Interesting move...

Posted by: jon h on 30 August 2008

There is an interesting move on the Linn Records site -


Discuss...
Posted on: 30 August 2008 by james n
Great idea - shame about most of the Linn catalogue though Frown
Posted on: 30 August 2008 by kuma
I agree.

It's irrelevant cuz, their music is not something I would listen to. ( most audiophile ones anyways )
Posted on: 30 August 2008 by Steve S1
Agreed. Vast bulk of the material is not to most people's taste so who cares how well it's mastered? Which, btw, is far more important than the recorded format.

Steve
Posted on: 30 August 2008 by u5227470736789439
I don't think that most great and significant musical performances will ever appear in 96/24 Hi-res. It is conceded in the industry that these rates yield a result not distnguishable by the absolute majority of music lovers from playing the master directly, and so what price for effectively issuing a master? The original cost perhaps, as it will be copied and file shared, whatever copy-protection might be implemented.

I am afraid to say, but the only recordings that will appear in Hi-res are those not worth sharing in the first place.

So let us get on with enjoying music in the best replay we can apply to what has been and will be issued, and concentrate on great music making, and optimise the quality of what actually will be issued - and has been of course - be that with a top CD played, LP Turntable, or the newly wonderful and simple world of Hard Disc based replay.

Don't hold your breath for worthwhile Hi-res reissues, of the greatest music making ...

George
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by garyi
£2.5k, and you don't get the sleeve notes.

HahahaHAHHahahaHAhahhhahah
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by Steve S1
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:
£2.5k, and you don't get the sleeve notes.

HahahaHAHHahahaHAhahhhahah


I thought that. Then I remembered how often I looked at sleeve notes. I read them when I first get it (you can do that online), then err that's it.

Not as big an issue to me as the lack of mainstream music. Frown

Audiophile labels usually produce such dross, with just a handful of exceptions.
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by BigH47
quote:
I thought that. Then I remembered how often I looked at sleeve notes. I read them when I first get it


?
You can remember ALL the sleeve notes you have read?
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by Steve S1
quote:
Originally posted by BigH47:
quote:
I thought that. Then I remembered how often I looked at sleeve notes. I read them when I first get it


?
You can remember ALL the sleeve notes you have read?


Oh H, you are such a card.

Steve
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by BigH47
Winker
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by jon h
I thought an interesting point was that here is the output of just one small record company, and you are looking at over a Tb of storage.
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by kuma
The storage is cheap and it'll always going on the downhill.

I don't see any problem with it.
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by Steve S1
Kuma's right. The storage capacity will be a complete non-issue in quite short time. Bandwidth for downloads (at least in the UK) will be a tougher nut to crack, but my guess is that a couple of years will see more strides made in that direction.

The point I don't altogether buy is the extra quality. I have some of Linn's 24/96 samples and they do sound very good. But the difference between those and the very best 16/44 is tiny. It's all down to the mastering and production and the fact that so little CD music gets what it should have to maximise what can be achieved.

I have moved to Mac/Dac and can play 24/96 but I see it as an additional feature, not a driver for the change. I moved over because my CDs sound better ripped and replayed this way than I've heard from any CDP up to 555 level.

Steve
Posted on: 31 August 2008 by pcstockton
I LOVE how everyone thinks storage is so cheap. $200 for a 1TB drive is NOT cheap.

Dont you understand that unless you want 10 external drives, you will be spending alot on storage space.

As HDs come down in price, your storage space demands go up accordingly.

My first HD was a 200GB WD Passport ($150).... i filled that up with my favorite CDs in V0 MP3s in no time what so ever.

My 750GB ($250) drive was great until i started ripping to FLAC only. Then I delved into 24/96 and instantly required another 750GB ($200).

Then I wanted to actually back up my data and was running thin on space again so I got two 1tb drives ($330 each).

So now i have two 1 TB drives with 1.5 of it backed up to the 750s. And the 1tb are just about full.

So I bought a 1TB internal HD ($200) and will buy another in a few days. I saw one in Portland for $180, and I will be in town.

That rings up to $1640 in hard drive space and I have about 2TBs at my disposal for listening and everything is fully backed up.

Decidedly NOT cheap. And as the 2 and 4 tb single enclosure drives come out, my needs expand just beyond. Making me require two of them to stay on top of things.

So my future purchase of two 2TB raided drives will net me 2TBs of space with only two drives to look at..... but that is another $1200...

not cheap.

I can only cringe and wait for the 32/192 recordings..... Trust me, they will be here in a few years.
Posted on: 01 September 2008 by thesherrif
Well hang on a minute there pcs, let's not confuse two issues here. Just because your requirements for storage seem to increase by the day doesn't mean that the cost of storage isn't cheap. You say yourself that you once bought 200Gb for $150, and now the cost of 1Tb is $200 ?? To me the cost of storage has reduced dramatically ! The analogy to your argument is the chap who trades in his mini for a 4 wheel drive gas guzzler when the price of fuel drops 10%, and then complains that petrol is expensive !
Posted on: 01 September 2008 by PMR
quote:
I can only cringe and wait for the 32/192 recordings..... Trust me, they will be here in a few years.
And worse for it!

Given that the sampler will have to process data 4 times more quickly than the current 44kHz sample rate, it's more than likely there will be more digital errors due to performance issues within the sampler. This stuff is complex! I give you that 24bit might be better, but I would suggest that the average human with hearing from 20Hz to 20kHz will not hear the additional samples.

Just a marketing con to be honest, unless you're a dog.

Peter
Posted on: 01 September 2008 by thesherrif
quote:
Originally posted by PMR:
quote:
I can only cringe and wait for the 32/192 recordings..... Trust me, they will be here in a few years.
And worse for it!

Given that the sampler will have to process data 4 times more quickly than the current 44kHz sample rate, it's more than likely there will be more digital errors due to performance issues within the sampler. This stuff is complex! I give you that 24bit might be better, but I would suggest that the average human with hearing from 20Hz to 20kHz will not hear the additional samples.

Just a marketing con to be honest, unless you're a dog.

Peter


Yeah but hold on...... the sample rate has nothing to do with the frequency of the audio that is produced. It just enables a more accurate reproduction of the frequency , be it 15Hz or 15kHz and that benefit will be more noticeable at higher frequencies. (SACD samples at 2.822mHz which is 64 times the red book 44.1kHz.)
Posted on: 01 September 2008 by PMR
quote:
Originally posted by thesherrif:
Yeah but hold on...... the sample rate has nothing to do with the frequency of the audio that is produced. It just enables a more accurate reproduction of the frequency , be it 15Hz or 15kHz and that benefit will be more noticeable at higher frequencies. (SACD samples at 2.822mHz which is 64 times the red book 44.1kHz.)
Yes, but the human ear cannot discern the difference, so why bother? Lavry has an excellent document covering this very argument.
Posted on: 01 September 2008 by thesherrif
Yep, I don't disagree. I'd rather have more bits !
Posted on: 02 September 2008 by pcstockton
quote:
Originally posted by thesherrif:
Well hang on a minute there pcs, let's not confuse two issues here. Just because your requirements for storage seem to increase by the day doesn't mean that the cost of storage isn't cheap. You say yourself that you once bought 200Gb for $150, and now the cost of 1Tb is $200 ??


Right... but my point is the following.

That 200GB drive was perfect for my needs a few years ago. Now it is unusable and laughable to have a drive that small.

So although the prices may be coming down, it costs the same due to needing more space. I have bought and ripped 100s of new CDs, and finished up all of my vinyl transfers.

Your point is valid only if I never rip anymore cds and never increase my collection. Or I am content to be using 8 smaller hard drives rather than two large ones.

Keep in mind that as you "upgrade" in drive size, you cannot recoup the cost of the smaller, now obsolete hard drive.

Storage costs might have come down 50%... but my collection has exceeded that rate. So in the end, I am spending the same amount of money, I just now have more space as well.
Posted on: 02 September 2008 by ferenc
quote:
Originally posted by PMR:
quote:
Originally posted by thesherrif:
Yeah but hold on...... the sample rate has nothing to do with the frequency of the audio that is produced. It just enables a more accurate reproduction of the frequency , be it 15Hz or 15kHz and that benefit will be more noticeable at higher frequencies. (SACD samples at 2.822mHz which is 64 times the red book 44.1kHz.)
Yes, but the human ear cannot discern the difference, so why bother? Lavry has an excellent document covering this very argument. See Here


Tim de Paravicini seems to think differently:

"The original digital system of CD, with 16 bits and 44.1kHz sampling, was what the mathematicians deemed to be the minimum acceptable to human hearing for so-called hi-fi. They never looked at all the artifacts and all the problems. And they never did enough analysis of the human hearing mechanism to realize that we don't stop hearing at 20kHz—people can discern and detect sound up to 45kHz. We have, as I say to people, an equivalent risetime of 11 microseconds in the hearing mechanism. And the ability to resolve detail in those digital systems wasn't quite good enough.

"In analog, you can change the thing and keep on aspiring to perfection without a compatibility issue. With digital, once you change any parameter, you've got a compatibility issue. Now, you can record on ProTools at 24-bit/192kHz, but it's not compatible with CD. I did my own summation—and this is from 20 years ago—that if we did 384kHz at 24-bit, we'll have a system that will resolve on a par with the best analog. That's the holy grail."

http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/1107parav/index1.html