"Lossless" duplicating. Is it for real? Seriously....?

radioeng2, I'd like to learn more, are these trials documented online? Did they figure out why there is a difference?

I was thinking last night that maybe you could set up a null test between the two analog outputs to display differences. Steve

Here's one story talking about this kind of thing Steve...

http://www.genesisloudspeakers.com/archive/Black_CD_Paper_v1.pdf


Here's some thoughts on Hard drive playback versus CD's.

http://www.avguide.com/blog/do-hard-disk-drives-sound-better-cd-0

"One's are One's and zero's are zero's, right? OK, I can concede to that. However, when you take those one's and zero's and arrange them into groups of 1's and 0's to represent "samples" of music [that may not altogether represent the original sound and locational cues, as you will read on about later]"

I agree with James; you're confusing the definition of digital "sampling" with something else. Yes; the musical signal's AMPLITUDE at each sample is conveyed via "groups" of 1's/0's (bytes) that are simply the binary number representation of signal magnitude. For CD's these "samples" are taken at ~44k Hz (i.e., 44,000 samples per second of music). THEORETICALLY this is "good enough" to allow the DAC to re-create the original analog signal with fidelity to 22k Hz. As to "original sound and locational cues" and microphone locations, etc., digital vs analog has nothing to do with this. HOW the sound stage is recorded in the studio (or wherever) is independent of how faithfully this info is recorded (from wherever the engineer chooses to place the mics or however), stored (whether as an analog signal or as 44,000 descrete digital samples per second) and then subsequently "re-created" by a DAC (or phono cartridge) and then amplified and "broadcast" in stereo out into your room via speakers (to hopefully re-create the original soundstage, etc.).

As the sound engineer, I choose to place this one 3 feet to the left and 4 feet above the stage. This zero goes...

Yeah, Bill. At the end of the day (regardless of what format you choose to use to store the final two signals that you will use to "play" against each other to re-create the live performance experience), you're still stuck with the sound coming out of two little speakers x feet apart in a "tiny" little room needing to stand in for multiple (as in much more than two!) sound sources being bounced off concert walls and "presented" to each concert listener as a wall of sound and reflected sound that is a live performance. Matters little (for THESE issues) whether or not you chose to store these two signals in digital format or pure analog signals. BOTH have major deficencies and in reality it's simply amazing that "stereo" sounds as good as it does. Both formats have good and bad aspects (dynamic range, "jitter", pops, clicks, economics, etc.). But in the end it's just two "wiggly" electrical signals generating TWO musical sources....will NEVER be able to 100% re-create the original sound(s) that your ears hear at a live concert. Not saying that "digital issues" (lossless, jitter, sampling rates, etc., etc.) are not important, just saying that "signal purity" (whether analog or digital) will never get you "there". IMO, more "headway" could be made by investigating new recording and accoustic innovations and formats and new ways to "play back" the music in one's home then in the endless "refinement" of these two signals, their amplification (tube vs SS vs digital), and subsequent "broadcast" from drivers that convert these signals into pressure waves from TWO sources. Perhaps "sonic holography" on steriods or something.... Point being: don't blame digital format on stuff that is common to both digital and analog formats....

Some VERY interesting reads !!!

READ THIS ONE AT LEAST
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/conte ... ethodology



http://lunetta.net/lossless/

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/en/index.p ... echnology/

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/article.c ... _just_hype

http://www.enjoythemusic.com/superiorau ... ures/0808/

Alright, on the first post I may have gotten some of the bits confused. On that last link James provided, I ran across this...

Using PCs (or Macs) a CD can be copied to a hard drive within a couple of minutes. Unfortunately, because of the weak error correction system used on audio CDs, the resultant audio can be less than bit perfect. The problems can range from subtle but audible unnecessary interpolation to random clicks and pops when copying used CDs. This type of ripping is known as "Burst Mode" and it assumes that the sectors being read from the disc are perfect; hence a fast copy can be achieved. Some mechanisms provide hardware-assisted correction in this mode, but typically it results in unnecessary interpolation of the audio rather than using techniques to extract the real audio samples from the disc.

In a nutshell, this is part of what I was trying to get at.

And here is another link to a pretty easy to read and understand article on jitter. Addressing the many different parts of the digital path.

http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue43/jitter.htm

And here is another link to a pretty easy to read and understand article on jitter. Addressing the many different parts of the digital path.

http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue43/jitter.htm

I know you are THE MAN, but that article footnotes things from 1984 --

Here is a better one from guys working on it in 2011.

http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/appnotes-d/jittercu



Here is also a pitch from those guys selling stuff -> stuff that has been rated best in class at this price level by ears, test equipment and TnRabbit. Few have looked into as much as these guys as they want to sell things to people above the Bose level.

Jitter-Immune UltraLock™ Clock System

Benchmark’s proprietary UltraLock™ clock system achieves an unprecedented immunity to jitter. Many modern (and expensive) converters suffer from significant jitter-induced distortion. If jitter is not effectively addressed, a converter will generate non-musical sideband tones and digital distortion. Benchmark’s highly-regarded UltraLock™ clock system ensures that jitter is never a problem, even under extreme conditions.

Even in the presence of extremely high input jitter, no jitter-induced artifacts can be detected on the outputs of the DAC1 PRE (using state-of-the-art testing equipment by Audio Precision). UltraLock™ will block more then 12.5 UI of jitter (@ 1 kHz). With the UltraLock ™ clock system, the D/A conversion-clock in the DAC1 PRE is totally isolated from the clock of the digital audio source. The UltraLock ™ clock system easily outperforms most well-designed two-stage PLL designs.

The bottom line is this: Benchmark converters will consistently and faithfully deliver truthful audio without jitter-induced artifacts, no matter what variables are present.

At the end of the day, don't you think terms, graphs, test instruments --> are fun, but ears have the final say?
Yours are apparently excellent. Mine seem to be able to hear every thing but the pitch of my wife calling.

I'm conducting an experiment using my home PC and my Tascam. Now, I believe the PC will have the edge in playback fidelity because it can buffer, oversample and convert to audio more, faster, better, because it has 6 processor cores and 16GB of 2000MHz memory to do it. AFAIK there is no CD player built anywhere even close to having that kind of raw processing power. My onboard audio has both optical and coax output that can be matched to the Tascam and run to an outboard DAC.

I guess we will see.

ray

Ray, is the Tascam what we used for the apparently bogus test last year?

yes it was Tom.

If I recall, wasn't it down to the DAC converters at the last "test" according to the latest talk and not whether it was the original or "lossless"? James had mentioned that I preferred the computer or the squeezebox [whatever the hell he was running].

The one clear thing I remember was that one of them lost the furthest part of the left imaging as if it had completely dropped off the sound stage and got dropped down to oblivion. If I'm correct, then the Tascom should be an easy find.

Please correct me if I'm incorrect.

If I recall, wasn't it down to the DAC converters at the last "test" according to the latest talk and not whether it was the original or "lossless"? James had mentioned that I preferred the computer or the squeezebox [whatever the hell he was running].

The one clear thing I remember was that one of them lost the furthest part of the left imaging as if it had completely dropped off the sound stage and got dropped down to oblivion. If I'm correct, then the Tascom should be an easy find.

Please correct me if I'm incorrect.

You're INCORRECT !

But thats just a general statement from the Prius boy .

SHUTUP FRANKIE!!!

I love you, man. Can't wait to see you again.

Yes Tom... The Tascan was the one you kept saying lost it's sound stage. If I recall, you were there around 2:00am
Keep in mind, at the time, both units were connected to the Silver-1 via RCAs
We had brought a Sunfire TGP-5 with us to do the test with. It has 3 optical inputs. (Beemer took it home with him)
He might have to bring it back if he still has it by then.

All we need is a GOOD CDP/transport with optical output. I will buy 2 of the same exact optical cables to bring.
(unless someone has 2 of the same we can borrow?)
I am also going to try to get my hands on a Logitec Transporter before CF... (keeping my fingers crossed, and wallet out)

Once it's set up correctly I honestly think the results will be surprising.

ACTUALLY.... If I can get a high end Transporter SE... It would be very interesting to do a 2ND TEST as well
A/B the high end "internal" DAC's of the 2 units head to head as well, via RCA outputs, and test the 2 players output performance.