Ableton Forum

The most hilarious part I've found in researching all this is finding out the highest frequency response limits of the best mics and speakers.

The highest mic I can find goes up to 30kHz. The highest for speakers that I could find was 40kHz.

That means even 96kHz recordings are going to contain around 8kHz that the speakers can't reproduce and 18kHz that the mic never picked up in the first place!

stringtapper wrote:The most hilarious part I've found in researching all this is finding out the highest frequency response limits of the best mics and speakers.

The highest mic I can find goes up to 30kHz. The highest for speakers that I could find was 40kHz.

That means even 96kHz recordings are going to contain around 8kHz that the speakers can't reproduce and 18kHz that the mic never picked up in the first place!

exactly.

The VAST bulk of people given blind tests between 320kbps MP3 and WAV just can't tell the difference. It's all total wank.

and a glass of water

There is life above 20 KHz.
http://www.cco.caltech.edu/~boyk/spectra/spectra.htm

Electret microphone shows no degradation of signal up to 48 KHz. Preamps work in that range too.

http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/44727/1/AFM_07.02.pdf

Let's assume for a moment that the average punter can distinguish a tune recorded at 24/192 from one recorded at 16/44.1.

Just for the sake of arguement.

What the early adopters pledging $400 for the LE editions seem to really, really want are 'hi-rez' versions of 40 years old albums.

Which were recorded onto, at best, 2" tape @ 30 ips. That's the master. The best there is. Cannot be improved without at least remixing/remastering.

Which is significantly lower rez than CD 44/16 let alone modern 'studio quality'.

Maybe 13 bits. If you are lucky. Significantly worse timing errors, noise, distortion and freq response.

Tape may well be great used as an instrument, EQ or effect. But as a method of reproduction?

Not even in the same ball park as digital. Why else did 99% of the industry change practically overnight?

So unless NY can convince all the artists/labels to remix/remaster just for him (yeah right)what the Pono music will be selling, for 3x the usual price, is exactly the same stuff. It doesn't matter whether 24/192 actually does sound better than 16/44.1 to the average human if recorded at that standard. The masters for Pono are all going to be lower rez than any modern gistribution medium.

Transfer a wax cylinder or shellac 78 to digital it's still going to sound like a wax cylinder or shellac 78.

hateful lies.

it will sound better than the original! as the artist truly intended! like being in the studio!

Until now, those artist's recordings sucked! PONO


PONO puts the soul back in music that was recorded without it but but was intended to be captured at the time so you can hear that music and those parts of it that were never there but should have been and would have if it could have but it wasn't but it is now or at least it will be.* PONO




This message has been sponsored by Neil Young n friends

Davo wrote:There is life above 20 KHz.
http://www.cco.caltech.edu/~boyk/spectra/spectra.htm

I don't think anyone would argue that instruments emit frequencies above 20kHz. At least no one in this thread seemed to.

Davo wrote:Electret microphone shows no degradation of signal up to 48 KHz. Preamps work in that range too.

http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/44727/1/AFM_07.02.pdf

Thanks for that.

RonaldDumsfeld wrote:Transfer a wax cylinder or shellac 78 to digital it's still going to sound like a wax cylinder or shellac 78.

I can confirm this as I have to do it occasionally for my work.

If this shit plays flac how is it any different that what we already have?
Any phone can play flac.
How is this better that just using wave files?

@stringtapper

If somebody told you a few months ago that you would be using your music expertise to tear apart a portable music player released by Neil Young would you say “Get the fuck out!” or punch them in the face?

beats me wrote:@stringtapper

If somebody told you a few months ago that you would be using your music expertise to tear apart a portable music player released by Neil Young would you say “Get the fuck out!” or punch them in the face?

Both.



The thing is I and some of my colleagues have been waiting for more information about this for a while, mostly because it was hinted when it was first talked about that Young might actually be trying to develop a new format.

Now it turns out that there's no new format and it's just a bunch of marketing BS to make a new player that no one wants or needs.

Davo wrote:Electret microphone shows no degradation of signal up to 48 KHz. Preamps work in that range too.

http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/44727/1/AFM_07.02.pdf

It's interesting stuff. The problem is that it seems we still don't know what positive effects, if any, these ultrasonic frequencies (when they are even being reproduced by speakers at all) have on the audible spectrum. Lavry goes into great detail to explain how ultra high frequencies can add intermodulation distortion to degrees that can negatively impact the audible range. In fact he seems to argue that microphones being able to pick up ultrasonic frequencies is actually a bad thing.

http://www.lavryengineering.com/pdfs/la ... _audio.pdf

stringtapper wrote:

beats me wrote:@stringtapper

If somebody told you a few months ago that you would be using your music expertise to tear apart a portable music player released by Neil Young would you say “Get the fuck out!” or punch them in the face?

Both.



The thing is I and some of my colleagues have been waiting for more information about this for a while, mostly because it was hinted when it was first talked about that Young might actually be trying to develop a new format.

Now it turns out that there's no new format and it's just a bunch of marketing BS to make a new player that no one wants or needs.

I find the whole discussion a little highbrow for my speed, but good to see your knowledge being put into practice. There’s some things you learn in education that are “but when I am ever going to need to know this??”