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DACs vs Turntables

I notice that the concept of "accurate" is frequently used as a kind of "Holy Grail" term in the exotic world of HiFi. As someone who has done a bit of playing, recording and mixing, this notion of "accuracy" as a fixed target in music reproduction seems very odd! I'll try to explain why by following an instrument through the recording chain....


If we were standing in a "live room" (the space where the guitar and amp are recorded) listening to an electric guitar, we'd hear the full range of tone from the guitar amp / speaker. We could consider the sound to be "accurate" at this point. ie: what it sounds like to a listener "in the room".

The recording engineer typically captures this sound by placing a microphone in front of one of the speaker cones on the amp / cab. Guitar speaker cones are quite large (usually 12") and there is a VERY wide tonal palette available depending on exactly where the mic/s are placed - from thick and dull at the edge of the cone to thin and piercing at the cap (You can even hear this if you ever stand in front of a guitar speaker and move your head around a bit - they are VERY "beamy"). Sometimes multiple mics are placed to get a blend of sounds (trickier to do as it can induce phase issues) or another "room mic" is placed further away to capture some room ambience into the overall sound.

If we go to the control room and listen back to the recorded guitar performance, what we are now hearing is a heavily filtered interpretation of the guitar amp sound based on the mic type(s) and on where the engineer decided to place them on the speaker cone. In fact, even at this stage, guitarists often complain that this sound doesn't sound "accurate" to them, because what they are used to hearing is the: "amp in the room" sound, not the "recorded" sound, which can be quite different.

Once the tracking (recording of different instruments) is done, the mixing engineer will adjust that recorded guitar track to sit better in the mix. He might apply a high pass filter to allow the bass guitar some breathing space, he might apply some panning and more eq to make room for vocals or keyboards, he might apply acoustic effects: (reverb, delay, phasing, flanging, chorus etc.). He might ask the guitar player to record the same guitar track multiple times with the mics in different positions (double / quad tracking) to create an overall sound to benefit the track. The aim is for the band itself to occupy the full range but each instrument to only occupy a smaller space in a "tidy" way within that. If you were capturing a solo instrument you might want it to cover a much broader range to present more of a full spectrum of sound but in the context of a band, the sound of each instruments is extensively changed and tailored to fit better into the whole.

After the tracks are mixed, the mastering engineer goes to work, changing the sound again to make the album as a whole sound more cohesive and as good as possible on its final formats. Perhaps we could consider this point in the chain to be "accurate"?....Probably not for the instruments themselves, due to the extensive process mentioned above. Even for the track as a whole, the mastering engineer is likely not targeting what he hears on his console, through his speakers, with his ears, to be the final "arbitrator". He's aiming for it to come to fruition at its best on a range of formats and a wide range of reproductive equipment from hifi's to TV's.

So I would suggest that, for many recordings, the audio pipeline is aimed at making an end product that sounds "good" and any "accuracy" is discarded very early on in the process. There are, of course, some recordings that aim at accuracy but even with something as apparently straightforward as a solo acoustic piano, that's extremely difficult to achieve and due to the recording process, is still at best an interpretation.
 
Jim, I think it's simple really, the intention is to hear what's on the recording.

The correct point would be what the mastering engineer is hearing when they decide the project is complete. Of course in reality it can get mangled all sorts of ways from that point on to reach your ears, and the process of actually sticking it on physical media, or uploading it to a streaming service could take it's toll, as well as your reproduction equipment and room. However, I imagine the weakest point in the whole chain is the speakers and room the average joe listens to music in, and the acceptable domestic music replay levels as you basically can't get the same experience without matching the replay level the mastering engineer used.

The choice of DAC is really not that important in the grand scheme of things if you are chasing that mastering engineer sound.

Meanwhile, on planet 'the aim is to enjoy the music and connect with it', if you find one speaker/DAC/replay system that does it for you, you've won, and what other people think really doesn't matter.
 
When I have a tasty meal in a restaurant — well, before the pandemic — I sometimes add hot sauce because that's how I like my food.

I feel much the same with audio reproduction. The mastering engineer's take is a good starting point, but why is it an issue if I like my music with Sriracha sauce? And let's face it, some mastering engineer are terrible cooks. A bit of Sriracha can make the crap they produced edible / listenable.

Joe
 
To me, sounding more accurate, whatever that might be, may not be what I want. What I want is to be able to understand the music from the performers point of view. I want to feel as though I'm being taken somewhere. Soundstaging and detail is all fine but the essence of the musicianship is what I'm after. For some reason, I find that easier to find in vinyl replay, whether it's accurate or not.
 
To me, sounding more accurate, whatever that might be, may not be what I want. What I want is to be able to understand the music from the performers point of view. I want to feel as though I'm being taken somewhere. Soundstaging and detail is all fine but the essence of the musicianship is what I'm after. For some reason, I find that easier to find in vinyl replay, whether it's accurate or not.
This sounds quite extraordinary. Because vinyl will never reproduce the original recording (i.e. the master, the work of art) as is - whereas cd will, it has to be concluded that vinyl is able to actually create more of "the essence of musicianship" where there was less before. In this case the copy is to be preferred to the original. Wondrous indeed.
 
To me, the only real metric we have is how well the system paints the illusion of real performers in real space and how well we can connect with the message they intend to convey. Anyone with a well sorted LP12-based system knows which format wins that fight.
Which simply means that those who prefer the colorations of the LP12 to the purity of the original sound, simply prefer the colorations of the LP12 to the purity of the original sound. One of the more hilarious aspects of the Linn cult is the conviction that you are entitled to elevate your personal preferences to something universal ("connect with the message they intend to convey") - just because a man in Scotland said so.
 
Octavian,

This sounds quite extraordinary. Because vinyl will never reproduce the original recording (i.e. the master, the work of art) as is - whereas cd will, it has to be concluded that vinyl is able to actually create more of "the essence of musicianship" where there was less before. In this case the copy is to be preferred to the original. Wondrous indeed.

I played a CD and an LP of the same Joni Mitchell album for my daughter (aka, the iPhone generation) as an experiment to see if she could hear a difference and, if so, if she had a preference.* It turns out the answers were yes, she could hear a difference, and the preference was for the LP. She said the record sounded more like a real person singing.

She's wrong of course, so I lectured her about digital audio for an hour, then sent her to bed without supper.

Joe

* Level-matched of course, in anticipation of the next post.
 
Spicy AF sauce!

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Joe
 
This sounds quite extraordinary. Because vinyl will never reproduce the original recording (i.e. the master, the work of art) as is - whereas cd will, it has to be concluded that vinyl is able to actually create more of "the essence of musicianship" where there was less before. In this case the copy is to be preferred to the original. Wondrous indeed.
By reproduce, do you mean duplicate?
Neither can do that, either way there are losses. It's just a matter of what losses do you choose.
And agreed, wondrous indeed.
 
It depends on the cd player, there's still plenty of sub 80db snr digital sources. The format is fine, it's the playback that's variable. But much less so than vinyl.
 
Bit late to the party, but to answer the OP’s questions:

- No
- More turntables, arms, cartridges and phono stages than you can possibly imagine, plus a handful of DACs
- A combination of both.

Hope that clears things up.
:)
 
We have been having this debate (analogue vs digital) for the past twenty years.

I'm reminded of that quote by Einstein "some things that you can measure don't count and some things that you can't measure, do count."


The small things that you can't measure are in between the numbers (however high the sampling rate). Digital doesn't capture that.

I have a good DAC and turntable, broadly comparable. I'm never disappointed with reproduction via the DAC but it's analogue that delivers more 'special moments'.
 
Octavian,



I played a CD and an LP of the same Joni Mitchell album for my daughter (aka, the iPhone generation) as an experiment to see if she could hear a difference and, if so, if she had a preference.* It turns out the answers were yes, she could hear a difference, and the preference was for the LP. She said the record sounded more like a real person singing.

She's wrong of course, so I lectured her about digital audio for an hour, then sent her to bed without supper.

Joe

* Level-matched of course, in anticipation of the next post.


Maybe your CD player isn't as good as your record player.
 
As I said before, streaming and cd deliver as many special moments as vinyl. There are a whole host of factors at play that contribute to this.
 


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