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Considerable Sounds: Analog Vs. Digital Circuitry - Which Is Better For Music? »
Posted by: Radiofreeeuropa 2 years agoThere are 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who read binary and those who don't. The encoding of sound into digits changed the experience music forever. Proponents of analog sound have much in common with the Spartan's suicidal last stand. In the digital age the inevitable demise of analog technology is certain. Or is it?
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Radiofreeeuropa
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Comments: 103
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Radiofreeeuropa
Oct. 24, 2007, 6:24 p.m.The illustration depicting the difference between an analog sound wave and a discreet (digital) one is very telling. Although digital recordings can, by use of very high sample rates come closer to duplicating the natural sound and shape of a natural sound wave, it will always have a degree of "etch a sketch" like stair stepping. It's the nature of the beast. Digital sound has the convenience of being easily integrated into computers and is inexpensive by comparison. But actually the bottom line is analog sound is sonically superior. Does this surprise anyone here?
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deathray
Oct. 24, 2007, 7:32 p.m.For a lot of my music listening, I am definitely an analog technology aficionado. Analog tape, or even a great turntable with a tonearm and moving coil cartridge are superior to pretty much any digital reproduction technology.
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earthlingerer
Oct. 25, 2007, 2:25 p.m.The funny thing is that a tube receiver/amplifier from the late 70's/early 80's STILL sounds better than any solid state similar "contraption" that you can buy at best buy or most electronics stores.
Vacuum tubes are THE shizznit. Still.
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jordan11
Oct. 24, 2007, 7:46 p.m.. In the digital age the inevitable demise of analog technology is certain>>>>
I think they just keep changing things so we'll have to buy new equipment. It's wasteful, and expensive. When my cars emergency call system changed from analog to digital, it cost me $1500 for the switchover. If I didn't switch, I wouldn't have the emergency access I'd already paid for. I'm getting tired of being ripped off by these 'advances.'
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Radiofreeeuropa
Oct. 24, 2007, 8:01 p.m.Does anyone have a SACD or Audio DVD player? I haven't made the plunge yet though I'm tempted. Any advice? I do have a pro studio and the 96K sample rate is vastly better than consumer 44.1k sample rate. Still a good analog system is magic.
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AntiNeoCon
Oct. 24, 2007, 8:18 p.m.Well to be honest, having worked around airports most of my life and loosing some of my high frequency hearing, it all sounds basically the same to me. :( My wife is the one with the music major, I will pass the story onto her. Thanks Man.
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crespi
Oct. 24, 2007, 9:15 p.m.Digital is incomplete but easier to manipulate and pick tracks.
Analog is a lot harder to clean, especially once it has been mixed...
AAD or ADD or DDD?
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stephen-johnson
Oct. 25, 2007, 12:28 a.m.Unfortunately, the music industry has been reduced to an iPod. The 15-24 YO purchaser of music - the prime demographic in the market - shows no interest in music quality better than an MP3. Music retailers like Tower Records have gone belly up, and even car stereos have begun phasing out CD players.
The home theater market is a better venue for advances in recorded music than record companies.
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cantfoolme
Oct. 25, 2007, 4:52 a.m.Lot of technical stuff here which is way over my poor old mushy head. I am told by many people that analogue is superior. I can understand that but you have to ask "how much better?". If you could play an analogue track followed immediately by the same track in digital how much less pleasure would you get from the latter? If it is a huge difference then i bow to analogue but i suspect not unless your hearing is so remarkebly acute (which is not the case with most people).
Here is my personal experience on Vinyl.
Despite dedicated loving care of record and equipment i would still get annoying crackles (my biggest gripe).
Storage is a problem and if not done correctly the records warp.
Unless you spend a bomb on equipment you get wow and flutter and you can actually wear out the grooves with faulty needles and cartridges.
You cannot skip rubbish tracks with ease.
You cannot play it in your car (the most important place to listen to).
So is it really worth it?
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Truzseeker
Oct. 25, 2007, 11:17 a.m.The final stage is still analog. Its the digital front end that makes it superior through digital conversion/compression removing a majority of the noise from the audio.
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getreal1
Oct. 25, 2007, 11:34 a.m.Sometimes Digital sound seems to lack something that the old time stereo record had in way of sound
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jovial
Oct. 25, 2007, 1:50 p.m.I don't know why, but sometimes listening to my old Nakamichi cassette deck with the old vu meters, sounds better than my cd's. Maybe it's just the ambience.
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earthlingerer
Oct. 25, 2007, 2:31 p.m.I re-found this old article from IEEE. It's written in "layman-ish" so it's pretty easy to get a grip on.
Explains the differenes between tubes and what you can buy today.
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JAG123
Oct. 25, 2007, 3:53 p.m.I have always believed that the industry should have waited at least another decade before it introduced digital music to the masses.
The CD standard of 44.1khz/16 bits was chosen due to the technical limitations of the time, and unfortunately is here to stay.
Most people don't care anyhow. They listen to their music via MPEG compression and crappy earbuds. Most home systems are composed of cheap satellite speakers with a powered bass driver.
The most important element in good sounding music has always been the recording engineer. They can make or break a recording.
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lvlotivation
Oct. 25, 2007, 4:18 p.m.Analog signals are sent using a Sine Wave. Analog signals are not as clear as a digital sound. However, the only difference between the two is that with a digital sound binary (0 and 1) is used to determine the true sampling rate. An interesting point I would like to make is that people don't generally speak binary. Computers are the only form of binary digit generation. People read binary but they don't interpret binary. With advances in todays technology, digital is the way to go. However, analog is often better because it has sound limitations that do not put a strain on the human ear.
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flyonthewallzz
Oct. 25, 2007, 5:38 p.m.About 20yrs ago my wife and I moved to our second apartment.
Of course the first thing I did was set up the stereo.
A Yamaha that I felt was way fancier than I deserved.
I splurged and bought a new CD player and fancy speaker wire,
I also bought the Santana Abraxas CD.
I left the CD unopened until I had a chance to savor the album.
The time came and I restrained myself from jumping to "Samba Pa Ti".
When the song began to play something was missing!
I turned up the volume, screwed around with the equalizer. Still!!
I then tore into unpacked boxes and found my dog eared old and tired album.
It was not hard to cue up the song and switch between phono and aux.
Have not bought too many CD's since.
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flyonthewallzz
Oct. 25, 2007, 6:49 p.m.This is completely tangential.
For a time I worked as an assistant (pig Keeper) photographer for a guy that did industrial and architectural work.
One of the jobs was the Columbia CD factory around the time the Bruce Springsteen album "Tunnel of love" was about to come out. Those folks where snotrags! A lot of time was wasted by young suits that found power in telling us what we could not photograph well after the equipment was set up.
They had a couple of machines that made jewel cases. There was this dude that would pull one out every now and then and measure it with a micrometer and then write down his findings. Lots of paper! I had to ask, He said they where all different.
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gamahuche
Oct. 25, 2007, 6:55 p.m.A day old story with plenty of divergent opinions and 63 comments and no negs..
That must be something of a record!
Kudos to you RFE for yr exemplary style.
My 2c.: I'm pathetically untechnical but the digital cuts never thrilled me to the marrow like the analog.
I thought that it had something to do with secondary sense-perception stimulation but I guess that what I've learnt from your article and from the discussion is that my ears weren't fooled.
A good argument for the live acoustic experience in a special space..
We have one in my hometown, a Corpus Christi chapel which spent a good part of its life being an ossuary and was last occupied full-time by an organ-builder. I've had the pleasure of sponsoring several concerts there - including one on the roof which employed the echos between a huge baroque building with 300 room behind it and a wooded hillside on the slopes of the hill opposite.
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Searchbeam
Oct. 26, 2007, 2:20 p.m.Music in any shape and form is absolutely divine.
Instrumental music takes us even a notch higher, because by removing verbal phrases, it makes the impact cross the thresholds of languages and cultural overtones.
It really goes straight to your cerebral space where the notes and rhythm can transcend everything to reach that higher state of awareness we call bliss!
World without music is just an unimaginable abyss, won't you concur?
Peace and Blessings on a low note!
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