Radio is going through some changes

[Mike Walker]

I'm talking in media terms, Tom. It's a digital MEDIA world. I can name many new digital mass media formats that have appeared in the last two and a half decades. Can you name any new analog formats (for radio, television, recording???) And if you can think of any (honestly, I can't), how are they faring today?

All future MEDIA formats will (likely, I can't see the future any more than you!) be digital, just as all from the recent past have been.

I'm not saying this is a good thing, Tom! You misunderstand! I think, particularly with radio and tv, analog and digital should co-exist indefinitely, because digital has DEFINITE, and INDISPUTABLE drawbacks...such as catastrophic, total failure in fringe areas, and under adverse weather, where analog would still be viable. I'm not disagreeing with your premise that analog has advantages, only with the idea that these advantages will help keep it (analog) alive FOR MASS MEDIA in the future. I just don't see it happening!

An early example of where anlog would have been better...remember how HORRIBLE early internet radio sounded over a dialup connection? We all know that analog telephone lines can sound much better than that (with audio signals). But that didn't result in a rush to distribute radio signals over analog telephone connections! Instead, digital was further developed, bandwidth increased, codecs inproved, and audio became better. MUCH better! Improving existing digital formats, and devising new ones is where future research dollars will be developed.

You may well be right about it not being a "digital world", Tom. Unfortunately, as we all learn at one time or another, being right doesn't necessarily mean that we win! You may win the argument (hell, you may already have). But we all know losing armies frequently win battles on the way to ultimate defeat. Such is life!

 

[KB1OKL]

Analog and digital will both always be around, I believe anything to do with vision, TV, movies etc. will be digitized because of the superior resolution and audio will all eventually be analog again because of the superior sound. Tubes have come back in a big was over the past 5 years and many musicians pay big bucks to record in analog studios because they KNOW they will have better sound. Many audiophiles buy LP's and use tube equipment because of the superior sound. Digital will never take over from analog, it will be around for a while as it's easier and cheaper but as technology advances and analog advances are made analog will take over again.

 

[TheBigA]

Many audiophiles buy LP's and use tube equipment because of the superior sound. Digital will never take over from analog.

It's been my experience that audiophiles make up an extremely small percentage of the population. The rest don't care.

CDs have been around for 20 years, and for all that time, I've heard the audiophile argument about superior sound from vinyl. And while they may have a point, it really hasn't changed marketplace that the CD is the dominant storage medium, soon to be replaced by home servers.

I've also heard the audiophile argument about tube amps, analogue recording consoles, and reel to reel tape. I've been among the most golden of ears, and have attended all the famous seminars.

In the end, most people listen to music through crappy earpieces or through shitty speakers, overly compressed, and distorted. So all the time and care that goes into the making and recording of music goes into the trash. I do all my work digitally, and I sleep very well every night. No boogie man has chased me around the studio yet.

The current format of IBOC is very likely to change at some point. Everything does. Nothing is permanent. There are lots of companies trying to come up with something better and cheaper, and when they do, the world will beat a path to their door.

 

[Mike Walker]

"Superiority of sound"...like distortion that can be as high as several percent (rather than several hundredths, or thousandths of a percent in the digital domain), dynamic range that frequently is as poor as 45-50db in stereo (vs. digital, where if you turn up the audio until you hear noise, the loudest sounds will be at the threshold of pain), and 35-40db real-world separation, vs. virtually limitless separation in the digital domain (the last beign the least compelling of my arguments, imho).

Audio will be "analog again, because it sounds better". Yep. with CDs, DVDs, digital radio and tv, satellite and internet radio and tv, youtube, digital download services like Itunes and Rhapsody, not to mention, er, "grey" areas like Bittorrent downloads, CLEARLY we're heading in that direction. Yep. It's a straight path 'back to analog". I can see it now!

As can be easily proven with double-blind testing, good digital sounds EXACTLY like a straight microphone feed! (Apparent) resolution doesn't get higher than that!

 

[JJS]

Can you name any new analog formats (for radio, television, recording???) And if you can think of any (honestly, I can't), how are they faring today?

The dollar-store radio is a phenomenon of the past few years that demonstrates the cost-effectiveness, energy efficiency and fault tolerance of the analog system. It's tough for an all-digital approach to match, particularly with a 1% injection. There's huge overhead in restoring data bits to analog audio for our eardrums. That's offset in analog recording technologies by their mechanical nature, which introduces motion, noise and waste heat. But that dollar radio has no mechanical overhead and skips a D/A conversion, beating digital cold. For now.

 

[Savage]

I have a longtime friend who owns a "record store." He sells everything including esoterica, everything from punk to classical to country, CDs, compilations, rarities like 1970s picture discs, and phono records in every speed including 78s.

FWIW, the fastest-growing segment for him is....16-25 year olds who come in to buy vinyl and refurbed and new turntables, styli, record cleaning systems and so forth. That's the counterintuitive truth: the demographic that lives in the iPod-download world is in love with...phonograph records.

A station client who sells musical gear for bands - amps, mixers, mics, DJ systems - confirms that turntables are a rapidly-growing sale item. They're frequently backordered.

 

[Mike Walker]

Vinyl is still less than one percent of the market. FAR LESS! But yes, there's been renewed interest in vinyl. I recently bought a turntable. I LOVE the way my records sound, but I'm not kidding myself into thinking that sound is a close representation of the master-tape!

 

[Savage]

I personally don't care if a vintage 45 or 33 "sounds like" anything, be it the master tape or a live performance. I want my favorite hits to sound like my favorite hits - exactly the ones I dug on the radio way back when, when my Transitone pushbutton car radio was glued to my favorite station. Since I'm 58 by definition that's AM, but everyone has similar preferences irrespective of their age and the prevalent technology when they were accumulating those universal memories.

I even enjoy chronicling the audio faux pas that made some recorded materials so unique and irreplaceable, like the bad splices in "For Your Love" by the Yardbirds or "Chanson D'Amour" from Art and Dotty Todd. Or the screwup in the final chorus of "I Saw Her Again" by the Mamas and Papas the producer decided to leave in.

Each recorded piece has its own appeal. Including the warts. That's why I think that more often than not, whether "it's digital!" is beside the point. The beauty in this material is greater than the sum of its parts. That's why some digitall-remastered material is inferior to the analog original, IMHO.

 

[Carmine5]

As I understand it, part of the appeal of vinyl for these young people is the record jacket. It's large and they can feel it.

Obviously, in the age of the digital download there is a certain amount of sensory deprivation because of not having a physical product to touch. In that way, for those of us who grew up on vinyl, listening to an album was a richer experience.

C5

 

[Tom Wells]

As I understand it, part of the appeal of vinyl for these young people is the record jacket. It's large and they can feel it.

Obviously, in the age of the digital download there is a certain amount of sensory deprivation because of not having a physical product to touch. In that way, for those of us who grew up on vinyl, listening to an album was a richer experience.

C5

Have you ever tried cleaning out seeds and stems on a CD cover?
Even worse, on a download?

 

[Carmine5]

As I understand it, part of the appeal of vinyl for these young people is the record jacket. It's large and they can feel it.

Obviously, in the age of the digital download there is a certain amount of sensory deprivation because of not having a physical product to touch. In that way, for those of us who grew up on vinyl, listening to an album was a richer experience.

C5

Have you ever tried cleaning out seeds and stems on a CD cover?
Even worse, on a download?

Or how about spilling a glass of Boone's Farm on an LP and rinsing it out in the sink.

Try that with an iPod.

C5

 

[KB1OKL]

As I understand it, part of the appeal of vinyl for these young people is the record jacket. It's large and they can feel it.

Obviously, in the age of the digital download there is a certain amount of sensory deprivation because of not having a physical product to touch. In that way, for those of us who grew up on vinyl, listening to an album was a richer experience.

C5

Have you ever tried cleaning out seeds and stems on a CD cover?
Even worse, on a download?

Or how about spilling a glass of Boone's Farm on an LP and rinsing it out in the sink.

Try that with an iPod.

C5

Haha!
I buy both CD's and LP's. I buy CD's when the LP's aren't available and I started the other way around as it had been twenty years since I had bought them. I soon realized that they just plain sounded better, more realistic. I just bought the three Beatles Anthology LP's brand new, believe me they sound better than both the CD and cassettes and I both heard. I have a decent turntable an old direct drive Technics with a good cartridge on it. Perhaps they have more distortion etc. but they also have a realism that digital sound is never going to have. Probably a lot of the kid's reasons for buying them is tactile and visual, you can see what's in the pictures and you have a nice big record in your hand but they are a PIA, you have to turn them over, you need to clean your stylus, you have to be very careful with them, they have much less material on them, etc.
If they didn't sound better than CD's I certainly wouldn't be buying them and I doubt any others would be either. In fact I just ordered Red Prysock's Rock 'n rock 1955 LP with Hand Clappin' on it. Many of these old records sound very good, the new ones sound great.

 

[Mike Walker]

People perceive "extra information" from lps (as opposed to cds) because there IS extra information. First of all, ambience (reverb) is more audible. That's because, with less dynamic range, compression is used during mastering to raise the average level...it's more audible because it's LOUDER.

LP sounds "richer", with more "harmonics". Yep. There ARE more "harmonics". The stylus resonates. The record itself resonates, and those resonances are transmitted back into the stylus. The platter resonates. The plinth resonates. The tonearm resonates. The moving system inside the cartridge resonates. These resonances are mostly harmonically related to the music...second (an octave above), fourth (two octaves above), etc. They are quite pleasant, as they make music sound, subjectively "richer". BUT THERE'S MORE! Random phase differences caused by vibrations within the moving system, and the electro-mechanical interface, generate extra stereo "information"...more "difference" component..making the soundstage seem "bigger". Yes, LPs can sound subjectively "bigger", and "better". The problem? NONE OF THIS EXTRA "information" was present on the master tape. It's all GENERATED WITHIN THE TURNTABLE ITSELF!

Anyone with a microphone, preamp, and digital recorder (plus a blindfold for the listening subject) can prove that decent digital sounds EXACTLY like the microphone feed. EXACTLY. THAT is "realism". It may not sound "better" (or as good) to you (or me) as the LP record. But it by definition is more "realistic" because IT IS WHAT REALITY SOUNDED LIKE!

 

[KB1OKL]

People perceive "extra information" from lps (as opposed to cds) because there IS extra information. First of all, ambience (reverb) is more audible. That's because, with less dynamic range, compression is used during mastering to raise the average level...it's more audible because it's LOUDER.

LP sounds "richer", with more "harmonics". Yep. There ARE more "harmonics". The stylus resonates. The record itself resonates, and those resonances are transmitted back into the stylus. The platter resonates. The plinth resonates. The tonearm resonates. The moving system inside the cartridge resonates. These resonances are mostly harmonically related to the music...second (an octave above), fourth (two octaves above), etc. They are quite pleasant, as they make music sound, subjectively "richer". BUT THERE'S MORE! Random phase differences caused by vibrations within the moving system, and the electro-mechanical interface, generate extra stereo "information"...more "difference" component..making the soundstage seem "bigger". Yes, LPs can sound subjectively "bigger", and "better". The problem? NONE OF THIS EXTRA "information" was present on the master tape. It's all GENERATED WITHIN THE TURNTABLE ITSELF!

Anyone with a microphone, preamp, and digital recorder (plus a blindfold for the listening subject) can prove that decent digital sounds EXACTLY like the microphone feed. EXACTLY. THAT is "realism". It may not sound "better" (or as good) to you (or me) as the LP record. But it by definition is more "realistic" because IT IS WHAT REALITY SOUNDED LIKE!

You may be right Mike but even if it is distortion I still like them much better, they sound warmer and is also very close to the argument for why tubes also sound better: even order harmonics. I've been a pro (when younger) and non-pro musician for over 40 years and have always used big giant 85 lb 300 watt RMS tube amps for my basses because they sound richer and bigger and you are actually able to control them a little bit by the way you play and by how loud you play which makes them part of your chain of sound unlike a dead just lying there SS amp, as compared to a dead just lying there CD. interesting idea.

 

[Mike Walker]

If a cd sounds "dead, lying there" it's because of lousy engineering. There are PLENTY of lousy sounding cds. MOST OF THEM SOUND HORRRID! But that's not a fault of digital (perhaps that doesn't even matter to listeners, but it matters to me). Check out an XRCD from JVC, or one of the "audiophile" cds mastered by people who actually care! I have a "gold" cd of Joni Mitchell's "Court and Spark" (perhaps my alltime favorite album) that is simply stunning. It's the first cd version that ever sounded better than my original (1974) lp! And you might find it amusig (as do I) that it was mastered by playing the original two-track master on a vintage open-reel deck with TUBED OUTPUT STATE! Hell, I don't freakin' care how it was made. If it sounds good, IT IS GOOD!

Dude, I love tubes, too! You should see the tubed doo-dads in my (cramped) house/studio! In fact I use a tubed microphone preamp every day! (12ax7a)

 

[Savage]

Beware the turntable operator! "Give him a plinth, he'll take a mile," haw haw.....

The BBC reports that vinyl LP sales went from 454,000 in 1007 to over 803,000 so far this year. I know it's an insignificant market share but it's an intriguing trend, especially given the demographics I noted earlier.

Then again, given the record industry's abysmal sales trends, the phonograph record sales phenomenon may be more significant than the mere numbers might indicate. (The record industry may be the only one comparable to the radio industry in terms of myopia and inertia.)

We have three transmitters: solid state Nautel AMPFET 25kw, a solid-state BE AM 2.5 (2500 watts) and a 1962-vintage all-tube hollow-state RCA BTA-1R backup-backup, tube-oscillator with two stages of RF and AF, push-pull pentode power amp. With all kinds of boat-anchor iron, modulation transformer and reactor, etc. And guess which one routinely gets compliments, even from the engineering-uninformed, on the infrequent occasions when it's on the air??

 

[Mike Walker]

When I was at WNNC in Newton NC back in the '80s, we had a 1940s vintage Raytheon that could modulate like 150 percent around the clock. It always sounded distorted, though...the solid state Nautel beat it by a mile. But the old (1960s) Gates BC1G transmitter was golden. GREAT sound!

 

[Savage]

If the Raytheon sounded distorted, there was something wrong with it. I've worked with two tube Raytheon rigs, an RA-250, the former main at former graveyarder WELM Elmira (moved from 1400 to 1410) and WBBF's RA-1000. Aside from being massively overengineered and bulletproof, these 1940s transmitters had especially fine audio systems, using plenty of feedback and good circuit design to keep noise and distortion down - even for a tube device. They were also beautiful pieces of equipment designed to be visually pleasing in the era when a transmitter was attended around-the-clock by live humans instead of living in solitary confinement in a cinder-block box out in a field of weeds. The RA-series featured two-tone paint and lots of nickel-chrome trim.

The transmitters considered the "Cadillacs" or "Mercedes-Benz" of their era (maybe that should be the "Packards") were Raytheons for lower powers, and the Westinghouse HG-50 for big rigs. The Gates 1G was a good box but lacked the class of the Raytheons. They were also famous for frying feedback ladders and mod transformers.

 

[Mike Walker]

I'm sure you're right something was wrong with the Raytheon. (The Raytheon was a 250 watt model, which the station was licensed for at night. But in the 80s "graveyard" stations got 1kw authorization at night, which made the Raytheon about as useful as a screen dor on a submarine!)

It (the Raytheon) was the standby transmitter (for the Gates) until the Nautel was purchased (when the station went stereo). The Raytheon then was pushed into a corner (where it might still be!), and the Gates became "second bananna".

 

[KB1OKL]

I'm sure you're right something was wrong with the Raytheon. (The Raytheon was a 250 watt model, which the station was licensed for at night. But in the 80s "graveyard" stations got 1kw authorization at night, which made the Raytheon about as useful as a screen dor on a submarine!)

It (the Raytheon) was the standby transmitter (for the Gates) until the Nautel was purchased (when the station went stereo). The Raytheon then was pushed into a corner (where it might still be!), and the Gates became "second bananna".

A lot of hams are taking these old BC transmitters, restoring them and putting them on the ham bands. I hear them sometimes, they sound unbelievable, big sound. I'd love to get one but don't have the space (yet).