Music Lane

I don't see how the audio quality of a copy can be better than the original. It isn't mysterious,

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tinear

In Reply to: RE: Transferring my Mercury Living Presence CD's to iTunes posted by Chris from Lafayette on September 18, 2014 at 21:42:50

it's counterintuitive and illogical. Of course, the system you're playing the downloads through could be superior.

Follow Ups:

I agree, it makes no sense and yet the transfers I've made. . . - risabet 13:50:11 09/25/14 (2)
from CD to JRiver MC19 running on a midrange Toshiba laptop (converting to DSD on-the-fly) through a Schiit Loki sound "better" than the original CD through the same system. Even when the CDs are played through the Toshiba through the same system, the rips sound better to my ears.

By denying scientific principles, one may maintain any paradox.
Galileo Galilei
- Well in your case. . . - Chris from Lafayette 19:52:15 09/27/14 (1)
  . . . it might make sense because you're a listener who prefers DSD?
  - I don't necessarily prefer DSD to other hi-res. . . - risabet 13:57:22 09/28/14 (0)
    formats, I definitely prefer it to Redbook. DSD is definitely different sounding, I am still on the fence as to whether it is better. My preference is vinyl and IMO that is the standard to which other formats are measured. YMMV!
    
    By denying scientific principles, one may maintain any paradox.
    Galileo Galilei
RE: I don't see how the audio quality of a copy can be better than the original. It isn't mysterious, - Old SteveA 14:52:08 09/19/14 (0)
Better is a subjective term.
When we talk about the "Audio Quality" of something digital we are definitely on a "slippery
slope" . It could just be "some" of us really are'nt that impressed with the original digital "rendering" of whatever it is we happen to be talking about. Some of us just consider the
original digital as a point of departure, & nothing more. (One more thing, there is really no way to be sure what the producer (not the engineer) deemed important enough to give us on
the release that may go as far enough to effect the SQ)
I tend to be more concerned with the "Enjoyment Quality" of what I'm listening to. You guys should back to talking about music over here ,so that I can get some useful information that
I would care to use. (For myself the old Abbott & Costello "Who's on First" is vastly more "Coherent" than most discussions about "Digital Truths". Me , I'd rather be a "Rebel" & enjoy
the "Audio Truths" that I've used my own perceptive discretion to discover)
(Man, I talk too much !!!)

Edits: 09/19/14
The "copy" is bit-for-bit the same - Chris from Lafayette 09:57:39 09/19/14 (11)
So it's more like two originals, rather than an original and a copy.
- Not that simple. All processing involves degradation, extra steps aren't "free." nt - tinear 10:42:05 09/19/14 (10)
  d
  - "All processing involves degradation" do you mind explaining? - Tre' 11:16:52 09/19/14 (7)
    With digital as long as the bit stream is left intact the copy can't sound any different than the original.
    
    Tre'
    Have Fun and Enjoy the Music
    "Still Working the Problem"
    - All CD players sound alike. One can send a signal through a series of electronic transfers, including sampling - tinear 15:31:23 09/19/14 (6)
      changing equipment, with no change in the sonic characteristics.
      I don't think that's a "starter" in this forum.
      - You see, son, it's like this. . . - Chris from Lafayette 18:09:07 09/19/14 (5)
        
        In Reply to: RE: All CD players sound alike. One can send a signal through a series of electronic transfers, including sampling posted by tinear on September 19, 2014 at 15:31:23
        
        It doesn't have anything to do with whether CD players sound different. (They do!) Your original argument however, in answer to my contention that both the original digital file and the digital copy are bit-for-bit the same, was, if I may quote, "Not that simple. All processing involves degradation. Extra steps aren't free."
        
        Let's try a little thought experiment to test whether your assertions are true or not. Let's say you've created a complex Microsoft Word document (.doc), and then you make a copy of it. And then you make a copy of the copy, And then another copy of the copy. And then more copies of the most recent copies still. Let's say you eventually get to the fifteenth (or hundredth for that matter) generation copy. Now, let's say you open that fiftenth (or hundredth) generation copy with the Microsoft Word application. What will happen? Will the file open at all? Will the fonts have changed? Will some of the characters now be nonsense? I trust you can answer those questions correctly. Now suppose that instead of a .doc file, you copy an .aiff file instead. Is there any reason to suppose that the results of multi-generation copying will be any different from what happened (or didn't happen!) with the .doc file?
        
        The computer software business DEPENDS on the reliability of digital file copies, and to argue that "Extra steps aren't free" is either disingenuous or just reflects a lack of basic knowledge as to how computers work.
        
        RE: You see, son, it's like this. . . - Tony Lauck 19:11:51 09/19/14 (4)
        
        In Reply to: RE: You see, son, it's like this. . . posted by Chris from Lafayette on September 19, 2014 at 18:09:07
        
        Would that it be so simple. A friend sent a Word document to an associate, he got back an edited version. Unfortunately some of the words ran together without spaces. It might be different versions of Word. It might be a font problem. It might ... Similarly, if you copy a digital audio file with a "lossless" compression such as FLAC and then expand it you get back the "same" file, except that it may not be the same. They headers may differ due to software issues. Do they sound different? Maybe. If so, try different software and then they might sound the same, or not.
        And let's say you take a file on one hard drive and copy it to another, this time bit perfect. Do the two files sound the same when you play them? That's the theory, but if you listen carefully you may just find that practice doesn't always accord with theory. These are all real differences that I and others have observed. In some cases it was possible to trace down the ultimate cause of differences. In others it wasn't.
        A dogmatic attitude is not productive to uncovering the truth.
        
        Tony Lauck
        
        "Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
        
        Edits: 09/19/14
        
        Jeez, Tony - I think you're just adding to tin's confusion - Chris from Lafayette 20:19:45 09/19/14 (3)
        
        In Reply to: RE: You see, son, it's like this. . . posted by Tony Lauck on September 19, 2014 at 19:11:51
        
        I do not disagree with you about a copied file, even though it may be bit for bit identical, sounding different. In fact, that was one of the main points I made in my OP, where the copied files now sound better than they did on the CD's - not because of the files themselves, but because of the different processing chain now involved. What tin was contending is that there must necessarily be a DETERIORATION in the copied file, and I still vigorously deny this. If you want to call that dogmatic, so be it.
        But then you bring all these other items from out of left field - compression, decompression, FLAC - which do not even apply to the case at hand. I was doing a straight copy from a CD to a hard disc. No compression was involved at any stage. Forget FLAC.
        Also, your example of the Microsoft Word document does not involve straight copies (as I was trying to show in my example) if there was editing or other processing going on with possibly different versions of Microsoft Word. Of course changes in the file are possible after that! Duh!
        All we should be discussing here is the equivalency of a straight copied file to the original. And I say again, that the computer industry would not exist today if there were a problem with this.
        
        Edits: 09/19/14 09/20/14
        
        You're arguing that copying redbook and changing it's original digital - tinear 21:23:42 09/19/14 (2)
        
        In Reply to: RE: Jeez, Tony - I think you're just adding to tin's confusion posted by Chris from Lafayette on September 19, 2014 at 20:19:45
        
        profile has enhanced the sound. That is as close to impossible as could be. What is possible is the placebo effect; you're fooling yourself after spending all that time and effort. And copies of copies can change, per Tony's example.
        If all your discs sound better, you should be asking yourself some other questions.
        
        RE: You're arguing that copying redbook and changing it's original digital - Tony Lauck 07:19:31 09/20/14 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: You're arguing that copying redbook and changing it's original digital posted by tinear on September 19, 2014 at 21:23:42
        
        Actually, if you change the bits (audio samples) in the file you may improve the sound quality, particularly if it was a bad recording to start with, but also possibly to compensate for some quirk in your playback. :-) This works best if you are prepared to keep a 24 bit file and play that as the conversion from 16 bits to floating point and back to 16 bits adds dither noise.
        
        As to true copies of files (e.g. done by an operating system file copy), a copy may sound the same, better or worse than the original, depending on the quirks of your system. If there is any difference at all and the copies have the same bits in them then it is an indictment of the quality of your playback chain. I routinely copy files from hard drive to RAM disk before playback, because I don't like to hear any seek "clunks" from the 4 TB drive that holds my music library. This is definitely a problem with my system which sits too close to my listening position, but it is easily fixed by a copy.
        
        Tony Lauck
        
        "Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
        iZotope Rx (Open in New Window)
        
        Hey, tin - what's so hard to understand about this? - Chris from Lafayette 00:14:33 09/20/14 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: You're arguing that copying redbook and changing it's original digital posted by tinear on September 19, 2014 at 21:23:42
        
        You take a file, copy it (with no loss to the integrity of the file), then run the copy through a different processing chain for playback, and different (in this case, improved) sound results. The original file's "digital profile" (as you call it) has not been changed.
        Get it?
        
        Edits: 09/20/14 09/21/14
  - Wrong - you're thinking in analogue terms [nt] - Chris from Lafayette 11:09:01 09/19/14 (1)
    - RE: Wrong - you're thinking in analogue terms [nt] - rbolaw 11:52:30 09/19/14 (0)
      Funny -- the ability to make perfect copies in the digital era was main thing the music industry seized upon as a basis for demanding more copyright protection. People had been taping LPs, radio and live concerts (especially Grateful Dead ones) for years, and pirated, counterfeit LPs were pretty common.
      Later there were counterfeit CD factories too. But the real reason most people have been copying CDs is to do exactly what you are doing. And when you are done ripping, it would be perfectly legal for you to sell the original CDs under US copyright law.

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