Can I Have My Money Back?

Neil Young in a recent interview for the music magazine MOJO explained how he was disappointed with the poor standard of SQ on many of the re-issues of his material, and of the general disappointing SQ of the CD format and how this was the motivation and catalyst for his getting behind the development of the Hi Res Pono device. Great! I Thought a musician who also appreciates the value of a high standard of sound quality, then records his latest album, "A Letter Home," in a 1947 Voice-O-Graph vinyl recording booth, aaaaaaaaaaaaargh!!

I wouldn't have posted your comments either. I wish we could have civil disagreements with people (even ignorant people like the author of the gizmodo article) without it always devolving into name calling. It's low and unnecessary and, ultimately, alienates people who, if handled with respectful disagreement, might be swayed.

We've already started to see Pono purchases trickle out and are they using the best quality masters as promised? No. During the fundraising campaign which I contributed to I specifically asked if they would guarantee no "loudness wars" masterings and was told that if a master didn't meet Neil's high standards they would ask for a new one. Well looking at the releases of some of the Metallica and Red Hot Chili Peppers' titles available they have not done that. Death Magnetic, One Hot Minute and Stadium Arcadium are all victims of heavy-handed dynamic range compression. They offer a 24/96 option for RCHP's 1991 breakthrough album Blood Sugar Sex Magik, it's DR9 which is pretty healthy as far as DR scores go until you consider the original 16/44.1 CD is DR13 and fully dynamic. Neil Young's offerings are of course fully dynamic and can be bought blind, but just like HD Tracks, Qobuz, Acoustic Sounds and others you cannot just assume you're getting dynamically intact masterings. That is a real shame.

I picked up the 24-bit version of Dave Matthews Band's most recent album a few weeks ago, it was the same dynamically-challenged mastering you can find on the CD...not surprising given the Ted Jensen mastering credit.

I was very happy to see Lloyd Cole's Facebook postings yesterday. He had received a flat digital transfer of the original 1/2" analogue tapes of Rattlesnakes and compared them to the existing CD "remasters" and noted that they do not retain the original dynamics, he even linked to a blurb about the loudness wars. He promised that the upcoming CD reissues would retain the full dynamics of the tapes and apologized in advance to anyone put out by having to turn up their volume knob, lol.

At the end of the day there is something to be said for the little labels we support, Audio Fidelity, Analogue Productions, MOFI, ORG Music and others like them - you know you're not getting lifeless sludge.

I'm fully aware that the topic of my post isn't related to Michael's qualms with the Gizmodo article and I agree the article is rubbish, just offering a different perspective on why Pono has some 'splainin' to do.

I think it IS over time that we really realize if something is better or if we are fooling our ears. I will bet that Michael's turntable just keeps sounding better and better (subtly) the longer he owns it.

Here's a reverse analogy...you don't "hear" your stylus wear as an A/B thing, it's only after a few thousand hours and when you change the stylus that you know what stylus wear is. Hell, I learned this as a 6 year-old, lying on the floor playing 45's.

I agree with Michael I was also very upset with the article that he stated we cant hear the difference between mp3 and higher bit rate music, which is just plain ridiculous. The goal of all this is to get the best sound possible and the most enjoyment from our music. Anyone that says we cant hear the difference in something either doesn't have the ears or a decent enough system to tell the difference. They are then doing a huge disservice to those that do care and want the to get the best sound. Anyone can hear the difference between mp3 and even cd quality, "as long as" its a good recording to begin with. If its a compressed recording sure you probably wont hear any difference. Also what ever your playback system is must be of decent quality and reasonably well calibrated so it can show you the differences.

Same issue when evaluating TV's if its a poor source and or the TV is not well calibrated all TV's will look the same. Your not going be able to evaluate which is a better TV. Common sense.

The whole point is to hopefully buy the best sounding version of all music, and although I am a huge "analog" record fan records also are not always the best option to buy. Case in point I'm a big Radiohead fan. I bought the records hoping they would be good. The records are horrible, compressed lifeless the cd kills them much more musical and involving. So you cant assume records are always going to be better. I also have a issue with some of these re-mastered Lp's. They are also not always better than the originals or other re-mastered versions. I bought 5 new expensive re-mastered Lp's only to find out that one is not as good as one of the original stamper numbers and the others to re-mastered Classic record versions.

I strongly feel we have to be able to playback both formats, especially now that most current music is being recorded digitally.

I also don't think you can buy music by reviews. I have read some highly recommended reviews only to find they were not as good as some of my originals. Its a huge challenge to find the best options often costing me a lot of money. I am going to be a lot more cautious when buying new music.

All though I have not bought any records from Tom Port of better records yet, honestly I kind of now think he is really on the right track, "but" has he chosen the right sounding versions ? What's his system ? and what does he listen for and is it on the same page as what I want it to sound like ? Guess I might have to find out.

It's all about the music is my point, and for someone to discourage us from wanting to get the most enjoyment from it and spewing this techno crap thinking we cant hear it, is doing everyone a disservice.

Last point is we have known about high resolution audio for a long time its nothing new, it shocks me to see it is taking someone like Neil Young to get the word out to the general public that we have not been hearing the music. Hey Kudos to Neil Young for getting the word out and bringing higher quality music to the masses. I'm just kind of shocked that since he was a huge analog fan and always hated digital that he's now promoting it over analog. I think he just likes the convenience of digital and can play it in his car lol.

Kevin

Its all about the music anyway.

One of my concerns with downloading higher resolution music is there is no mention of what the native format of the music is and how it was transferred. Is this up-sampled redbook music ? I can up-sample my own music, I'm certainly not going to pay a premium for up-sampled digital music. Until there is more information on this I wont be downloading higher sample rate music. Why are these company's not telling us what the original native format was and how it was transferred and mastered ? I don't get it. Am I missing something here ?

Kevin

"It's a wonder we survived for tens of thousands of years using our senses not subject to A/B/X testing because only then could we know what we're actually hearing, seeing, smelling and touching."

I'll never understand why so many audio critics are opposed to blind listening. It's unscientific and doesn't make sense. I evaluate sound using my ears. I don't need to see or know what I'm listening to to hear it properly. I love the audiophile press but will always take their claims with a grain of salt as long as they reject blind listening. If you need to see something to hear it, there's something wrong with your ears (and you discredit the visually impaired). Put simply, if I can't hear a difference between equipment via a blind test, any differences are irrelevant to me.

How can blind listening improve a test taker's test taking skills but decrease their ability to hear accurately (or in some other way make their results "stupid")? What does that mean? How can a person become so skilled at blind listening tests their results become invalid? Can repeated blind listening improve or lessen a person's ability to hear accurately? How can bias or inaccuracies of any kind creep into a blind listening test set up and executed properly?

Sorry, this post will not compete with the technical detail and fire of some of the previous. I just wanted to share a quick story. I got "back into" vinyl a couple of years ago. I am a tinkerer and very amateur electronics restorer so tracked down a couple old Marantz 6300's, frankensteined them into one nicely operating table, bought a reasonably priced Denon DL103 cartridge and peramp and, after thorough cleaning, set down to spin some of my old favs. I was shocked. Of course, the time I spent restoring the table may have been a factor, and the romantic, nostalgic re-living of youth may have been involved, but i found myself ENJOYING music again. I had not realized that I wasn't enjoying music much until coming back to vinyl. Was it the elimination of all the complexities of CD quality or MP3 digital audio? Maybe. Regardless, I still feel like it SOUNDS BETTER. Alas, MOST people don't care. A smart phone, earbuds, and they are fine. Sigh.

Here's a completely different take on all this:

If the question is whether hi-res will be mainstream then everyone can relax. It's been decided already.

Studios currently produce a "product" that is hi-res. DAC chip makers don't even make chips below 24 bit anymore from what I can tell. I don't even think bedroom studios produce a product that is less than 24/96 these days.

So why does this "product" get dumbed down as it is distributed (Apple, Spotify, others) -- the iPhone 6 in fact has a chip that can decode 24/96 already -- mainstream "Joe" already has the darn capability in his phone by default and he's not paying extra for it! It's simply due to the data storage and bandwidth considerations. There is no other incentive to take a product and dumb it down, in fact, I suspect maintaining the code to do this is costly in the long run. It's probably also costly to have people on the staff of distributors like Apple to even debate the issue -- do they debate why a book is 1000 pages long instead of 100? No! Do they compress the book by taking out unnecessary words to make it smaller? No! It's a waste of time because the storage needs of a digital book are trivial. Similarly, the storage needs of a hi-res audio file will soon be trivial as well. It's simple logic and the trend is obvious.

Think about -- how often do you see cases like this where the producer of a product hands the product to a distributor and the distributor SUBTRACTS value rather than ADDS value. It's very uncommon. The modification of the product is costly, why not just pass the product along "as is"?

So this "dumbing down" is a short term issue based on the awkward place we are with digital audio technology. But it solves itself very soon as data costs rocket down and 4k drives these prices way way down.

There may be an opportunity for folks to monetize the switch, sort of how Apple monetized the switch from 128k to 256k and then they just sold 256k by default. But that was short lived -- similarly Apple will probably have a "hi-res" version that sells for a premium for a while (one year or two) and then eventually simplify and just sell the "product" that comes from the studio as the pressure from Spotify and the likes of Tidal simply make lossless the default.

I think Neal Young means well, but in the grand scheme of things he's just capitalizing on this short term issue of selling these files before they are the default. His window of opportunity is relatively short if you look at it based on the trends in data storage and bandwidth costs -- I don't think Pono will influence the timing on any of this nearly as much as 4k video adoption will. Within a few short years I think lossless hi resolution files will be the default and eventually distributors will simply pass along the format that comes from the studio and save the costs of modification.

No matter what Neal, you or me say about this, it's been decided already. The "product" is a hi resolution product and the costs to dumb it down eventually will not make any sense any longer.

I'd be worried about hi res not happening IF the producers (studios) were happily cranking out compressed mp3s and feeling comfortable with that as their product. They have already decided that's not good enough. So we can relax and let it play itself out. I'd also be worried if Apple wasn't requesting hi-res files from the studios, but they are. Further I'd be concerned if mobile devices lacked DAC chips to play hi-res but again, that's not the case.

We are perhaps a few years away from this -- if you want it to happen sooner than push for 4k video.

4k video will drive the need for increased storage on mobile devices, increased bandwidth to homes, etc .. etc.. Audio will just happily benefit from this.

So, to me, if we want to debate about the sonic viability of hi-res we should ask the studios that produce music why they produce it at hi-res? Why do THEY feel it's important that their product be a high resolution? Ultimately it is what they want to provide to us listeners.

I feel that the importance of the middle man (Apple, Pono, etc..) between the product producer and the consumer will be less of a focus in a few short years. In fact, recently I've been buying files directly from small indie bands and guess what? They provide lossless files. It's what they want to provide as the artist.

I'd love to see the audiophile community focus more on BIGGER ideas, like adaptive file formats -- imagine buying an audio file that has a few different mastered versions within the file and can adjust or blend those perhaps based on the listening environment.

I think hi resolution is really yesterday's issue -- studios , chip makers, even Apple -- have already decided this is the future. 4k video will just lead us into the ability to deliver it seamlessly and remove this noise of the middle man adjusting the product.

Now of'course hi-res doesn't mean hi quality, so I might never convince my co-workers to dump $300 on a good pair of headphones, but I have little doubt that we will soon both be downloading lossless files whether they want them or not.

I think we audiophiles should be looking forward not backward and asking some of these questions to the producers of the product and let the middle men play themselves out. Why do the studios produce a product with just one "take it or leave it master"? It puts all the eggs in one basket if that final step (which is 1/1000 of the effort) makes some bad decisions or compromises. Why do we have to compromise in the future on this last critical step?

We need to bark about why most hi-res files still sound lousy and why the product offers just ONE master that has to satisfy different listening environments --- background music, cranking on a hi-fi, subway listening, car, etc...

In the grand scheme of things, it seems silly to me that in a world where data is cheap and getting cheaper that we are limited to "one-size-fits-all" presentation of the music.

I feel strongly that this is the next wave of hi-fi -- the resolution wars are over -- we won. It just needs to play itself out. Now we need to ask the producers about the next step which could revolutionize audio quality far more than the step from 16 to 24 bits.

JBo
True Vinyl Radio

I've done blind tests as well and have never gotten one wrong. I was put through a test of the directionality of wire by a famous recording engineer Steve Hoffman and got it right 10 out of ten times. He was shocked for he was'nt even sure he heard a difference. Granted like anything else and especially in audio we can and do educate our ears and hearing, the keys are knowing what to listen for, that its a good source and played back on a decent and well calibrated system. This issue is many people who are making these bad claims are playing it back on a receiver and pair of speakers that are most likely not well setup. Receivers are just to limited and not going to reveal large enough differences in program material. So double blind test can work, but there are so many variables that wont give you a true outcome. Ultimately a better indication is weather the music moves you emotionally.

Just like when Cd's came along sound quality was terrible. Mp3's then came and it even got worse, why ? all for portability ? Sad, Mp3's have destroyed the real enjoyment in music, it made it into fast food. and then on top of that people are listening to them on these apple and other really bad sounding head buds. Oh my god have you heard music through these things ? They are just dreadful. Why mp3's have been excepted just staggers my mind. Redbook cd's is bad enough, and now with the introduction of high resolution music its now becoming more listenable. Not perfect, I don't think digital ever will be, but unfortunately know one is recording analog anymore (at least that I know of) so we are stuck with what the industry is giving us. All the more reason to listen to old music recorded analog, mastered by good engineers. Thank god for the Bernie Grundmans, and Kevin Grays in the world, and that can get the original master tapes to work with.

I listen to vinyl and digital in equal amounts. I don't know much about A/B, A/B/X, short term or long term testing. I know for some reason, (maybe for a measurable reason, or maybe a nostalgic reason) I have a better listening experience with my records and my old solid state receiver. So can I just say that I still really enjoy my vinyl? Lets end the technical back and forth stuff. Go listen to whatever you like however it makes you the happiest.

Michael, beyond the attacking of this Aguilar fellow, I’m inferring your real point is as follows: Analogue audio is better than CD digital audio because there’s a bunch of info above 16-bit that’s missed by Redbook CD (but captured by analogue) correct? Thus, anyone who claims 16-bit CD is ‘good enough’ is either a “know-nothing” or a nut -job who can’t hear.

I remember reading somewhere (how’s that for documented support) that all the info emitted by vinyl above the limit of a Redbook CD is junk info (or colorizations, distortions, pop, hiss, mud, syrup, silly-putty, etc).

Hasn’t your principal argument always been that people should listen with their own ears and decide for themselves what sounds better? Isn’t that what this Aguilar character is doing? He’s basically imitating your shtick by staying “Hey, who cares what all the specs say on paper, listen with your own ears and ask yourself if 24-bit really sounds better than 16-bit.” So, hasn’t your mantra always been “Hey, who cares what all the specs say on paper, listen with your own ears and ask yourself if CD really sounds better than vinyl).

Michael, I love you and I love vinyl. I have a Pro-ject Xtension turntable and 1,500 records that I use frequently because I enjoy the EXPERIENCE of listening to vinyl. Nevertheless, when listening *with my own ears* more often than not, I hear a better sounding CD than it’s vinyl counterpart.

I don't understand why people want the industry standard for digital audio resolution (16/44.1) to be based on the people who CAN'T tell the difference. I would want the resolution standard to be determined by the people who are genetically predispositioned to be able to hear the difference. Set the bar high, not low. If higher resolution files produce a better sound for the ears that can hear it, I'm all for it. I think people are just pissed that they spent lots of money on CDs when they were marketed as perfect, only to find out it's not. They feel ripped off, don't wanna buy the music again (understandable), but unfairly defend a format that is not everything it claimed to be. If Michael Fremer was selling hi Rez digital products, I'd be skeptical. But, he's not. He's concerned only with what sounds good.

http://www.laweekly.com/music/why-cds-may-actually-sound-better-than-vin...

Delves into hi-res, and how mixing and mastering are the keys.

MF wrote: "There's a lot of music only available on CD so I buy it to have it and listen to it but I still can't engage to the point of sitting and listening to the exclusion of all else. Only vinyl manages that for me...."

IMO, you just need to experience the right source with low jitter and the right DAC with the right digital filtering and you will abandon the vinyl.

"funny thing is, a lot of young people now have the same experience after years of MP3 listening. Are they now "habituated" to distortion etc.? Or is something else going on here?"

If that's all you have ever known, then its fine. Until people have the experience of hearing really resolving, emotional music, they simply don't get it. Its primarily about the beat and lyrics to most of them IMO.

The main problems with getting hi-res to the masses are:

1) good SQ is still expensive and may always be
2) currently large Hi-res file sizes are an impediment to progress
3) it takes more than a youtube video to convince someone that they benefit from hi-res. The bricks and mortar stores of the 60's and 70's don't exist anymore where you could get a sense of this. This is the primary thrust of Pono - using a trusted celeb to deliver this message.
4) it does not solve the bigger problems of compression added in the mixing room, A/D jitter and poor mastering DSP software

Pono only partially solves (3) IMO. If we could solve all of 4 of these and not just hi-res, the playback chain would again become the weak-point in music reproduction. It isn't right now IME. ITs the recording.

And, to agree with another poster, adopting hi-res is just a matter of time, so Pono may be a short-term incentive. There are other more far-reaching improvements to audio reproduction that are more interesting to me, but also a lot more complicated.

One of these is eliminating the crossover in the loudspeaker and replacing it with DSP software in the digital source creation. If this were accomplished, it would lower the cost of all non-headphone audio systems and improve their quality significantly. Even $100 speakers could sound amazing.

I made a proposal to Microsoft audio group to do this 2 years ago and it sits gathering dust. Maybe Apple?

I would love to do a kickstarter campaign for this invention, but no one would understand what it is. Most people don't even know that there is a crossover in their speakers. With this invention, you plug your speakers into the wall outlets and you drive music to them from your iphone over the cloud. What could be simpler?

This is the problem with high-fidelity. Its too complicated and not getting much simpler.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio
est. 1996

Young has already said he doesn't think they will be making them for long.

Thanks for your input (never took a class in statistics) but I'm satisfied with the misguided idea that 50% who could hear a difference.;-)

Journeyman - You have it right. There would be three DACs in each speaker and three amps. A DAC and amp pair for each tweeter, midrange and woofer. There are already lots of powered speakers available and the digital amp technology is getting better and better, as well as cheaper. Each speaker type could have a set of parameters from the manufacturer that are loaded into the software when the speaker is purchased, and these will set the crossover frequencies and slopes for the crossovers. Zero phase shift DSP algorithms can be used, making this superior to even the most expensive analog or discrete crossovers.

There is no reason with enough bandwidth on the WiFi that this system could not support movie surround-sound either. Once the software has control over the data, virtually anything can be done prior to sending to the speakers, as many streams as desired.

The system would have to synchronize the streams, since each is a set of independent packets coming over the Ethernet or WiFi channel. They can arrive out of order easily. This can be solved.

This could be an open system that would allow software developers to offer plug-ins for CODECs, crossover, room EQ. These could be purchased independently by the consumer.

This system could even be used for video, given enough bandwidth.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Journeyman - You might be surprised. There are quite a few audiophile quality digital amps out there and many more extremely small inexpensive well-performing DACs, such as the Dragonfly. These are not at the very top of the SQ heap yet, but it is just a matter of time.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

I have not heard many good digital amps either, but one worth checking out (based on the Hypex module) is the Merrill Audio Veritas monoblock. Merrillaudio.net

The new Hypex module is very good, assuming that you don't screw-up the analog input circuit and power subsystem.

The big names don't have anything interesting yet, but that is to be expected.....

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Here is a question. Don't recording engineers and producers use 24 bits to record or re-master music? If you record music with analog tape, don't these enginners work in 24 bit to edit, punch in and master? And in creating the final stereo master, isn't that done in 24 bit ( 96 , 192 etc) for digital replication? So why wouldn't 24 bit playback be better than 16 bit? Wouldn't it be closer to the sound captured in the first place?

CD's have been around since 1985, and was commonplace by 1987. Would we want something better by now?

The key in remastering is not to simply up-sample a 16/44 master, which may not be great to begin with,but go back to the source , and re-master from that. This is a concern to those would might bite on downloading 24 bit , but are wary of the quality of the sound.

I am wary of Pono due to the price of the downloads, where most are 16/44, no better than CD's which in some cases , can be obtained from Amazon for half, 70 % less than the download. I think Pono has got to be up front about the quality of their downloads. After all quality of experience is what they are selling.

I have compared 16/44.1 to 24/44.1 and the 24-bit sounds better with most modern DACs. I can change from 16-bit to 24-bit on the fly using my Synchro-Mesh reclocker/resampler.

However, I have found that older DACs that only support a max 96 sample-rate usually sound better 16-bit, even using 16/96.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Neil Young's PonoPlayer: The Emperor Has No Clothes

https://www.yahoo.com/tech/it-was-one-of-kickstarters-most-successful-10...

A classic case of apples to oranges. They should have done the experiment much differently. If selling the player is not the object of Pono in the first place, then the Pono player should have been used with same track recorded in both 44.1 and 96. No iPhone. This is the real point, not selling this particular player with unknown quality headphones. If Pono is to guarantee a uniform result with this player, they should sell it with really good headphones.

The player is only an enabler that lets one hear the difference.

This emphasizes the flaw in the kickstarter campaign. Player hardware is something that people can understand, so they funded the campaign this way, but player hardware is not really the object of Pono.

Again, to my point that the campaign funds should have been used to subsidize the recording companies to offer 24/192 or 24/96 and for lobbying Apple and Samsung to make their players compatible in the next generation.

One thing no one's mentioned is how wonderful the new Pono remasters of Neil's work are-I've heard them in both 16/44.1 and 24/192 and they both are superior to the last versions released (and include never on cd ones like Time Fades Away).

Secondly, as a 57 year old who began listening to vinyl at 10 and live concerts at 13, I submit that what we inherently hold as good sound is dependent on what we heard growing up-the current generation listens to music over smartphones and computer grade speakers that really aren't capable of giving much in the way of what we older folks would call good sound-and lossy mp3 sources make what isn't very good to begin with sound even worse. Many of the current popular musical acts use devices such as auto-tune to electronically correct bad sound-as opposed to a Martin guitar and Joni Mitchell's voice back in 1972 with only speed correction on the recording and a decent microphone necessary-however, this is what millions (judging from RIAA and Apple I Tunes sales figures) consider to be good sounding music. Perhaps the Pono will speak to them, although I doubt its market penetration isn't much beyond Neil's fan base.

Finally, blind testing of anything is dependent on the experience of the person being tested. Give a non-wine drinker multiple sips of the finest wines and they might get lucky and identify the better ones but the same samples given to a true connoisseur will be easily differentiated. Same with music-as a most of the time consumer of Stereophile, Absolute Sound, etc but with a modest (under $1k) stereo system, I listen to enough music to be able to tell the difference between a 16/44.1 and a 24/96 downsampled to 16/44.1 cd-same album. Higher original resolution is even easier to discern, even when downsampled to Redbook. But, if I listened to an I-Phone playing mp3s in my car with road noise present most of the time instead of what I've listened to for 40+ years, I might not pick up on the aural differences right away.

Remember the Telarc digital LPs from the late 70's to early 80's ?
The LPs were stunning but the CDs sounded so bad they sounded like a different performance.
I used to use the Holst Suites to compare.
So digital is capable of sounding good but it rarely does.
I imagine those same digital LPs could have been even better on very high quality analog equipment.