels deliver to them. Good stuff and shit, same as any other reseller. They come in for a lot of stick and they are not accommodating to refunds on quality grounds although they play fair if technical difficulties come to light or arise with downloads. At least if you buy a CD from e.g. Amazon you'll get a refund if you don't like it, although I doubt Amazon et al would refund on a download if you complained about poor sound quality. Buying downloads is for me reminiscent of the old days buying vinyl, when online didn't exist and you frequently had to like it or lump it, even if what came out of the sleeve sounded damaged.

that's correct Wat ..... I definately have plenty examples where the High Res version is far superior to the original CD (i.e. Jazz at the Pawn Shop), but there are a few where I have serrious doubts like the one we discussed above

Unfortunately with this surge in interest in high-res music, some record labels see an opportunity to rip-off their customers again.

recently I read a blog-post by Mark Waldrep telling that one of his friends, a mastering engineer, had to create high-res rmasterings using vinyl cutting EQ-ed master tapes, i.e. Tapes that were EQ-ed for use in vinyl production.

this is definitely not the material you want to use for true high-res digital playback.

Due to the limitations of vinyl for playback, these masterings have an increased EQ around 15 kHz to compensate for the limited capability for high frequencies in vinyl playback. Also low frequencies are turned into mono because of playback limitations.

the reason they are using vinyl masters is due to rights issues, so they don't have to pay rights where to would have to when using true masters or CD masters.

this material is flawed in terms of what high-res digital playback is capable of.

So they've spotted another rip-off possibility, which most unaware customers wouldn't know of / notice anyhow.

Welcome to the greed driven reality.

Cheers

Aleg

Hi iver, I do find hires or hidef copies hit and miss.

There are so many variables in the mastering chain that I feel perhaps a  lot of the original hidef material is lost... Or never there..

So really perhaps it's a comparison between Redbook, vinyl and hidef masters...

Now it is true to say that if I have been listening to some of my hidef material and then listen to Redbook, the latter can sound slightly curtailed and compressed. However if I start my music listening session listening to that Redbook version, I don't notice this at all... so much of this down to our brain I guess...

So I don't often bother with hidef now unless there is a particular remastering that is noteworthy.

Simon

I do not use hi-res downloads but shouldn't the sellers give potential buyers a sample to evaluate before they buy? Like Amazon does with MP3s. Make available a 30 second sample of each song on an LP before you buy. Run it through your DAC and make an informed decision. It seems to me a very big marketing advantage over CDs or vinyl. You could actually hear exactly what a (portion of a) song is going to sound like in your home before you have to buy.

Nice. That guy really has got an excess of talent. 

Re. distortion. There's still a lot of mush in it and modulation of levels. It will sound OK in the car but alas the turd will be forever unpolished. Whilst the band are are to be commended for putting their hands up and trying to address it, the emphasis has necessarily been on trying to rescue information which inevitably and unfortunately cannot address the fact that there is no true DR. 

It could happen. It should happen. At the moment the business comes from relatively early adopters who are willing to take a punt. We are a grain of sand on the music buying beach, albeit a profitable one.

Here http://www.realhd-audio.com/?p=1805 another story about a botched up job regarding a new high profile high-res release.

these cases explain why you sometimes don't have any difference between CD and high-res formats.

you need to have provenance of what was done or have faith in a company you know does a good job.

Thanks Aleg. Interesting read.

The Macca and Sting examples reflect my thought that, generally speaking, you have to go back to pre-1984 to find source material with no digital signature. And it once again raises the question; "What's the point of buying vinyl recorded during the digital age?"  It also might raise the notion that CDs are not as obsolete as many have recently and vociferously contended.

Hi Iver, I think you will be in the business and hit of miss with the high def stuff. The reasons for that are varying from:

1. Sometimes the mastering for the high def is done completely different than the CD one (so perhaps not better or worse but just different ...leading to differences).

2. Just up sampling of the same base

3. If we look nowadays at the way music is recorded very often the recording is done to sound well on the radio - so less dynamic, hence the high res even if it is genuine will have a more difficult time to express the differences.

.....

So conclusion - potentially go for the well known and recommended options of recordings in the forum or out of different forum sources...., or accept that you sometimes are disappointed..,and you could reduce your hit and miss buy opening a new post on ....Dear forum member - please tell me your recommendation on excellent high res recordings...

Bert, if you go back to the earlier days of commercial music and mass market pop records, I think you'll find that mastering has been optimized for low fi mass market replay systems. Joe Meek was a pioneer of such techniques along with Les Paul back in the 60s.. Both seemingly mastering their craft independent of each other on different sides of the Atlantic.

Distortion, eq, reverb, and compression were all techniques to make music stand out on cheap radios or record players... it can certainly sound quite crude, albeit interesting, on accurate and revealing replay equipment. No different IMO than much on iTunes with AAC today... Somethings never change..

Simon

Hi Simon,

Of course your statement is right, as always. I only have the sad impression it's happening even more nowadays than before.

Hi Joe,

A good reason for buying a digitally recorded vinyl album is the is mastering is usually different. For example, if you check out the DR Database website you will find that Random Access Memories has a dr of 8 for the CD and 12 or 13 for the vinyl. The HD tracks version is only 8. The vinyl sounds stunning, by the way.

Keith

I believe that "Come Away With Me" was originally recorded and mastered on analogue tape - in which case it's not really a very good choice of album to investigate the difference between hi-res and redbook - unless you are wanting higher resolution tape hiss or wow and flutter. And since the HD releases are re-masters, you aren't really comparing like with like - a different mastering engineer will produce a different balance, use a different tape deck, the masters may have degraded ... who knows!

I would suggest it's more useful to make such comparisons using known high- resolution digital recordings. For example, there are plenty of recent releases from Linn records - some of the classical ones are prize-winning - that you can download in Studio Master Quality, and  red-book quality, and of which  you can buy the corresponding CD. To be absolutely pedantic, you could even downsample the Studio Master version yourself, using something like sox, and then make all the relevant comparisons.

It's a pity that so much of the "HD" market is actually concerned with decades old, probably degraded, analogue masters. 

Hey LikesMusic,

" ...I believe that "Come Away With Me" was originally recorded and mastered on analogue tape ... " that might be the reason

Thanks for sorting out ! Just to clarify, I absolutely understand and respect the idea of High Res. I have many Hi-Res recordings that sound stunning. Just the above example disappointed me. My conclusion is to be more critical before purchasing a high-def album. It would be great if one could upfront "judge" the value add of the high-res recording.

Cheers,

Iver

great email ! :-)

thanks for all your help Wat !! appreciated !

Good evening Iver,

Just a question that 's not linked with the aforementioned subject : how do you manage to download from Hdtracks though you are located in the Netherlands I think

Thanks beforehand

Benedict