Modern "Mastering" - We need to stop them!!!

[Alaric]

Yeah , I kind of went off on a rant. Apologies all around. My gripe was the whole "remaster" thing. The master is the master-period. It refers to the original studio recording of the performance in question. IMO , you can get 1000 experts and the entire band/orchestra together and still not "remaster". How do you get do-overs ? The master tape (or digital recording) was the best representation you'll get of that performance. You can play with equipment and 'bits' all you want , you won't get any more info from the studio master than it contains. I went off on a tangent relative to retrieving that info (vinyl vs. CD). You can change tone , balance , seperation , etc. , but you can't change that moment in time when the band said-"Yes!That's what I wanted."

P.S. Yes,I'll be keeping my CD player.

[dknightd]

Maybe "remaster" was the wrong term. The process I was referring to is the process of going from master tape, to stamping master. What is that process called?

I'd consider it part of the "mastering" process. So, if you take the same master analog tape, and do the Analog to Digital conversion differently, have you "remastered" the album? (or likewise, if you make a different LP stamping master, has it been remastered?)

Lets take a specific example. The Rolling Stones album Beggars Banquet.
The original Decca LP release is good, very good. The MFSL 1/2 speed mastered LP
is IMO better. The early London or ABKCO CD's were OK (not as good as the LP). The 2002 ABKCO remaster is much better (comparable to the LP). Here is an example of both an LP and CD of a artists work where the "remaster" is arguably better than the original release. (I do not know if the same "master" tape was used to create all these different releases -
if so both MSFL and ABKCO managed to make a better product from an older, more time degraded, "master" tape.)


We know that the record companies could generate better sounding CD's than they did in the 80's. The AtoD conversion available today is much better than what was available then. Unfortunately they more often than not mess up the process,
seemingly on purpose, and generate an over compressed mess. This is what
bothers people. The "remastered" digital master should be better than the earlier
digital master (as long as the master analog tape has not degraded) but often it is
not (or at least it is not in the opinion of people with decent reproduction equipment
who can listen in a quiet environment). It is a troubling trend to people who
consider dynamic range as part of the artistic expression.

[dknightd]

One more thought. For most of these older releases there may not be "master" tape anymore. What we get might depend on which version of the "master" tape is used.
Did they start with the final master the artists signed off on? Did they start from the LP
equalized version? Are they using a copy of a copy of a copy of the "master"?

So much of this personal preference. What you prefer I may not, and visa versa. And what we prefer may not be the same as what somebody else prefers. There is no right answer.

For old vinyl it is hard to beat a good condition example that was early in the
pressing run, on the original label. But that is not what you usually find.

[Alaric]

One more thought. For most of these older releases there may not be "master" tape anymore. What we get might depend on which version of the "master" tape is used.
Did they start with the final master the artists signed off on? Did they start from the LP
equalized version? Are they using a copy of a copy of a copy of the "master"?

So much of this personal preference. What you prefer I may not, and visa versa. And what we prefer may not be the same as what somebody else prefers. There is no right answer.

For old vinyl it is hard to beat a good condition example that was early in the
pressing run, on the original label. But that is not what you usually find.

Bingo.

[jim777]

Is XRCD basically the same as HDCD, or will that provide better dynamics?

Technically, no, but not by far. In theory, you should be able to do better with a HDCD on a HDCD player. The XRCD doesn't require special processing in the CD player. I loved the sound of HDCD's on my previous CDP (but now I have one that does SACD!)

[jim777]

Can I ask, there is an element of interpolation in the process, even if not as I described? I quote " Unlike in downsampling which uses a low-pass filter as an anti-aliasing filter, upsampling uses an interpolation filter, which also is a low-pass filter."

From what you are saying I am guessing that it would still have no impact on the "hot" issue

No, compression ("hot") is processing done on purpose and can't be undone because it is non-linear processing. It has nothing to do with interpolation. Compression is a non-linear gain, and upsampling has to do with linear conversion between sample rates.

And yes, both downsampling and upsampling need the same kind of low pass filter. For example, 48k to 96k or 96k to 48k conversions both require a half-band low-pass filter.