High definition vinyl rips?

[magiccarpetride]

What your guys' take on the 24-bit/96 kHz rips of vinyl material? Is it really possible to achieve high resolution sample by playing back vinyl and capturing the signal with a decent analog-to-digital converter? Is it really a healthy 24-bit/96 kHz signal?

[TONEPUB]

I've had excellent luck so far....

If you have the disc space and the patience, 24/192 will bring you even closer, but 24/96 is excellent. Of course the quality of your rips will depend on everything else in the chain.

[magiccarpetride]

I've had excellent luck so far....

If you have the disc space and the patience, 24/192 will bring you even closer, but 24/96 is excellent. Of course the quality of your rips will depend on everything else in the chain.

Some people claim that vinyl is a medium that is capable of only 12 to 13 bit resolution maximum. If these limitations are indeed true, what would be the point in sampling the vinyl recordings to 24 bit resolution? Wouldn't it be like playing a VHS tape on a HD TV screen?

However, that may merely be an urban myth. How does one determine what is the resolution of an analog medium in terms of the digital sampling density? What I'm trying to say is that those naysayers could be talking straight out of their arses.

[Reid Malenfant]

What I'm trying to say is that those naysayers could be talking straight out of their arses.
They are doing just that :eyebrows:

A top flight record deck & cartridge can sound better than just about any CD player. Please remember that analogue is virtually an infinite number of samples because you have the complete waveform & not one chopped into bits ;)

A nice clean record & good gear playing it & i'm sure it'd be well worth recording in at least 24/96 :)

[magiccarpetride]

They are doing just that :eyebrows:

A top flight record deck & cartridge can sound better than just about any CD player. Please remember that analogue is virtually an infinite number of samples because you have the complete waveform & not one chopped into bits ;)

A nice clean record & good gear playing it & i'm sure it'd be well worth recording in at least 24/96 :)

I don't need no convincing when it comes to the special status of analog sound (when done well, of course). What I'm interested in discussing here is this: would a good vinyl rip equal a good SACD/DVD-Audio master? Would it even surpass it? I'm mainly talking about a 24-bit/96 kHz rip.

Example: I have a rather OK DVD-Audio master of Billy Cobham's legendary 1973 album "Spectrum" (24-bit/96 kHz). I like how it sounds, the cymbals are very detailed and realistically etched in space, the overall sound is soft, not grainy at all, the dynamics are happening and are quite convincing, and in general, this high def master is far superior in every respect to its CD equivalent.

Now, if someone were to find a good vinyl copy of the same album, and rip it in 24/96 using a top drawer gear, would that rip equal the DVD-Audio master?

[Reid Malenfant]

I think you'll it probably could be, yes :) A great deal would depend on the equipment that generates the 24/96 datastream though imo. Again you'd want it to be as good a quality as the vinyl playback system.

I'm not sure exactly what equipment would do this :eyebrows:

But yes, a mint record with good quality equipment playing it (read loadsamoney :eyebrows:) & something of equal quality doing the conversion & you'd be onto a winner :) I'm sure it'd equal it, after all your digital copy came from somewhere :scratch: You don't know what was used to actually make the 24/96 datastream on your disc, it may well be possible to surpass it quality wise...

[Orient_Pirate]

Try this one this what I use with FLACS,WAV and PCM rips. You need Vaio with DSD chip set though.

http://vaio-online.sony.com/prod_info/software/sonicstage_m_s_v2_2/index.html

[Alex_UK]

Looks like I've got that on my Vaio laptop and didn't even know it! Thank god I don't work in IT. Oh, hang on... :doh:

[Spur07]

I've heard plenty of 24bit Vinyl rips and they've all been pretty rubbish imo. Without exception the equivalent rip from CD sounded infinitely better. Apart from the fact that it always sounds invariably flat I'm not sure there's a way to remove all the hiss and pips properly.

Waste of time without proper post production pimping.

[DSJR]

They are doing just that :eyebrows:

A top flight record deck & cartridge can sound better than just about any CD player. Please remember that analogue is virtually an infinite number of samples because you have the complete waveform & not one chopped into bits ;)

A nice clean record & good gear playing it & i'm sure it'd be well worth recording in at least 24/96 :)

I disagree with the above. Vinyl may well be "nice," but compared to the source recording it's pants. CD isn't, surprisingly, when compared with the source recording. Even though there appears to be differences in CD playback, they're tiny when compared to the supreme differences that LP playback introduces. These views are from first-hand experiences and not just hearsay. For LP's, a well fettled Decca gets close when set up in a suitable arm on a proper turntable, but even that is hampered by the often band-limited plastic it's playing...

[Reid Malenfant]

Well Dave i guess you'll be pleased to know that i'm sticking with CDs then :eyebrows: That is apart from the records i do have ;)

Perhaps i'm just thinking about the early CD spinners which were pretty ghastly in comparison to more modern kit. I don't think it'd be much of a controversy to say that early CD playback wasn't that hot ;)

[magiccarpetride]

I've heard plenty of 24bit Vinyl rips and they've all been pretty rubbish imo. Without exception the equivalent rip from CD sounded infinitely better. Apart from the fact that it always sounds invariably flat I'm not sure there's a way to remove all the hiss and pips properly.

Waste of time without proper post production pimping.

While I have yet to hear a superior 24 bit vinyl rip, I've heard some that are getting pretty close to the CDs. For example, Santana "Abraxas" 24-bit 96 kHz vinyl rip gets it at more than 80% success rate. While the CD still sounds overall superior (OK, make that way superior and more enjoyable), the vinyl rip is nevertheless quite acceptable.

On the other hand, vinyl rip of Gerry Rafferty's "City to City" is beyond pathetic.

What I'm curious about is are there examples of vinyl rips that would surpass the CD versions of the same tracks? Or are those rarer than hen's teeth?

[Spur07]

I've got the Cowboy Junkies, Trinity Revisited as 24bit vinyl rip and it's about the best VR I've heard. I've not got the CD to compare it to however, but its certainly got the presence you usually get with 24bit CD replay.

[Vincent Kars]

Some people claim that vinyl is a medium that is capable of only 12 to 13 bit resolution maximum. If these limitations are indeed true, what would be the point in sampling the vinyl recordings to 24 bit resolution? Wouldn't it be like playing a VHS tape on a HD TV screen?


A 24 bit master recording has a dynamic range of -144 dBFS
A CD (16) -96 dBFS
Obvious as a bit is approximately 6 dB and vinyl can have a dynamic range of 70 dB (but often limited to 50 dB), 12 to 13 bits should do.

According to Shannon-Nyquist your sample rate should be the double of the highest frequency. Vinyl can contain signals up to 25 kHz (but higher values are reported) so 44.1 kHz is probably a bit at the low site.

Pragmatically spoken, recording at 24 will make your live easier. You can have comfortable headroom and still capture at full resolution.
http://thewelltemperedcomputer.com/KB/Bit1624.htm

A sample rate > 88 or 96 is probably overkill.

[StanleyB]

As I have mentioned before, sometimes the theory gets in the way of the actual outcome. It's no different in this case. A vinyl with a 70dB SNR ripped to 24 bit is not going to be miraculously converted to a 144dB file. What will happen that the -144dB reference in the digital rip will now be the old 70dB vinyl reference point.
I have a good stash of vinyl rips and I can assure you that there is no additional depth and previously hidden instrumentation that were not noticeable before. If the stylus used for playback during the rip did not pick up something, it wasn't added to the rip at any stage thereafter.

So what is the 24 bit about then? In the case of vinyl it refers to the number of digital samples taken from the original analogue signal extracted from the vinyl. More samples means more information retained from the original. That's it.

[Welder]

I don’t think Vincent is stating that is what one gets in practice.
I think he’s just pointing out that on some vinyl the information is there; whether or not it can be retrieved and converted is another matter as you point out

[pabbab]

To throw in my two cents:

Certain vinyl rips I have heard are to my ears far superior to their cd counterparts, in large part, I think, because of the more natural, more believable sound. Typically, more space, much better sound on drums and cymbals, in particular, better overall balance.

As far as hi-res vs redbook, lots of those vinyl rippers posting on blogs post both in 24/96 and 16/44.1, allowing comparisons from a same original file, so apples vs. apples.

Obviously the quality of the vinyl and the equipment involved throughout are determinant.

[Stratmangler]

As far as hi-res vs redbook, lots of those vinyl rippers posting on blogs post both in 24/96 and 16/44.1, allowing comparisons from a same original file, so apples vs. apples.

It's nice to have a level playing field on which to draw conclusions.

[StanleyB]

I don’t think Vincent is stating that is what one gets in practice.
I think he’s just pointing out that on some vinyl the information is there; whether or not it can be retrieved and converted is another matter as you point out
It's not what you think. It's how it comes across to the general AoS readership. Some things need clear explanation, especially when we are dealing with issues that involves quite a bit of prior technical knowledge. High res files don't come cheap, so we owe it to any potential novice buyer to be clear about what it is that he/she should be expecting.
As an example: I have had to explain to customers many times that a 24/96 DAC won't mysteriously turn a 16/44.1 audio file into a 24/96 file on playback. But it's easy to see why many would get that impression.

[Peter Galbavy]

IMHO Where 24-bit wins is in processing. If you have something as basic as a digital volume control for 16-bit samples then you want to internally process it in at least 24-bits so that you don't lose the dynamic range while altering the overall volume. Shove the 16 bits into the top 16 bits of the 24-bit sample (accounting for negative values and sign extension if applicable, which I don't think it is in LPCM ?) and then do your scaling on the 24-bit sample...