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Topic: Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated? (Read 13896 times) previous topic - next topic
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Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Here's a Cool Edit Pro spectral graph of the pink noise (channel balance) track on the HFNRR test record (old version) side 1, band 3.  This is using my new $100 Audio-Technica 440ML cartridge, recorded via preamp through a 24/96 card.

Note at the bottom of each channel the yellow, denoting a louder portion caused by LF groove noise.  However, some may be surprised to see vinyl easily makes it to 20KHz before things really start falling off -- at least, this record does.  I've found this to be quite common with almost all my records.  If the Cool Edit spectral display is to be believed (why not?) then the commonly propagated idea that vinyl falls off quickly after 15KHz or so is really a myth, although it probably does vary on older recordings and between different types of cutting lathes.

The dynamic range of vinyl is definitely not understated however, in my experience.  Pricier turntables will do better (less bearing noise and etc. resulting in a quieter noise floor) but the overall capabilities of vinyl in that area are pretty well known.

What's really nice is the "fine line" stylus profile on this cartridge I'm using (the needle itself is practically invisible to the naked eye).  Tracking ability, especially in the high frequencies with loud program material, is amazing!

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #1 –
interesting, thanks

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #2 –
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However, some may be surprised to see vinyl easily makes it to 20KHz before things really start falling off -- at least, this record does.  I've found this to be quite common with almost all my records.

I'm not surprised at all, actually. I've seen vinyl recordings (not even new ones) contain energy all the way up to 24kHz and beyond - no idea whether this high frequency content was still a part of the music signal or just noise, wonder how I could find this out?
A riddle is a short sword attached to the next 2000 years.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #3 –
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However, some may be surprised to see vinyl easily makes it to 20KHz before things really start falling off -- at least, this record does.

Starting in the late 70s quadrophonic records were made. Because the rear channels were frequency modulated on a help carrier (something around 38 kHz, just like in FM Stereo) these cartridges had to reproduce up to 50 kHz.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #4 –
Since you have a 24/96 card, you could record at 96khz and maybe find the actual cutoff. Thx to nyquist you could analyse up to 48kHz. More interesting than a test vinyl may be some graphs of actual music with modulated high frequencies. Showing both the existance AND absence of hf on a record can proove it's not only noise.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #5 –
Quote
Quote
However, some may be surprised to see vinyl easily makes it to 20KHz before things really start falling off -- at least, this record does.

Starting in the late 70s quadrophonic records were made. Because the rear channels were frequency modulated on a help carrier (something around 38 kHz, just like in FM Stereo) these cartridges had to reproduce up to 50 kHz.

Gday..

correction?
the first quadraphonic recording
a have heard.. is a early black sabbath
single.. and then you have 3. floyd records..

BTW:
among my stuff.
is a quadraphonic riaa module..
by shure.. produced in 74.
and on my cartridge i use now..
(shure M73A.. have a flat output of 48Khz..
produced in 72.)

go figure.........

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #6 –
The yellow part at the bottom has nothing to do with LF grrove noise, that is around 20 Hz, because the yellow lines go up to 1000 Hz.

First what you used was a pink noise, not a white noise.
Here is the spectrum of a white noise, according to SoundForge :


It might be also an artifact caused by the windowing and overlapping interfering with the summation. Unfortunately, the program doesn't allow to access the windowing settings.

An analog audio analyzer doesn't have to sum up anything, there is one level meter per logarithmic band. A pink noise looks flat, and a sweep tone also looks flat.
When will a software provide this elementary requirement ?

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #7 –
D'oh !
Windowing can't interfere with summation since it's working in real time !

By the way, this problem explains why all fancy visual plugins doesn't seem to move well with the music.
First they are usually linear based : half of what is displayed covers the 10-20 kHz range. the melodic part is rejected into a tiny band at the extreme left.
Second, bass are clipped in order to show treble, because music has a pink noise profle in average.

I've lost hope in a proper software audio spectrum analyzer.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #8 –
Quote
Since you have a 24/96 card, you could record at 96khz and maybe find the actual cutoff. Thx to nyquist you could analyse up to 48kHz. More interesting than a test vinyl may be some graphs of actual music with modulated high frequencies. Showing both the existance AND absence of hf on a record can proove it's not only noise.

Yeah, I ought to do that.  Unfortunately I don't have an LP with a frequency sweep on it, and pink noise is the closest I can get to "full spectrum" at this point.  I'll post another similar graph sometime today with 96KHz recording, and perhaps a couple other graphs to satisfy requests of others here .

Not sure what music would qualify in terms of modulated high freqs, but could look around... perhaps some acoustic stuff with lots of cymbals and such.  I've already seen spectrographs of music like this though, and clearly there's energy well up to 22 KHz that (as far as I can tell) isn't just "noise."

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #9 –
Here's the same LP track with 96KHz recording.  Note that I have no idea of the frequency response characteristics of the preamp I'm using (the cartridge is rated 5Hz-32KHz).  It's possible that the preamp (1979 Technics SU-C01... no specs on the Web) could be the limiting factor.  Also, it should be noted that this LP track is intended for adjusting stereo channel balance,  not for testing frequency extremes of vinyl.

Anyway, it looks to me like by about 23KHz, the pink noise has just become low-level decorrelated... noise.  In fact, there almost appears to be a hard cutoff just below 23 KHz.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #10 –
This is a good graph.

We can see the response rising between 5000 and 10000 Hz, while it should go on decreasing. Then the response is ok until about 18 kHz. Then it seems to loose about 3 or 4 db until 20 kHz.
At 22 kHz it is on the -72 db line, while it should be about 3 db below the level of the 10 kHz (-3 db per octave), that is around -60 or -61 db. These frequencies are no more reproduced properly.

I had posted spectrums of music from LPs.

http://perso.numericable.fr/laguill2/files...lueforvinyl.gif

This one compares the spectrum of a whole track (or maybe just the short sample I posted) with the spectrum of the CD. The blue parts show where the vinyl is louder, and the white parts (that look pink) where the CD is louder.
The problem is that I can't tell if the treble part is noise or music. A good way to know would be to slow down the recording and to highpass it, so that we could listen to the treble.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #11 –
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We can see the response rising between 5000 and 10000 Hz, while it should go on decreasing.

Sounds like it could be an upper-midrange "hump" in the frequency response of the cartridge.  This model has been considered "bright" by many people who bought it, so that could be the explanation.  To my ears it sounds very pleasant, especially with electronic and pop music.  Others prefer the mid-bass hump in the Stantons (considered "warm" I guess) or the mid-midrange emphasis of the Grado cartridges.

Seems difficult to find a truly flat response in an inexpensive (under $300) cartridge... no surprise, perhaps.  It's not exactly a mass market technology any more. 

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #12 –
No surprise, because a cartridge is a device similar to a microphone, or a speaker, or headphones. It is difficult for these kind of devices (acoustic - electric transductors) to have a flat frequency response.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #13 –
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No surprise, because a cartridge is a device similar to a microphone, or a speaker, or headphones. It is difficult for these kind of devices (acoustic - electric transductors) to have a flat frequency response.

Good point... to my mind, most similar to a microphone (output voltages and etc).  Just blowing on the cartridge near the stylus is audible when listening with headphones.  It would be no surprise if shouting loudly nearby the cartridge could be quite audible when amplified. 

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #14 –
Yes, I have recordings of vinyl where external noise is picked up. These were not very good recordings nor good equipment but the material was equally bad anyway, but interesting.

I want interject one overlooked fact in the vinyl-capabilities that is significant. Basically, what good is having super high frequency response going to get you? I figure most of the recordings during the time vinyl was in high demand came off of tape (for example the Beatles master recording were all on tape). How much high-frequency range can tape capture in relation to vinyl? From the 24/96 spectral response it seems as if that vinyl had a digital recording. At any rate, from reading this thread it seems that a source recording from tape will fall short of vinyl's capabilities. Doesn't that mean the uppermost response on the spectral view is vinyl noise or tape noise or both?
"Something bothering you, Mister Spock?"

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #15 –
Destroid, don't underestimate the frequency response of studio reels.. I have no numbers, but I'm pretty sure that it can exceed the numbers mentioned in this thread. I know for fact that mere VHS tape can already at least rival audio cds.
A riddle is a short sword attached to the next 2000 years.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #16 –
I'm not going to argue the capabilites of tape. I just think is possible that HF response on vinyl made from a tape recording is just going to be mostly noise, and this is why I think so: Since any audio at such high frequencies is inaudible to humans I suspect tape machines have lowpass filtering done electronically. Just one advantage to lowpass signals being recorded on tape is to help reduce tape oversaturation. Depending on the quality of the tape machine the type of lowpass filtering may influence more or less of the audible frequency range (another issue entirely). Seeing some numbers on tape might determine if the inaudible HF noise is originating from from the tape recording or the vinyl playback itself, but who really cares about that?
"Something bothering you, Mister Spock?"

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #18 –
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From the 24/96 spectral response it seems as if that vinyl had a digital recording.

That's quite possible, even likely.  It's a test record published in 1996, and generating the sounds and tones on the record digitally would have been the easiest (and maybe best) way of doing things.

BTW I never intended to present this as a demo of "how high can vinyl go," merely state that it's clear to me it can (and usually does) do much better than 15KHz, which is an oft-cited number by people who seem to want to point out how limited and crappy sounding vinyl is.  The topic of "euphonic distortion" is a bit niggling, since many people I know (including myself) have worked very hard (in some cases spent big $$) trying to minimize vinyl distortion as much as possible.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #19 –
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BTW I never intended to present this as a demo of "how high can vinyl go," merely state that it's clear to me it can (and usually does) do much better than 15KHz, which is an oft-cited number by people who seem to want to point out how limited and crappy sounding vinyl is.

Yes, exactly.

I'm trying to suggest the culprit of "crappy 15KHz roll-off vinyl" may be the fault of the tape recorder that captured (and caused) early roll-off. If that happened to the source recording there is no way to put what is missing back just because it was later pressed to a better medium, in this case vinyl. Do you know what I mean?

The point was taken. Saying "all vinyl sounds bad" is sort of like getting angry with the waitress for the overcooked steak when all she did was bring it over to the table.
"Something bothering you, Mister Spock?"

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #20 –
I don't know the history of tape recorders, but 15 kHz seems low, for a roll off. Even old tape recorders should work better than nowadays cassette recorders.

The spectrums there http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....2896#entry28616 show a 4 kHz roll off on a weared 1991 vinyl. Maybe this roll off would occur at higher frequencies for higher linear speeds.

What I always wondered was if old LPs from the 50's sounded muffled because the original recording was itself muffled, or if the medium itself had lost its treble after years of storage. That would be interesting to know if vinyl is a good medium for long-term storage.

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #21 –
Quote
Quote
BTW I never intended to present this as a demo of "how high can vinyl go," merely state that it's clear to me it can (and usually does) do much better than 15KHz, which is an oft-cited number by people who seem to want to point out how limited and crappy sounding vinyl is.

Yes, exactly.

I'm trying to suggest the culprit of "crappy 15KHz roll-off vinyl" may be the fault of the tape recorder that captured (and caused) early roll-off. If that happened to the source recording there is no way to put what is missing back just because it was later pressed to a better medium, in this case vinyl. Do you know what I mean?

The point was taken. Saying "all vinyl sounds bad" is sort of like getting angry with the waitress for the overcooked steak when all she did was bring it over to the table.

Yep, I know what you mean.  The point was just intended generally for whoever may be reading (I never got the idea you thought vinyl was limited to 15 Khz).

I guess maybe this thread was aimed at some imaginary someone "out in the cloud" who states that vinyl is limited to 15 KHz.  I've read that on more than a few occasions, but don't recall specifically who said it... it appears to be a myth, and as far as I'm concerned it just isn't true.

In my opinion, vinyl is underrated as a "high fi" medium.  I'm not saying it should (or ever will) go back into the mainstream, just that it deserves to be looked at objectively, after 50+ years of being the dominant consumer format.  I think most of us who remember vinyl from "back then" had no knowledge of what constituted a quality turntable, phono preamp, properly aligned cartridge, maintaining vinyl properly etc. etc.  What "sticks out" are the clicks, pops and surface noise -- and no surprise, since we didn't know what we were doing. 

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #22 –
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What I always wondered was if old LPs from the 50's sounded muffled because the original recording was itself muffled, or if the medium itself had lost its treble after years of storage. That would be interesting to know if vinyl is a good medium for long-term storage.

From here, it's hard to say... old LP's from the 50's probably used all tube gear as far as recording (some rolloff there), technically inferior tape recorders (from today's perspective), lesser quality microphones, not as good pressing machines, etc.  I think it would be hard to judge, since equipment is now so different.  Maybe in another 50 years, we'll have the answer.  It may be totally irrelevant by then, of course. 

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #23 –
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... old LP's from the 50's probably used all tube gear as far as recording (some rolloff there) ...

The amplifiers I use are from the 50's and they're down 1 dB at 100,000 Hz. Any roll-off from 50's LPs was not due to tubes. Quick quiz: what's easier to accelerate, electrons in a vacuum or electrons in sand!?

Capabilities Of Vinyl Understated?

Reply #24 –
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... old LP's from the 50's probably used all tube gear as far as recording (some rolloff there) ...

The amplifiers I use are from the 50's and they're down 1 dB at 100,000 Hz. Any roll-off from 50's LPs was not due to tubes. Quick quiz: what's easier to accelerate, electrons in a vacuum or electrons in sand!? 

I'm not at all up on tubes vs. transistors, but isn't there more to it than that?  I thought tubes had the tendency to introduce distortions that transistors don't... it seems to me that tube gear I've heard sounds rolled off, or perhaps too smooth/liquid/oily (harmonic distortions).

P.S. Why do you use amplifiers from the 50's?  What I mean is, what's wrong with today's (tube or solid state) amplifiers?  I'd think a 1950's amp would be getting very difficult and expensive to maintain by now, especially keeping it in original condition (fun for wealthy hobbyists, maybe).