Comments on: Audio compression: sound and lack of vision http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/ Technology, politics, culture Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:40:00 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: Russel http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-3680 Russel Tue, 08 Jul 2008 09:02:10 +0000 http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-3680 Now that I am about to reinvest in CDs I was wondering what genres, labels, ... heck ... what years were good for CD-quality audio? How would I know if a recording was compressed before buying it? It's a nightmare Now that I am about to reinvest in CDs I was wondering what genres, labels, … heck … what years were good for CD-quality audio?

How would I know if a recording was compressed before buying it?

It’s a nightmare

]]> By: Sam Penrose http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-1439 Sam Penrose Thu, 03 Jan 2008 17:56:00 +0000 http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-1439 A couple caveats: 1) Let's remember that the high-fidelity era is the historical exception. Rock and roll was dominated by AM radio and often-abused records played through low-fidelity speakers. Then there were the acoustics of the live shows ... Rich baby boomers are entitled to their nostalgia, but the lost musical era they mourn is their youth. 2) The current compression is driven in part by the cost of storage, bandwidth, and output devices. These will fall (especially the first 2), making quality cheap enough to popularize. A couple caveats:

1) Let’s remember that the high-fidelity era is the historical exception. Rock and roll was dominated by AM radio and often-abused records played through low-fidelity speakers. Then there were the acoustics of the live shows … Rich baby boomers are entitled to their nostalgia, but the lost musical era they mourn is their youth.

2) The current compression is driven in part by the cost of storage, bandwidth, and output devices. These will fall (especially the first 2), making quality cheap enough to popularize.

]]> By: Joshua Haberman http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-1418 Joshua Haberman Mon, 31 Dec 2007 22:58:20 +0000 http://www.wordyard.com/2007/12/31/audio-compression/#comment-1418 I certainly won't argue in favor of a loudness race, but we should remember that there are downsides to a wide dynamic range, too. No one wants to put music on at a dinner party and have to suddenly lunge for the volume knob when the loud bit comes on. It's also annoying to listen to music in the car (where there is a lot of background noise) and have to constantly adjust to keep the music above the noise floor without it being too loud. In situations like these, music with excessive dynamic range makes the listening experience more high-maintenance. I certainly won’t argue in favor of a loudness race, but we should remember that there are downsides to a wide dynamic range, too.

No one wants to put music on at a dinner party and have to suddenly lunge for the volume knob when the loud bit comes on. It’s also annoying to listen to music in the car (where there is a lot of background noise) and have to constantly adjust to keep the music above the noise floor without it being too loud.

In situations like these, music with excessive dynamic range makes the listening experience more high-maintenance.

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