[BC] AudioVault, Now Cascading Algorithms

[Rich Wood]

------ At 11:06 PM 7/1/2006, Steve wrote: -------

>You and Powell have made very good, sound arguments but the general 
>public are bringing these million dollar recordings down to iPod 
>players and less and you're worried about cascading algorithms? 
>Let's not even get into a discussion about noise floor or the 
>transmitters and, more important to the discussion, the 
>receivers/amplifiers. Hey, I don't re-compress Mp3 files. I master 
>my voice tracks to .WAV and save to 192Kbps (96Kbps mono). They 
>sound great. I use a Neumann U-87 so the source is clean. My whole 
>argument has been about what the average joe-blow/josephine blow 
>listener hears. Also, I'm not using that as an excuse to shove the 
>best I can down the pipe.

In the days of Easy Listening there were several studies on listener 
fatigue relating to processing and high end distortion, particularly 
its effect on women. Jim Schulke of Schulke Radio Productions was a 
huge proponent of gentle processing and avoidance of distortion. 
Since virtually all his stations were dominant in their markets, it's 
safe to say he was on to something. In taped syndication a major 
selling point was audio quality. Syndicators boasted about 1:1 
duplication vs. high speed. I don't believe you could tell a high 
quality high speed copy from 1:1 on the air, but stations bought the concept.

As I recall, the studies were proprietary but the format was so 
dominant that the successful stations simply took Jim's word as gospel.

I can only imagine Easy Listening today run through cascaded codecs. 
The 101 Strings would be even greater torture than they were then.

Rich



Rich Wood
Rich Wood Multimedia
Phone: 413-454-3258