Fidelity of albums and cds

[bmwr75]

I read routinely people stating that vinyl fidelity is superior to CD fidelity.  In my experience either format can sound great or terrible. 

To me....how good what you hear sounds is more dependent on how well the disc was recorded and mastered more than anything else. 

Of course the exception being a well recorded vinyl LP that has been abused (e.g., snap, crackle, pop).  And, a dead quiet LP is a rarity on the used market, even after cleaning with an RCM.

Has anyone used steam cleaning as a part of their LP cleaning ritual?  I have a Scunci steamer, but have not tried it yet.

Now......talk among yourselves and report back to me.

[schwarcw]

You are right on about the fidelity of the medium (CD, vinyl and tape).  Sometimes it comes down to a matter of taste.  Some people love Sushi, others hate it.  It's a shame that we have a generation of young folks who have listened to compressed music on IPods.  To some of these poor folks, a well recorded piece of music on SACD or vinyl played through a hifi system sounds like shit to them.    I read some of the posts in the music forums and I want to puke.

Scott, I have wanted to try a steam cleaner but never tried one.  I have heard these are very good for vinyl that has dried maple syrup, tomato sauce or some other ghastly shit deep in the grooves.  I have an LP with a faint white "haze" on the black vinyl that I can't remove with my VPI cleaner.  It doesn't affect the sound but I would like it to be gone!!!     I was curious if a steam cleaner would work.

Do a search on Youtube for "steam cleaning records".  There are a couple of good demos out there.

[bmwr75]

I discovered yesterday that the prior owner (it was bought at a flea market as new) of this steam cleaner had put what looked like powdered laundry detergent in it.  Guess they wanted soapy steam!!??  This concoction also plugged the steam valve.  Got it working after disassembling it.  Have rinsed it a few times with distilled water and think it might now be ready for use on a record. 

I had already watched a fellow on youtube demonstrate how to steam a record, here's the link:

Vinyl record cleaning with steam

He seems pretty meticulous, so I plan to give it a try next time I have a record that needs cleaning.

[BB3]

Carl, You are sooooo right about the whole Generation and compressed music thing. What a damn shame.

Believe it or not, as far as record cleaning goes.......ever try using a hand held steamer ? May sound strange but it gets the job done, and for not a whole lot of $$$$$$.

Just some thoughts Gents. Happy Listening.------BILL

[F1nut]

I discovered yesterday that the prior owner (it was bought at a flea market as new) of this steam cleaner had put what looked like powdered laundry detergent in it.  Guess they wanted soapy steam!!??  This concoction also plugged the steam valve.  Got it working after disassembling it.  Have rinsed it a few times with distilled water and think it might now be ready for use on a record. 

I had already watched a fellow on youtube demonstrate how to steam a record, here's the link:

Vinyl record cleaning with steam

He seems pretty meticulous, so I plan to give it a try next time I have a record that needs cleaning.

As I push play on my SACD player's remote, I have to chuckle at the above.

Such good sound. 

[bmwr75]

I hear you F1nut.  I've got 2 SACD players and thinking about the new OPPO unit if work comes thru with a bonus in January.  Most of my listening is done from a PC running iTunes and streaming digital CD quality sound wirelessly throughout the house.  Have DACs doing the heavy lifting on the D/A end of the chain.

The same 100+ GB music library travels with me everywhere on an iPod stored in Apple Lossless format.

[MasterBlaster]

This is quite a controversial subject that has been heavily debated over the years.
There are distinct differences between the two. cd audio is quantized into 16 bits which is a bit outdated at this point. There is actually noticable artifacting in cd audio that requires the insertion of noise into the signal to mask it. At the time of its introduction, cd audio was pretty good technology, and for most people it still is. I agree that it is more of a personal preference like tube vs ss.

However, from a media format sacd and potentially dvd-audio offer a better alternative to plain old cd audio at this point. Actually, I expect that physical media will be less of a factor as time progresses, and audio codecs will reign. The format du jour is flac which offers quality superior to cd. Actually some notable artists are releasing albums in flac. For example, the Beatles recently released 14 albums remastered in 24 bit flac on a thumbdrive.

[bmwr75]

Master Blaster,

Just a clarification for the masses on FLAC.  FLAC stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec.  The only way FLAC can sound superior to CD's 16 bit/44.1 MHz sampling rate is for the source recording to be higher resolution than 16 bit/44.1 MHz, like the Beatles remasters you referenced.

http://flac.sourceforge.net/

Regards,
BmWr75

[MasterBlaster]

Just a clarification for the masses on FLAC.  FLAC stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec.  The only way FLAC can sound superior to CD's 16 bit/44.1 MHz sampling rate is for the source recording to be higher resolution than 16 bit/44.1 MHz, like the Beatles remasters you referenced.

http://flac.sourceforge.net/

Agreed. You can't take a CD and rip/encode it in 24 bit FLAC and expect an improvement.
However, I'm sure the original masters are of sufficient quality to produce high quality
FLAC for the consumer. It would be potentially fraudulent if they were simply reencoding a lower quality signal into 24 bit FLAC, and marketing it as such.

That raises another question, doesnt't it?

[bmwr75]

Agreed, FLAC files encoded from the original master tapes has the potential to yield superior sound to a CD made from the same source.  That being said, CDs still sound pretty good to me, are much more available and usually less expensive than SACD, DVD-audio, vinyl, or any other higher-rez media.  And, there are 1000s of great recordings that cannot currently be purchased in any better format than Redbook CD.

[schwarcw]

There are plenty of great sounding CDs out there.  Unfortunately, the trend with new artists is to win the loudness war.  Hence, many new and newly remastered CDs are way to "hot".  The dynamic range is greatly reduced.  I understand some of the recently remastered Led Zepplin is terrible.  Also, some of the early CDs mastered in the early to mid '80s also sounded very bad.  The music companies used the vinyl mix and just converted it into a redbook, without regard to how it sounded.  As the CD matured, more emphasis was placed on the digital mastering to create a high quality sound.  Still, if the original recording was poor, so was the CD.  I have some CDs that rival SACDs for sound quality.  Some of the XRCDs produced by JVC sound fantastic.  Amanda McBroom's "Dreaming" comes to mind.  If you can find it, expect to pay $30 or more!

[BB3]

Carl is all over this subject bigtime and right on the money, no question about it. I couldn't agree more.

----BILL(BB3)

[schwarcw]

Anybody doing needle drops??