I've got really sensitive hearing, and I can hear well into the 16khz range. Because of this, I can pick out distortion a mile away, and I absloutely cannot stand poor quality audio. Well, lately, I've been getting a bit of listener fatigue with my two most frequently used sources of music...my I-pod, and my XM radio, which I listen to in my company van. My most favorite tunes I've always enjoyed just didn't invoke the enjoyment that they used to. I figured I was simply getting tired of listening to the same stuff
I was at a flea market over the weekend and I found a really nice professional grade Technics direct drive turntable for only $5. Most of my albums long since copied to cassette, then bought on CD, and then compressed to fit on my I-pod were dug back out again to try this baby out. The old turntable on that "all in one" system I had in high school long since gone. A few months ago, I found an old Stromberg-Carlson vacuum tube amplifier at a yard sale to, so I connected the newly found turntable up to that, and my Cerwinn-Vega 12 inch speakers I bought in college. HOLY CRAP!!!! this thing sounds NICE!!! Yes, there are a few cracks and clicks in the audio, but it didn't take long to realize that I was not listening to a stereo in my office, but Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson, and Neil Peart (RUSH) cranking out all the tunes with all their heart, along with many other musicians. The stereo was literally transparent as I heard every subtle nuance of music that was beyond the walls of the room. I wasn't just hearing drums, but I could tell where and how the drums were being hit, and the fact that every hit was different than the last. The square waves from synthesizers made me shiver they were so chilling.
As I drove home this evening listening to my XM radio I became readily apparent as to why I was getting such fatigue with listening to music...the audio quality on this thing SUCKS!!!! I could hear the variable bit compression switching in and out when high frequencies were present in enough quantitiy to demand a higher bit rate. Even then, it sounded garbled, like the cymbals were being played under water. Symballence in the "s" and "t's" of singing was so slopped out singers sounded as if they were spitting. Audio compression knocked all the punch out of the music, and brought the quiet passages up too loud. I'm ready to throw my XM out the window and be done with it, especially since they started playing commercials on the music channels...gotta love ClearChannel communications!
My I-pod sounded a little bit better, but still lacked that transparent feel that the turntable was giving me last night. It just sort of sounded dull and lifeless, and again, compression artifacts reared their ugly head. Yes, an I-pod stores several days of music on a disc about an inch and a half large, but it cannot compare with the fidelity of only 45 minutes of music stored on a huge 12 inch disc of vinyl! I couldn't wait to get home this evening and crank up this old system and re-introduce myself to my favorite music again!
Let's hear it for 50 year old recording technology ...semiconductors, who needs 'em!!!
I was at a flea market over the weekend and I found a really nice professional grade Technics direct drive turntable for only $5. Most of my albums long since copied to cassette, then bought on CD, and then compressed to fit on my I-pod were dug back out again to try this baby out. The old turntable on that "all in one" system I had in high school long since gone. A few months ago, I found an old Stromberg-Carlson vacuum tube amplifier at a yard sale to, so I connected the newly found turntable up to that, and my Cerwinn-Vega 12 inch speakers I bought in college. HOLY CRAP!!!! this thing sounds NICE!!! Yes, there are a few cracks and clicks in the audio, but it didn't take long to realize that I was not listening to a stereo in my office, but Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson, and Neil Peart (RUSH) cranking out all the tunes with all their heart, along with many other musicians. The stereo was literally transparent as I heard every subtle nuance of music that was beyond the walls of the room. I wasn't just hearing drums, but I could tell where and how the drums were being hit, and the fact that every hit was different than the last. The square waves from synthesizers made me shiver they were so chilling.
As I drove home this evening listening to my XM radio I became readily apparent as to why I was getting such fatigue with listening to music...the audio quality on this thing SUCKS!!!! I could hear the variable bit compression switching in and out when high frequencies were present in enough quantitiy to demand a higher bit rate. Even then, it sounded garbled, like the cymbals were being played under water. Symballence in the "s" and "t's" of singing was so slopped out singers sounded as if they were spitting. Audio compression knocked all the punch out of the music, and brought the quiet passages up too loud. I'm ready to throw my XM out the window and be done with it, especially since they started playing commercials on the music channels...gotta love ClearChannel communications!
My I-pod sounded a little bit better, but still lacked that transparent feel that the turntable was giving me last night. It just sort of sounded dull and lifeless, and again, compression artifacts reared their ugly head. Yes, an I-pod stores several days of music on a disc about an inch and a half large, but it cannot compare with the fidelity of only 45 minutes of music stored on a huge 12 inch disc of vinyl! I couldn't wait to get home this evening and crank up this old system and re-introduce myself to my favorite music again!
Let's hear it for 50 year old recording technology ...semiconductors, who needs 'em!!!
