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Post by Deleted on Oct 30, 2009 22:54:28 GMT
I have been playing around with the 24/96 .flac files of "Claire Martin -Too Darn Hot" that I saved to my 'G" drive in July 2008,
which is well before playing around with PC sound and vibration deadening, using the self adhesive 3M 2552 anti vibration tape.
Initially, I tried reconverting them to.wav and saving them to my 8GB USB pen from PQI.
I only tried a few tracks, because it was taking around 2 hours to convert and save just one track to the PQI drive!
However, results seemed very promising when these files were then played back directly from this drive, so I ordered a rather expensive 32GB Corsair Voyager GT USB2.0. , which has now arrived.
This time however, the 13 tracks were converted to.wav and saved on the Corsair USB drive in approximately 13 minutes, which is about 120 times faster than the 8GB PQI USB pen !!!
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that these original .flac files now sound far better than the previously converted files which were saved originally on the "G" drive. I can no longer tell that these files were derived from paid and downloaded .flac files.
They have lost that annoying "veil" that I usually hate about .wav files of "lossless" origin.
It should be noted that my "G" drive has since been dampened with the 3M tape.
Furthermore, I also reripped the 24/96 DVD-A of "Fleetwood Mac-Rumours" to the Corsair USB drive a little while ago, and again,
I say with 100% certainty on my part, that this is the best that I have ever heard these great tracks.
If you have high resolution playback gear, why not try the same to a USB pen of your own, and see if you can hear the differences ?
I am now looking forward to trying the same with some 24/192 material.
As usual, YMMV,and will also depend on the software player that you use. I use Creative Media Source player in preference to Foobar, but I believe that equal (or better?) results should be achievable if played using XXHE from Peter St. (www.phasure.com.)
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Spirit
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Post by Spirit on Oct 31, 2009 2:12:14 GMT
It sounds like what you're saying (in just this post) is that it's possible lossless is in fact lossless (as in, no loss  ) and that playback quality is dependent on what medium the files are being stored on...  |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 31, 2009 3:18:43 GMT
It sounds like what you're saying (in just this post) is that it's possible lossless is in fact lossless (as in, no loss ) and that playback quality is dependent on what medium the files are being stored on... Phil I have been saying that to a few other people for a while now. At least, that is now my experience with .flac. I haven't yet been able to verify how much better it would have been,if the downloaded 24/96 .flac files had been saved directly to the USB pen, or a good SSD originally. It seems possible that further gains may have been made if that was done. I have also found that the original .flac files sounded better after conversion to.wav after being saved to and played back from the same HDD after 3M 2552 tape dampening, than the original converted files saved to the same HDD back in June 2008. i.e. before any drive and chassis vibration and noise deadening. The attached quote is from a reply to a CA post that I made a little while ago, confirming yet again, that SSD sounds better than HDD, identical check sums notwithstanding. Alex New comment: Author: DSD_mastering Title: Playing back from SSD drives Playing back from SSD drives is not new and yes, it does sound better. We've been doing this in our mastering studio for about a year now. Regards,__________________ Bruce A. Brown Puget Sound Studios Seattle, Washington www.computeraudiophile.com/content/Higher-Quality-playback-PAID-2496-flac-Downloads#comment-29675 |
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Spirit
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Post by Spirit on Oct 31, 2009 4:44:33 GMT
I'll keep on wavpacking for the foreseeable future then  |
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Will
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Post by Will on Oct 31, 2009 16:10:19 GMT
It sounds like what you're saying (in just this post) is that it's possible lossless is in fact lossless (as in, no loss ) and that playback quality is dependent on what medium the files are being stored on... Indeed. Heard it with my own ears and everything  |
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Post by derekrumble on Nov 4, 2009 13:47:45 GMT
Ref 'Too Darn Hot'....
A while back I wrote a short, informal, report for a Yahoo group I belong to on the quality of a few supposedly hi-res recordings.
Have attached it here if anyone is interested.
At the top of page 2, take a look at the graphic of an extract from 'Something's Coming' and you will see that the upper response limit of this disc is ONLY (just) 20kHz! 96/24 indeed.
Regards,
Derek
ps I checked this attachment thoroughly for typos but one or two persist - sorry
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Post by Deleted on Nov 4, 2009 20:55:51 GMT
Hi Derek
Interesting, but not surprising, given the SQ of some DVD-As that I own. I didn't even bother looking at the ripped files in Sound Forge 9
Alex
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Post by PinkFloyd on Nov 4, 2009 21:08:57 GMT
All interesting but do you trust the measuring equipment? "specs" and "measured results" mean very little if the equipment sounds crap to the human ear..... I pay VERY little attention to "specifications".... Who calibrates the calibration and who calibrates the calibrator? We live in an age of instant computer generated calibrated pie charts, graphs and meters and we seem to be taking the results as "fact".... none of these measurements are reliable (in audio terms) the only true "meter" being our own ears.
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Post by derekrumble on Nov 5, 2009 9:19:55 GMT
All interesting but do you trust the measuring equipment? "specs" and "measured results" mean very little if the equipment sounds crap to the human ear..... I pay VERY little attention to "specifications".... Who calibrates the calibration and who calibrates the calibrator? We live in an age of instant computer generated calibrated pie charts, graphs and meters and we seem to be taking the results as "fact".... none of these measurements are reliable (in audio terms) the only true "meter" being our own ears. I disagree in this case. Take a Claire Martin '24/96' track from Too Darn Hot. Read it into Audacity or Audition and look at the frequency spectrum - it is chooped off at just below 20kHz. So the fact that it is passed off as a 24/96 file wrong. True , the file is SUPPLIED in a 24/96 format but it failes to contain the information above 20kHz one would rightlky expect. Or have I missed your point? Derek |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 5, 2009 9:53:55 GMT
All interesting but do you trust the measuring equipment? "specs" and "measured results" mean very little if the equipment sounds crap to the human ear..... I pay VERY little attention to "specifications".... Who calibrates the calibration and who calibrates the calibrator? We live in an age of instant computer generated calibrated pie charts, graphs and meters and we seem to be taking the results as "fact".... none of these measurements are reliable (in audio terms) the only true "meter" being our own ears. I disagree in this case. Take a Claire Martin '24/96' track from Too Darn Hot. Read it into Audacity or Audition and look at the frequency spectrum - it is chooped off at just below 20kHz. So the fact that it is passed off as a 24/96 file wrong. True , the file is SUPPLIED in a 24/96 format but it failes to contain the information above 20kHz one would rightlky expect. Or have I missed your point? Derek Derek After your recent post, I had a look at "Black Coffee" from the same album in SoundForge 9. Using Spectrum Analysis there is content to just past 40kHz, then it nosedives. The R channel on this track goes out a couple of kHz further before nosediving. It is hard to get exact figures because of the small window size. I opened the .wav file that was recently converted from the original 24/96 .flac download of June 2008 in SF9(Spectrum Analysis-Blackman) I think your Pioneer player may be letting you down ? Alex P.S. Some specifics, but don't ask me what it all means! Ask someone like Robert ! ;D Blackman-Harris. L Ch. - PEAK =-78dB at 39,179HZ R Ch. - PEAK =-81dB at 42,370HZ (0 to 95.9kHz) Derek I have emailed you a couple of screen shots. Alex |
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Post by derekrumble on Nov 5, 2009 11:06:49 GMT
Thanks Alex - if I read a track into, say Auditon, and analyse it then the Pioneer is out of the picture - my downloaded FLACs have been 'unpacked into wavs and then looked at - I will take some care and repeat the process starting with the my originally downloaded flacs.
I am in danger here of hijacking this thread - I just meant to comment to the side that hi-res downloads often aren't what they are said to be - ref the other tracks considered in my 'report'. The PIoneer I used (as a source for SACD tracks, does roll off at above 40kHz - but here I ma talking about the catual contenet of the wav file - not a reconstruction of it by a particular player. Am at work with not much time to explain so hope this makes sense.
Let's consider moving this to a new thread because your original theme was on hearing differences between playing back from different storage media?
Derek
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Post by Deleted on Nov 5, 2009 11:24:55 GMT
Derek
Let's see if you can make some sense out of the SF9 screengrabs from "Black Coffee" in the email, when you get home. There appears to be definite extended HF response to just over 40kHz.
Alex
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Post by derekrumble on Nov 5, 2009 13:09:54 GMT
Derek Let's see if you can make some sense out of the SF9 screengrabs from "Black Coffee" in the email, when you get home. There appears to be definite extended HF response to just over 40kHz. Alex Yes, there IS a response out to c. 40kHz - but if I can for the moment assume that the track I have already looked at (Something's Coming) has a similar pedigree - the info at 40kHz is just noise artifacts from what looks like a transformation, at some stage, to DSD format. Phew... hope you follow. To be absolutely sure of my method I have just re-purchased the track and downloaded it this morning and there is a fresh screen-dump extract attached. The image is of a scan of the whole track. I suggest that the history behind these Claire Martin tracks is... 1. 44.1 kHz source at whatever bit depth 2. translation to DSD (giving rise to the spurious response out to 40+kHz 3. Resampling to 96/24 - hence the cut-off of the noise c. 48kHz !!! I'll take a look at my download of 'Black Coffee' when I get home. Isn't 'Black Coffee' a great track whatever its pedigree? I play this often; it's my Claire Martin demo track for any visitors who havent heard of her. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 5, 2009 22:30:56 GMT
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FritzS
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Post by FritzS on Nov 13, 2009 4:04:24 GMT
Derek Let's see if you can make some sense out of the SF9 screengrabs from "Black Coffee" in the email, when you get home. There appears to be definite extended HF response to just over 40kHz. Alex are Black_Coffee.wav a true 24 bit files from source and not upsampling/upscaling? It runs now fine in 24 bit / 96 kHz withe the grace m902 |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2009 4:18:35 GMT
Derek Let's see if you can make some sense out of the SF9 screengrabs from "Black Coffee" in the email, when you get home. There appears to be definite extended HF response to just over 40kHz. Alex are Black_Coffee.wav a true 24 bit files from source and not upsampling/upscaling? It runs now fine in 24 bit / 96 kHz withe the grace m902 Friedrich Yes, they are genuine 24/96. The producer of the recording gave the reason for the increasing noise level towards 40kHZ as the DSD process. This is a known problem with SACD. It would appear that DVD-A is superior in that respect. "Verbatim from Mr Hobbs: "As you will be aware, on 'raw' DSD there is a rising noise spectrum as you move away from the base audio band and, as far as I can see from the 'WTF' plot you so kindly attached, this rising spectrum is reflected in these PCM files." And: "Most of our more recent titles have been recorded in hi res PCM rather than DSD ( and we then upsample this to DSD for the SACD disc). You may find these files have a more 'normal' noise spectrum." Does it sound better than typical 16/44.1 with the Grace M902 ? Alex P.S. Is the Grace M902 on loan, or permanent ? If it is permanent, do you wish to be included in future 24/96 DLs |
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FritzS
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Post by FritzS on Nov 13, 2009 5:17:14 GMT
Does it sound better than typical 16/44.1 with the Grace M902 ? Alex P.S. Is the Grace M902 on loan, or permanent ? If it is permanent, do you wish to be included in future 24/96 DLs It sounds better (I cannot say why or what ) - the sound is very detailed and immaculate, perfect, spotlessly clean - IMHO the Grace m902 is one of the best DAC/HA combinations of the world - the only disadvantage the price about 1700 EUR (and my buget for my hobby from the minister of finance  ) My goal is to get one very good DAC with S-PDIF, TOSLINK, USB (or Ethnernet / IP too) inputs that converts all audio formats. A TOSLINK input switch would be a big hit, so I could connect it to a digital sat receiver to hear digital sat radio too. Please put me to your list of 24/96 DL. |
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Spirit
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Post by Spirit on Nov 13, 2009 7:33:03 GMT
Minister of Finance.... Love it Freidrich |
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) and that playback quality is dependent on what medium the files are being stored on...
)