[linux-audio-user] Re: Digital Fidelity

I have no idea what the word "uneducating" means, so I can't really interpret your remark - other than to guess you mean my comments are stupid and irrelevant. (I find that remark rather 'uneducating' as well.) Apparently digital fidelity is a non-issue around here. If you guys really feel that you can produce professional-sounding, commercial quality CDs with 16-bit sound cards and 'correct' dithering - be my guest, and good luck. Music that originates in the digital domain doesn't even need to be sampled. Perhaps there are many here just doing all this for fun or as a hobby - I have no idea. I am guessing that there are not many people on this list recording acoustic instruments or classical-type music. I doubt that a recording engineer trying to record a violin, harp or orchestra, would be happy using a 16-bit sound card. OK Carlo, I found that all to be gratuitously insulting - but whatever. There *is* generational loss in the digital domain, as well as in the analog domain. Sorry. If you think the subtle differences I hear are auditory hallucination or self-hypnosis, and you can't hear them yourself - I can't convince you otherwise - I see no reason to even try. But there is a big difference between saying that this loss is negligible and insignificant, and saying it simply does not exist. There are some physical laws working against your premise here but I won't go into them - I don't want to take this thread OT yet again and turn it into a discourse on physics. There are others - professional audio engineers - who also hear these kind of differences, but I guess they must all be into metaphysics, hocus-pocus and self-delusion as well. (A lot of money in that.) Here are a few articles that touch on this subject, and say a lot of what I have been saying: http://www.johnvestman.com/digital_myth.htm http://www.johnvestman.com/digital_myth2.htm (There's tons more great stuff on his site w/re to mastering - a real wealth of valuable information - highly recommended.) I have found that his perceptions regarding audio quality closely mirror my own, and his writings have validated much of what I was already hearing. What John and I share in common is having started out as musicians - we were both violinists. Doubtless that has a lot to do with why we hear things similarly - or I might say - *listen* to things in the way we do. Violinists have to train themselves to listen very carefully to things that perhaps other instrumentalists do not. But John is not alone in his views - there are other working professionals who also hear these kind of differences, but I don't feel like taking the time to track anymore of it down, since I don't think there is any interest in this subject here, and as they say: "A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still." I was completely serious and sincere about everything I said, but I can see that this topic is a non-starter here. I was tryng to bring about a constructive discussion concerning digital fidelity and how best to improve it - but it seems like it has elicited more of a 'hold-the-fort' response instead. That's too bad, because I am just interested in making good music sound as good as it possibly can, and demonstrating that independently produced music - with OSS tools to whit - can equal or rival commercially produced music with their multi-million (billion?) dollar recording studios and engineering departments. If we can't do it yet, than I want to figure out how we can. It seems a good many of you believe you have already accomplished this - so good for you. I only know what *we* are trying to achieve, and we're not quite there - yet. - Maluvia