jgossman wrote:

If you didn't use a cheap walkman with the attendant cheap crappy headphones.

Kind of shot yourself in the foot for being taken seriously in this regard.

I maybe slow but I'm ahead of you.

:-)

Geoffkait
Machina Dynamica

OK, never one to hold a grudge, I propose damning the torpedoes and full speed ahead. So, let's think about this for a second - what is it that makes one medium (tape) have air and another medium NOT have air? I suspect if someone wishes to argue that CDs actually DO have air they are most likely mistaking transparency for air. Air is a puffiness, the top of whirring sounds, the top of strummed guitar sounds the top of drum and cymbal sounds, that unmistakable sound that is the natural part of the sound and for whatever reason is lost in the sauce of CDs. That's why they can it analog, because it's basically a one for one process. No matter what anyone says, Nyquist included and mastering engineers, something is lost in the whole digital process. And they can argue until they're blue in the face. I really don't have the time now to figure out where they went SOQ wrong.

Now, I will have to say that listening to the classic rock FM station reveals that the sound on a stupid portable FMAM radio is more open more natural and has more AIR than most CDs. What I don't get is I assumed radio stations play digitally remastered files. Is that even true? Anyone know the answer? Share, share....

But back to the main point. If I want to listen to Heifetz playing Brahms so I can hear all the AIR, all the dynamics, all the bloom, all the power I will listen to the cassette on my portable cassette player. If I wish to listen to a watered down, threadbare, thin, unmusical, synthetic, bland, weak, but artificially transparent version I suppose I could listen to the CD. But of course, I won't. High end audio has a few Catch 22s. CDs happen to be one of them. We have been so conditioned to believe that CDs are a superior medium we will fight tooth and nail if someone contradicts us. We are so thoroughly conditioned in this respect we're like Pavlov's dog, and one has only to mention cassette and the knives come out. The more someone contradicts these beliefs that have taken 35 years to get emblazoned in our brains the more we cling to the belief. And 20 bits are better than 16 and 24 and better still. And high definition files are the cat's pajamas. Yeah, right! It's the old Backfire Effect in full bloom.

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica