Is DSD a match for analogue sound quality?

No it won't die because of these prices. It might die specifically in Malaysia, but most of the multiple tens and hundreds of thousands worth of equipment are going to China and the newly minted Eastern European states, not to mention a healthy market in the Middle East.

Sflam,

You have just ellaborated further my posting. Until there is a mass market ie demand for hi res, engineers ad designers will continue to jack up the price for the so called 'ultimate' sound quality hi res music and equipment.

Maybe something will come out of this DSD thingy soon.

I will put my money on it.

Since the big cooperations ain't interested, the brains behind the industry are coming out with something....

CHECK Positive Feedback Issue 59. Jan/Feb 2012

The agreement on open standard on DSD. Hope it gather momentum.

Dear All,

I spent another night comparing different formats last night, and I have the following observations.

I find DSD, in prolonged listening, slightly too smooth and rounded. The music lacks touches of dynamic vigours especially in the extreme heights. However, as I switched to DXD playing multi-bit high resolution files like 24 bit x 384KHz, it comes with right clarity, rich in tones and dynamic vigour in sonic representation. IMHO, both DSD and DXD are as good as each other depends on which side your system takes you; if your system lean slightly towards bright sounding, DSD suits you more, conversely, if your system is like mine, would prefer DXD.

The difference between the two can be due to the sound of both is skewed whereby DSD is towards mid-low bands and DXD is leaning upward towards mid-high frequency bands. This may not be significant for some, but it is important for me due to the listening requirement of mine.

DXD allows a wee bit better panning of spatial, in volumetric, information where placement of the physical sound of music within it, which I find to be more believable listening experience. There is just a touch more contextual information able to be deciphered in my sampling.

DSD produces great stature of sound especially in the reproduction of piano, like concert grand type, with strong bodily resonance coming through. There is this fundamentals of sound anchoring effect to the overall sonic landscape which is stable and assuredly laid out. Lacks slightly is the space, its aural cue especially in the faintest "tingg.." of a triangle in a big space, which it does not generates enough "spatial volume" that is clearly there for it to placed within a staging.

In both formats, they have this welcoming dynamic/amplitude freedom, the rise and fall, dynamic contrast are without hes and yet both assume the ability to "know how to slow down" during soft passages, generating sonic picture that is unconstrictive and without any trace of congestion; both at the threshold of their platforms.

Jo Ki

joki
tx 4 yr observations n comments.

i think dsd and dxd (24/384) are the best that digital can offer unless some smart fella can think of some other way to digitally store and decode analogue sounds.
if there r any improvements, i think it will be in the filters and noise-shaping aspects.
in conclusion, nothing beats the sound and music tht we hear everyday everywhere - natural analogue sound.

Joki,

Are both DSD and DXD very very much ahead of PCM hires or is it just marginal? Are there any negatives or weaknesses compared to PCM ?

carz,
afaik dxd is hi-res pcm. the only diff is the very high sampling rate of 384kHz i.e. it is a 24/384 file instead of, say, a 24/192, 24/96, 24/176.4 etc.

Dear all,
My input on the subject. Hires and CD uses the same format; PCM ,while SACD/DSD is a 1bit DSD which is a different format. In order to compare which format is superior, compare the sampling rates. In digital format either PCM or SACD/DSD for that matter; The higher the sampling rates, the more data been stored & captured, That is why analog is more superior due to higher resolution- analog in theory has infinite resolution!!! - the depth , weight , ambiance & nuances are reproduced more in general ,with vinyl/analog than from a CD/redbook, provide the equipments used+ control of all the mechanical aspect of analog playing is been managed at a " reasonable " level. Analog can have noise that affect distortion and loss of signal because of the method of "playing" and unwanted " variations" which in general digital playback can be more "consistent". Even if the resolution of an analog signal is higher than a comparable digital signal, the difference can be overshadowed by the noise in the signal. However if the same attention can be used on the Digital format on a CD format, an "acceptable" level of sonics can be attain. (one will be surprised to hear how much of information can be retrieved especially if one has a revealing system+ control to minimize distortion at all levels).

PCM Hires" or CD/( 44.1khz) has less data. The sampling rate of DSD /SACD is 64 times higher than CD/redbook =64 times I repeat! there is no doubt that SACD/DSD is far more superior than a CD or even a Hires up to 192 kHz. The sampling rate of SACD is 2.8 Mhz ( 1 mhz is 1000khz) and CD is only 44.1 kHz and some Hires is 192 kHz only not even 20% of 1mhz!! In some studio recording, recorders used can be even have double DSD sampling rates - 5.66 Mhz. On the debate of differ opinions of whether which is better -analog or digital. I think the DSD will be the one format that can be the superior format to analog, the playback to retrieve all this information can be or should be less complicated and less costly in general despite the infinite resolution of analog! The DSD format can even lead to a higher playback resolution in the future due to progress. SACD or DSD will be as close as hearing the original Master tape! and definitely will be close /equal or more superior in sonic information than analog depends on many factors. But with the current progress in Hires and DSD to make it commercially available - these superior sonic source is most welcome giving more advantages to analog playback in terms of cost/convenience , reliability, accuracy, repeatability & consistency.

Shanghai wrote:
However if the same attention can be used on the Digital format on a CD format, an "acceptable" level of sonics can be attain. (one will be surprised to hear how much of information can be retrieved especially if one has a revealing system+ control to minimize distortion at all levels.

Shanghai,
Spot On! Reduction of jitters, very good quality power supply and line conditioning would enable us to achieve this.

Shanghai

Very informative. Thks.


Read it from somewhere

"I LOVE ANALOGUE...BUT NOT FROM VINYL"

i somehow concur with above statement, vinyl as source induced too much surface noise, too much variations in setting, too troublesome, distortions etc etc..

I can understand those who bought expensive vinyl rig and want to protect their investment.

Those who haven't, think twice.

It is not necessary that all properly setup vinyl rigs are expensive, today one can spend just as much on digital. DCS gear not expensive meh. We all know big commercial brands are expensive no matter what gear it is but treading carefully especially when in deep waters is the key here.

I can easily understand why many love analogue but hates vinyl... its bloody troublesome and fiddlesome to set it all up. Getting the optimum SRA and VTA points of the cartridge tests one's patience level not to mention understanding it altogether. There are variables that need lots of time getting it right.

I love vinyl today over digital anytime, BUT dislike setting it all up again using the protractor again when rolling cartridges and for the fact of having no remote to repeat a track or when switching sides. I have lost weight ever since I started vinyl playback.

There is a price to pay for everything especially for sound. If we were to talk about being economical, then hi res CAS is the way to go. Everyone that I speak to regarding owning a CAS system comes to a common conclusion, ' I save money on buying expensive cd's these days ' LOL!! but its true for that matter.

You'll also save money on buying vinyls which can be a hefty investment too

But when one comes to the analogue and organic qualities of vinyl, you can't mask the truth and the fact that the source of music or sound has always been analogue, the process of converting it to digital will always have a flaw that cannot be corrected 100% altogether for the best conversion is still no conversion at all. Be it playing from CAS or cd spinner you still have to go through a DAC and jitter from digital remains the enemy of true analogue sound in its playback. Jitter alters sound altogether. Many don't understand or even know the existence of this problem altogether.

If any of us recognize analogue qualities for ex our day to day FM radio broadcast , you will know that digital will always be different no matter what resolution, what native file you are playing it from. Ok digital is far from dead, the convenience of CAS is shrinking the cd market today but I don't think cd will die just like the resurgence of vinyl this couple of years. Will we see a resurgence of cd playing one day when hi res takes over fully? I guess we will all see 5 or 10 years down the road, ( if this website is still active la ) but vinyl will definitely still be around.

Anyway I read that the topic of this forum is DSD a match for analogue qualities, not vinyl qualities, nor TT playback qualities... thus its not the same. Analogue LIKE sound can be achieved from digital playback today with DSD being the closest altogether but not necessary a replicate of the true original analogue qualities. I guess that's a pretty fair statement to conclude it altogether.

frankly i am hoping for some bright spark from anywhere in the world to invent something that can store analogue sound in analogue format which does not click or pop or suffer all the other weaknesses of vinyl and which does not have tape hiss or deteriorate with time like tape.
that would be the perfect format.

Archive quality magnetic tape is pretty stable...

afaik, master tapes from the 1960s kept in the archives of record companies are already deteriorating. the extent of damage apparently varies from brand to brand.

the problem with tape is tape hiss.

and there is the problem of selling the reel-to-reel tapes to the consumers. one of the reasons that the cassette tape was invented was convenience.

I remember reading master tapes have been lost, misplaced, never found, suddenly found in someone's garage, numerous tapes in the label's vaults probably never see the light of day.

I was told, but unsure whether its true or not, one local recording company here in Malaysia is supposed to deposit a duplicate master to its parent company abroad, soon after recording session is over. I did happen to listen to a recent compilation album with tracks that have all the tell tale symptoms that its a vinyl rip, and a bad transfer job it was. They could easily find and copy the same track from a past re-issue, but those lazy buggers appear not to have taken the effort. I suppose its the case of forced to sell on the cheap that you get a cheap skate digital transfer job, and customers have no avenue to complain. Poorest local job I've seen recently.

Analog Master tapes that have been kept in storage over time also suffer permanent damage known as "print-through". The layers of magnetic tape that are so tightly wound together end up magnetizing each other.

This is especially obvious in reissued vinyl from original master tapes where there is a faint background music track of a forwarded or delayed portion of the music mixed into the main track itself.

So for almost permanent archival of music, the vinyl disc is still best for analog due to the robustness of the medium provided it's well cared for, and also digital formats simply because the digital media can be copied, cloned and re-cloned a million times over without any (further) degradation of the captured information.

Whatever the case, everyone would have to rely on the best of what the label or rights owner have in store. How they select, edit, enhance, remaster or further screw up the album to produce the marketable product is entirely at their prerogative.
Speaking about one of my favourite albums, Cat Stevens, Teaser & the Firecat, I've numerous different pressings from mass production ones, USA, EU, limited numbered edition (the worst), Mobile Fidelity, original LP, re-issue LP, all of them sound different in varying degrees. I just sit back and enjoy the music.

Did I Just Experience DSD Music?

I purchased 3 CDs from Platinum Records label yesterday. It states on the cover DSD/ HDCD 24/192 quality.

Sound wise...yes its more powerful, energetic and livelier than normal CD. However, I started asking whether is this truly DSD? The question came up because my faithful HDCD DAC, could not detect the HDCD signal.

So is it true CD from Platinum Records are DSD/HDCD material?

Or is it because my old HDCD DAC can only detect up to 96kHz and so cannot detect the 192kHZ HDCD?

A confused man I am....