Frankly, I do not know where to begin. This and similar issues come up every now and then, and then they are debated endlessly. I think we are far better off listening to music or practicing it ourselves. Unfortunately, there are too many points which are made very convincingly but will not hold water under scrutiny, and some obvious points are missed in the heat of the moment.
In the following, I will list a few of these and make my observations:
1) I honestly think, it is absolutely pointless to debate on the superiority of one or the other of the digital and the vinyl format. The basic mechanism, the recording and the pressing methods are very very different. As a result, it's no wonder that the sounds the two methods produce are in general quite different. Some people like the vinyl sound better, some like the digital sound better, and there are quite a few like me who can enjoy both formats (I actually can enjoy audio cassettes even in this day and age), depending on the particular recording. In my honest opinion, it would be nearly impossible objectively to decide in favor of one or the other format in general to reproduce the music more faithfully. In addition, I do not think, there is any need to do that either. Let everybody enjoy their favorite music on their favorite equipments and formats.
2) However, in the midst of such discussions, there are technical claims made which are dubious and at times plainly wrong. For example, one such notion very often floated is that human beings do not hear above 20 kHz, so there is no need to worry about frequencies higher than 20 KHz. Foget about 20 kHz, I do not think, I hear anything above 14 or 15 kHz, and that's quite normal for people of my age. But I think the notion floated is wrong, and I shall explain why. No energy carrying signal in this universe is composed of a single wave or of a single frequency (even the tuning fork which comes very close to producing a single frequency sound, does not actually do it, there are other frequencies present). Hence, a single musical note is composed of many waves each having a single frequency. Usually the lowest of these frequencies is known as the fundamental frequency, and the rest are called the higher harmonics (integer multiples of the fundamental frequency). Relative presence of each of the harmonics with respect to the fundamental in a single musical note decides the shape of the wave packet, and is actually responsible for the timbre of the sound. For the same note with the same fundamental frequency, this is how one can differentiate between a Lata Mangeshkar singing or a Kishor Kumar singing. Now, when reference is made to the range of human hearing, one needs to point out that it is done with respect to only the fundamental frequency of a musical sound (or any sound in general). Harmonics above 20 kHz or whatever upper limit of hearing will be there and are very important ingredients in the quality of sound (remember for musical note with fundamental frequency 7 kHz, the 3rd karmic is 21 kHz and the 4th harmonic is 28 kHz). If my equipment has a hard frequency cut-off at 20 kHz, the shape of the wave-packet for the note at 7 kHz (fund. freq.) will be seriously changed due to the absence of the 3rd harmonic and above. People, especially engineers do worry about such things. Only in the forums, where we are not held responsible for our words, such things are heard that there is no need to worry about frequencies higher than 20 kHz.
3) The other thing that inevitably comes up in such debates is the Shannon-Nyquist sampling theorem, and some people waking up to claim that it is a rigorously proven theorem with no approximations. Let me be absolutely shameless in pointing out for the 5th or the 6th time in this forum the :
This issue has been specially addressed in this previous post of mine (http://www.hifivision.com/phono-tur...-vinyl-sounds-better-digital-5.html#post37385). For the mathematically minded among you, please go through the post. It's actually very simple, and shows the consequences of having a time-limited signal in simple words.
In another earlier post (http://www.hifivision.com/phono-tur...-vinyl-sounds-better-digital-4.html#post37340) in the same thread, I discussed the problem more generally and some other important issues regarding the low pass filter has also been discussed.
A related issue regarding something called the Gibbs phenomenon has been discussed by me in another post much later (http://www.hifivision.com/cassette-tape-decks/12804-vinyl-better-than-cd-6.html#post178184). A few of my observations may not be completely correct in that post; however, the Gibbs effect surely is a serious issue in this matter, and if you are really interested, this is still an active area of research in Math and signal processing with people writing papers on the sampling theorem and the Gibbs phenomenon.
Finally, let me say that, recently I have discovered that the issue of a time-limited signal and the sampling theorem is also an active area of research and people have published recently addressing precisely this issue (references are available with me). I am very happy to note that the general conclusion that is drawn from these works is that an increase in the sampling frequency will improve matters, something I also concluded after a casual look at the problem long ago (as evident in some of my posts). But this is something we already know, 24/96 music sounds better than the 16/44 music (I have done this experiment myself with my Sony Pro digital recorder which can record up to 24/96).
I urge everybody, especially the ones having some knowledge in this area, to come out of whatever inhibitions and appreciate the matter beyond the knowledge of the textbook.
OT: I have also had my views on cable burn-in checked with the most well-known Indian theoretical condensed matter physicist (since my area of specialization is not CMP) and he agrees with my views. I am also happy to note that this involves also an active current area of research in CMP. Quantum Mechanics and the band structure is inevitable in such a discussion.
Sorry for the long post, but this has been long overdue.
Regards
In the following, I will list a few of these and make my observations:
1) I honestly think, it is absolutely pointless to debate on the superiority of one or the other of the digital and the vinyl format. The basic mechanism, the recording and the pressing methods are very very different. As a result, it's no wonder that the sounds the two methods produce are in general quite different. Some people like the vinyl sound better, some like the digital sound better, and there are quite a few like me who can enjoy both formats (I actually can enjoy audio cassettes even in this day and age), depending on the particular recording. In my honest opinion, it would be nearly impossible objectively to decide in favor of one or the other format in general to reproduce the music more faithfully. In addition, I do not think, there is any need to do that either. Let everybody enjoy their favorite music on their favorite equipments and formats.
2) However, in the midst of such discussions, there are technical claims made which are dubious and at times plainly wrong. For example, one such notion very often floated is that human beings do not hear above 20 kHz, so there is no need to worry about frequencies higher than 20 KHz. Foget about 20 kHz, I do not think, I hear anything above 14 or 15 kHz, and that's quite normal for people of my age. But I think the notion floated is wrong, and I shall explain why. No energy carrying signal in this universe is composed of a single wave or of a single frequency (even the tuning fork which comes very close to producing a single frequency sound, does not actually do it, there are other frequencies present). Hence, a single musical note is composed of many waves each having a single frequency. Usually the lowest of these frequencies is known as the fundamental frequency, and the rest are called the higher harmonics (integer multiples of the fundamental frequency). Relative presence of each of the harmonics with respect to the fundamental in a single musical note decides the shape of the wave packet, and is actually responsible for the timbre of the sound. For the same note with the same fundamental frequency, this is how one can differentiate between a Lata Mangeshkar singing or a Kishor Kumar singing. Now, when reference is made to the range of human hearing, one needs to point out that it is done with respect to only the fundamental frequency of a musical sound (or any sound in general). Harmonics above 20 kHz or whatever upper limit of hearing will be there and are very important ingredients in the quality of sound (remember for musical note with fundamental frequency 7 kHz, the 3rd karmic is 21 kHz and the 4th harmonic is 28 kHz). If my equipment has a hard frequency cut-off at 20 kHz, the shape of the wave-packet for the note at 7 kHz (fund. freq.) will be seriously changed due to the absence of the 3rd harmonic and above. People, especially engineers do worry about such things. Only in the forums, where we are not held responsible for our words, such things are heard that there is no need to worry about frequencies higher than 20 kHz.
3) The other thing that inevitably comes up in such debates is the Shannon-Nyquist sampling theorem, and some people waking up to claim that it is a rigorously proven theorem with no approximations. Let me be absolutely shameless in pointing out for the 5th or the 6th time in this forum the :
- The theorem can be rigorously proven, there is nothing wrong with the proof or anything like that.
- However, the proof is done with the assumption that the continuous information that is being sampled at discrete points of time extends from the infinite past to the infinite future, while in the case of a music recording, it has only a finite extension in time.
This issue has been specially addressed in this previous post of mine (http://www.hifivision.com/phono-tur...-vinyl-sounds-better-digital-5.html#post37385). For the mathematically minded among you, please go through the post. It's actually very simple, and shows the consequences of having a time-limited signal in simple words.
In another earlier post (http://www.hifivision.com/phono-tur...-vinyl-sounds-better-digital-4.html#post37340) in the same thread, I discussed the problem more generally and some other important issues regarding the low pass filter has also been discussed.
A related issue regarding something called the Gibbs phenomenon has been discussed by me in another post much later (http://www.hifivision.com/cassette-tape-decks/12804-vinyl-better-than-cd-6.html#post178184). A few of my observations may not be completely correct in that post; however, the Gibbs effect surely is a serious issue in this matter, and if you are really interested, this is still an active area of research in Math and signal processing with people writing papers on the sampling theorem and the Gibbs phenomenon.
Finally, let me say that, recently I have discovered that the issue of a time-limited signal and the sampling theorem is also an active area of research and people have published recently addressing precisely this issue (references are available with me). I am very happy to note that the general conclusion that is drawn from these works is that an increase in the sampling frequency will improve matters, something I also concluded after a casual look at the problem long ago (as evident in some of my posts). But this is something we already know, 24/96 music sounds better than the 16/44 music (I have done this experiment myself with my Sony Pro digital recorder which can record up to 24/96).
I urge everybody, especially the ones having some knowledge in this area, to come out of whatever inhibitions and appreciate the matter beyond the knowledge of the textbook.
OT: I have also had my views on cable burn-in checked with the most well-known Indian theoretical condensed matter physicist (since my area of specialization is not CMP) and he agrees with my views. I am also happy to note that this involves also an active current area of research in CMP. Quantum Mechanics and the band structure is inevitable in such a discussion.
Sorry for the long post, but this has been long overdue.
Regards
