More Consensus That Streaming Is An Inferior Format & Not High End?

[PeterA]

I'd have gone with a second tier symphony orchestra followed by one of the best. Having both played in the latter's hall on following evenings.

Without much imagination one could level that playing field. It comes down to actual musical appreciation.

Despite broadcasting more noise. Today, there is a very good chance of my enjoying the second tier SO in this depiction transposed to digital.


Signs of actually being on stage, carrying over the energy, are wholly lacking from overproduced perfect top tier recordings today. Systems accommodate the composite choices of their era. I'm merely noting the trouble of reproducing the sound in vogue across multiple decades. As much as what resonates with any one person. Reading any further into this would be looking for confusion.

Rando, I think I understand what you are writing, and I think I agree with it. The set of values belonging to the designers of the gear in the recording engineers of a particular era are reflected in the products of that era. What we have in physical form from that time is a reflection of those values. Those values change over time, and seem different today than they were in the 50s and 60s, for example. Influences and goals and values matter in this process of creation. Listener values also matter later when those products are experienced.

Comparing state of the art approaches today in both recordings and gear can result in very different outcomes. And these outcomes are different from the state of the art systems and recordings from earlier eras.

They have just installed a mixing console in the orchestra section at Boston symphony hall eliminating a number of fairly good seats. As a fellow concert goer told me yesterday, things were just fine for 150 years, why change it?

 

[Amir]

This is good CD for checking Dynamics

 

[rando]

Rando, I think I understand what you are writing, and I think I agree with it. The set of values belonging to the designers of the gear in the recording engineers of a particular era are reflected in the products of that era. What we have in physical form from that time is a reflection of those values. Those values change over time, and seem different today than they were in the 50s and 60s, for example. Influences and goals and values matter in this process of creation. Listener values also matter later when those products are experienced.

Comparing state of the art approaches today in both recordings and gear can result in very different outcomes. And these outcomes are different from the state of the art systems and recordings from earlier eras.

Yes Peter, this was an attempt to cover a lot of ground without incurring a lot of history. My primary station throughout this topic has been reaching towards a view from increasingly afar. When we look at high end equipment. It is as a whole system taking many years to reach a point of reference. WBF currently boasts a high percentage of members having surveyed more than could be easily recounted in this regard.

The consensus here is rapidly moving away from state of the art towards reestablishing the high end. The most likely proponent of exposition on this site (Ron) won't need to be disturbed from a state of enjoyment. To denote a shift. One with less basis in price or establishing public awareness of exclusivity that have grown in recent years. I like the term you used, listener values.

They have just installed a mixing console in the orchestra section at Boston symphony hall eliminating a number of fairly good seats. As a fellow concert goer told me yesterday, things were just fine for 150 years, why change it?

One of many indicative examples of avoiding a complete break while establishing a steady movement away from state of the art.

 

[Blackmorec]

View attachment 103333
This is good CD for checking Dynamics

Hi Amir, Opera is not really my usual diet, although when I do hear it I ‘often’ very much enjoy it, so thanks for the heads up with this album. I thought I’d just dip in but ended staying nearly an hour. This is one of those albums where you get a physical side of the music…..you can feel the power of her voice as it activates the entire venue. A really glorious performance

 

[Amir]

Hi Amir, Opera is not really my usual diet, although when I do hear it I ‘often’ very much enjoy it, so thanks for the heads up with this album. I thought I’d just dip in but ended staying nearly an hour. This is one of those albums where you get a physical side of the music…..you can feel the power of her voice as it activates the entire venue. A really glorious performance

What is interesting in this record is it is very good for listening to different media (file vs CD) because it has least compression and when you hear the peaks you can compare which media is more comfort/relax at higher SPL.
Thank you

 

[Audire]

Actually no, my concert analogy is based on the premise that exactly the same music can sound different, depending on what is getting in its way. In my concert analogy its walls. In the CD discussion its noise and jitter.
I spent the first few years of my audio journey listening to 78s on my grandmother’s radio gram. I still remember a green box full of needles with a shaded-dog logo. That was the sound I got used to initially. Then my Grandmother bought me a Dansette record player, which I probably used for longer than any subsequent hi-fi (ha ha), so I certainly got used to that.
During the next 40 years I must have bought and sold 15 different CD players. Bought because I wanted perfect sound forever. Sold because it wasn’t . The point was, it wasn’t better or more enjoyable than my vinyl, so I do get your point. The problem however turned out to be the amount of noise and jitter that got in the way of the music played via those CDs. Remove that and CD sounds a lot, lot better and can finally compete with vinyl.

Streaming has noise issues as well. Everything in the audio chain produces noise. The key is learning to control it. The clicks and pops on some vinyl albums is noise as well. But we accept it saying it’s part of the experience. Streaming has a long way to go. It’s still not perfect - never will be…

 

[Blackmorec]

What is interesting in this record is it is very good for listening to different media (file vs CD) because it has least compression and when you hear the peaks you can compare which media is more comfort/relax at higher SPL.
Thank you

Hi Amir,
The album is very cleanly recorded, with no hardening or harshness or indeed anything recording wise that detracts from her wonderful voice, other than the mikes are at a distance that doesn’t catch mouth and breath sounds much so you get a more audience as opposed to intimate perspective, although you still get all the power. At the peaks, as you mention there’s enough energy to generate strong venue reflections which I can hear adding their contribution to both the atmosphere of the venue and the impression of venue size and volume. If all that ‘reflective’ energy is not fully resolved in terms of subtle timing, phase and frequency, then that treble energy will remain unresolved from the direct sound, increasing its energy level and making it sound uncomfortable. If the information is fully resolved it sound like she’s singing in a large reverberant venue with a high ceiling that she has the vocal power to absolutely light up.

 

[Blackmorec]

Streaming has noise issues as well. Everything in the audio chain produces noise. The key is learning to control it. The clicks and pops on some vinyl albums is noise as well. But we accept it saying it’s part of the experience. Streaming has a long way to go. It’s still not perfect - never will be…

Hi Audire,
Personally I’m not denying that streaming has noise issues. That’s at the very heart of this discussion. How to remove them, how to avoid them, how to clean them, how to block them whatever. The key is, as you say, actually controlling noise from wherever it comes, in whatever form it comes. And when you do, something magical happens and streaming sounds amazing. Better and better as you progress. Pure, dynamic, rhythmical, massively involving, totally immersive. , Streaming has a long way to go. Sure it does. I prefer to put it another way….We have a long way to go with streaming. We are only at the beginning but it can already sound great. There’s still a large number of areas we can address and clean up, however we’ve already done a lot of the basics and generated some massive improvements.

Of course if you look at streaming simply as music from a computer or music via a network thats like saying music from a radio or record player and we should compare it to the like. But if we say streaming of high-end quality music what we are talking about is a very sophisticated hi-fi system with network designed and optimised specifically to play great music from a cable in the wall.

 

[godofwealth]

It’s not just streaming that has noise issues. Digital PCM by definition has noise built in, which is cleverly obscured by brilliant marketing propaganda by Sony and Philips going back 45 years. When CDs first came out and were advertised as “perfect sound forever” — the liner notes on every CD ever made had a blurb at the back that said CDs offered “the best possible sound reproduction” (see attached marketing propaganda on every CD back then).

Cleverly, the specs often touted for the superiority of digital over analog quoted the S/N ratio at 0 dB — the loudest possible signal when all 16 bits are active (thereby giving a theoretical 96 dB S/N ratio). Conveniently obscured by this propaganda is that digital recording suffers greatly when the volume level is far below the maximum, as it almost always is!. If you are recording an oboe in a large orchestra playing Mahler Second Symphony, and you can’t overload in digital like you can in analog, how many bits do you have for recording an oboe? 6-7 bits if you’re lucky. No wonder to my ears the oboe on my many thousands of orchestral CDs at home sounds dreadful compared to the sound of the oboe in a concert hall, which I have heard thousands of times. While analog tape cannot match digital in ultimate S/N ratio, analog tape hiss is constant and does not increase as volume levels go down.

Keep this point in mind the next time you see marketing propaganda advertising a DAC as having 120 dB S/N ratio — that’s at 0 dB! Ask what the S/N ratio is 60 dB down from the loudest signal being recorded. That’s the level at which an oboe plays. Our hearing is entirely nonlinear and completely different from linear PCM. As the sound level goes down, our hearing gets more acute in some ways — this is highly dependent on frequency. Paradoxically, what you can tolerate is distortion at high volumes. The brain automatically clamps down on loud sounds to protect your hearing. As a ghoulish application of this idea, Mercedes Benz sedans play an extremely loud sound milliseconds into a crash to protect your hearing as they exploit our brain’s ability to shut down the hearing system from loud noise. This in only activated in a serious crash.

 

[Audire]

Hi Audire,
Personally I’m not denying that streaming has noise issues. That’s at the very heart of this discussion. How to remove them, how to avoid them, how to clean them, how to block them whatever. The key is, as you say, actually controlling noise from wherever it comes, in whatever form it comes. And when you do, something magical happens and streaming sounds amazing. Better and better as you progress. Pure, dynamic, rhythmical, massively involving, totally immersive. , Streaming has a long way to go. Sure it does. I prefer to put it another way….We have a long way to go with streaming. We are only at the beginning but it can already sound great. There’s still a large number of areas we can address and clean up, however we’ve already done a lot of the basics and generated some massive improvements.

Of course if you look at streaming simply as music from a computer or music via a network thats like saying music from a radio or record player and we should compare it to the like. But if we say streaming of high-end quality music what we are talking about is a very sophisticated hi-fi system with network designed and optimised specifically to play great music from a cable in the wall.

I enjoy my older music as close as possible to the way I grew up with it. I don’t desire anything added or subtracted from it. I enjoyed it then, and I’m enjoining it today as well. I’ve just purchased a new transport that should maximize the payback of the older songs I enjoy so very much. I can’t wait.

As I stated earlier I don‘t mind higher resolution on newer files that I’m not accustomed to hearing as much. There it sounds wonderful and natural. I do like all the detail, as long as the human warmth is present as well. A lot of DACs doe t balance the detail and warmth that well IMO. I understand the Horizon does. Can’t wait until that demo lands here.

 

[dminches]

I enjoy my older music as close as possible to the way I grew up with it. I don’t desire anything added or subtracted from it. I enjoyed it then, and I’m enjoining it today as well. I’ve just purchased a new transport that should maximize the payback of the older songs I enjoy so very much. I can’t wait.

As I stated earlier I don‘t mind higher resolution on newer files that I’m not accustomed to hearing as much. There it sounds wonderful and natural. I do like all the detail, as long as the human warmth is present as well. A lot of DACs doe t balance the detail and warmth that well IMO. I understand the Horizon does. Can’t wait until that demo lands here.

I assume you are playing the older CDs on different equipment. Doesn’t that affect the sound as much as going to hires?

 

[Audire]

I assume you are playing the older CDs on different equipment. Doesn’t that affect the sound as much as going to hires?

Well I don‘t have my original CD player from back in the day - Sony top loader, can’t remember the model was one of them. That’s why I stated to get the sound “as close as possible.” The nice thing about higher end equipment is it last longer IMO. Therefore, I purchase something that can get me as close as possible and enjoy for years to come, at this point pretty much for the rest of my life.

 

[ferenc_k]

But again IMHO what is relevant in streaming debating is comparing streaming with downloads and CD. Comparing apples with apples. Digital is a different beast from analog.

Our My Reel Club® label recently issued a double CD/file download (in DXD/DSD/PCM192k) and a high-speed tape (soon in Dolby Atmos and LP) of the same live studio concert: The Gabor Juhasz Trio (featuring Julia Karosi, and Tony Lakatos) plays its Planest album. Album 1 is the music mixed live in a completely analog system, digitized with Merging Anubis ADC at 352,8k/24 bit and DSD256. No post-production, mastering happened, so it is as pure as it gets. Album 2 is postproduced, mastered version of the same live event, recorded in 192k/24 bit with a standard Pro Tools digital production system and converters. Tape is the same, as the DXD/DSD256 file, at 15 ips, recorded with a Nagra IVS. So if one wants to compare the different versions, there is a chance.

 

[microstrip]

It’s not just streaming that has noise issues. Digital PCM by definition has noise built in, which is cleverly obscured by brilliant marketing propaganda by Sony and Philips going back 45 years. When CDs first came out and were advertised as “perfect sound forever” — the liner notes on every CD ever made had a blurb at the back that said CDs offered “the best possible sound reproduction” (see attached marketing propaganda on every CD back then).

Cleverly, the specs often touted for the superiority of digital over analog quoted the S/N ratio at 0 dB — the loudest possible signal when all 16 bits are active (thereby giving a theoretical 96 dB S/N ratio). Conveniently obscured by this propaganda is that digital recording suffers greatly when the volume level is far below the maximum, as it almost always is!. If you are recording an oboe in a large orchestra playing Mahler Second Symphony, and you can’t overload in digital like you can in analog, how many bits do you have for recording an oboe? 6-7 bits if you’re lucky. No wonder to my ears the oboe on my many thousands of orchestral CDs at home sounds dreadful compared to the sound of the oboe in a concert hall, which I have heard thousands of times. While analog tape cannot match digital in ultimate S/N ratio, analog tape hiss is constant and does not increase as volume levels go down.

Keep this point in mind the next time you see marketing propaganda advertising a DAC as having 120 dB S/N ratio — that’s at 0 dB! Ask what the S/N ratio is 60 dB down from the loudest signal being recorded. That’s the level at which an oboe plays. Our hearing is entirely nonlinear and completely different from linear PCM. As the sound level goes down, our hearing gets more acute in some ways — this is highly dependent on frequency. Paradoxically, what you can tolerate is distortion at high volumes. The brain automatically clamps down on loud sounds to protect your hearing. As a ghoulish application of this idea, Mercedes Benz sedans play an extremely loud sound milliseconds into a crash to protect your hearing as they exploit our brain’s ability to shut down the hearing system from loud noise. This in only activated in a serious crash.

View attachment 103382

Surely there was hype in the CD launch - discussed ad nausea everywhere.

But you seem to fail to understand that we are now discussing mostly HiRez (24 bit) and redbook CD is used as a distribution format, not as a recording format - the old analog tape over saturation argument does not apply any more.

Can you point us which 2nd Mahler CD recording has the oboe recorded at -60 dB peak?

 

[godofwealth]

Surely there was hype in the CD launch - discussed ad nausea everywhere.

But you seem to fail to understand that we are now discussing mostly HiRez (24 bit) and redbook CD is used as a distribution format, not as a recording format - the old analog tape over saturation argument does not apply any more.

Can you point us which 2nd Mahler CD recording has the oboe recorded at -60 dB peak?

Any of them. In digital recording, you cannot overload. You set the maximum volume to correspond to loudest climaxes in the Mahler 2nd. When the whole orchestra is playing fortissimo, the peak volume near the microphones can exceed 110 dB. A solitary oboe is going to play at a much lower level. Depending on where the mikes are placed, the sound level can easily be 50-60 dB below maximum.

Anyone can do this experiment at home. Play the Mahler 2, or indeed any classical orchestral or operatic piece at a sufficiently loud level. My Kliipsch La Scala horns produce 105 dB sound intensity with just one watt of power. I don’t listen that loud normally. Say I play at a volume where climaxes are around 95 dB. You can use any iPhone app for this like dB. Now check to see what a single oboe produces in comparison. I’ve done this experiment many times. Most classical pieces rely on contrasts between soft and loud, pianissimo vs fortissimo. The difference can easily be more than 60 dB.

Now here’s the really important part and the most fascinating thing about human hearing. At a pianissimo level when strings are playing softly, my iPhone app dB will say something like “rustling leaves” to indicate verbally the volume level. But your hearing is incredibly acute even at the pianissimo level. It’s not like linear PCM where resolution drops like a rock. The brain is a highly nonlinear device. Our hearing is fundamentally logarithmic. Even at soft levels we clearly hear the difference between a violin and a viola, a flute vs an oboe, a double bass vs a cello. It’s not like at the softest level we can’t tell the difference between instruments.

The ear/brain has been estimated to have a staggering dynamic range of over 140 dB, but even that’s a bit misleading because of frequency effects. We are maximally sensitive to the midrange which is why speaker colorations like voice jump out at us. On the other hand our resolution in the low bass or extreme treble is much worse. Again, linear PCM is a terrible idea that’s the worst way to design a recording format because it wastes resolution where it’s not needed at the expense of where it’s needed.

 

[Elliot G.]

Wadax Server ($150k) is better than Taiko and finally Wadax Server is not better than CEC TL0 3.0.

the Wadax server is 65000.
You have taken your opinion on the transport , made a bet which didnt happen and then quoted your opinion as a fact.
I have no issue with your opinion but when you dont have the gear and have not done this you REALLY do not know you are assuming .

 

[Elliot G.]

I think its somewhere in that range yes , but Wadax has the advantage that it does sound very good .
If all goes well regarding work planning i ll be in Munchen this year as well , hope to hear some more WADAX

There will be Wadax at Munich as far as I know and they will have the new products. The cable you listed is correct. I have not yet received my Server optional power supply or cables so I can't comment on what it does however I am excited to see what Javier and crew have come up with since everything they told me so far has come true. Assuming that one can isolate the sound of these things in a showroom with a whole mixture of strange gear and acoustics is IMO rediculous. It can give you some insight and an idea but if you want to really understand these items should be heard in a state of the art mature system.
I have compared streaming to the Wadax Atlantis Transport the latest model the X ( CAP FEST 15 months ago)which I would bet is better than the CDC HAHA and one might be surprised. Thats a joke BTW

 

[hopkins]

I hear absolutely no difference between the same "release" downloaded or streamed. There are significant differences between alternative versions of the same album, so when comparing streaming vs local files it is obviously important to ensure that the versions are identical.

My DAC’s manufacturer claims that it is pretty much "source immune", and I know some others with the same DAC have found this not to be the case. I don’t care to know who is right, i’m just happy having my large local file collection and the convenience of streaming services without any "audiophile stress" (and associated expenses...)

Regardless, there are other issues with streaming that are much more important, IMO, than perceived micro differences in sound quality over identical local files:
- limited catalog and the proliferation of poor releases from dodgy labels (albums are unavailable or not in the desired version)
- poor metadata and very limited availability of liner notes
- disappearing albums
- errors in albums (a wrong track in an album, something i have come across several times on qobuz, for example)
...

 

[godofwealth]

I don't know how you calculate but Taiko router, switch and Extreme is around 40k. The Taiko software is included.
And for your CEC you need a separate DAC, for the Taiko solution you can get the upcoming PCIe DAC if you want.
So you might end up spending the same amount on both streaming and CD

Matt

I have owned the CEC TL 3.0 transport for several years now, and can comment. I also have the Lampizator server and Pacific DAC (I realize Taiko Extreme and Lampi Horizon offer higher performance at a substantial price increase).

Comparing physical media playback vs streaming is an issue beaten to death and I doubt any arguments made by one camp will convince folks on the other. I keep my physical media (over 5000 CDs collected over 35+ years) because using the TL0 transport into the Pacific, they sound extremely good, but more importantly they offer me peace of mind that my playlist will not disappear.

Streaming requires juggling a completely different set of parameters from disc playback. To my engineering brain, neither one is simple, but disc playback is a simpler problem. Streaming requires optimizing a huge set of parameters, most of which you have no control over. Streaming will get better over time. It’s like CD players were in the 1980s. We are at the Model T stage.

CD playback has been refined over four decades. It’s a more mature system. Even more important to me is that it’s a frozen standard. CDs are defined by the Sony/Philips Redbook standard, like vinyl is defined by the RIAA standard. Streaming by its nature is infinitely flexible. There’s already dozens of variations of bitrate and depth and time will only increase that choice. That makes designing a streaming solution much more challenging. Roon also does data mining of users. I assume they’ll have advertisements at some point. Netflix has gone down that path. Everyone who offers an online service eventually discovers ads are a great way to generate more revenue. Roon would be crazy not to exploit its platform for ads. Even paid services like Amazon Prime serve ads. Amazon made over 30 billion dollars from ads. I don’t have to worry about ads with CD playback!

As with everyone else, I enjoy streaming Qobuz via Roon and it’s hard to beat the convenience of streaming. But Qobuz and Roon might disappear tomorrow. My CDs have been with me 35+ years and that gives me assurance that my lifetime of music will not disappear into the ether. I hope Qobuz and Roon survive. Time will tell.

 

[PYP]

I hope Qobuz and Roon survive. Time will tell.

Me too. At this point my library has more Qobuz links than CDs that I own and were ripped.

As I follow all the new music that Qobuz has added and the features Roon continues to add (now quite portable), it seems to me that a younger generation may stream using these services. There are certainly folks who have "audiophile-approved" streamers/servers, but Roon can run on more modest (price-wise) gear. I'm not sure how many millennials are Roon customers, but I hope it is an increasing number. For them, I would assume that the features, not the hardware, is the primary focus.

Look at the revenue numbers and growth for streaming music. This is the future (and present). Whether that is good for musicians and music will be seen.