Hey, it's not my fault it's the size of Texas :p

the study of waves was my favourite thing in physics, apart from the rocket science, which was very easy, ironically.

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

"Fire, meet tube.

WIN!"

[QUOTE=Dj Yoshi]More like the basics of wave functioning.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, I don't see how that helps, either because I'm daft, drunk, or both.

No matter if this thread answered the original question or not, it was very enlightening to me, as it forced me to study some information relating to the subject. Mostly this is thanks to Emon (even if he is daft, drunk, or both). I honestly believed the dynamic range of vinyl is better, but I don't believe so anymore. And I also learnt the dynamic range of CDs is not 96dB in practice, but 90dB, since 6dB of it is used for filter purposes (well, it's still there and more valuable that way, but it's not simply available to lenghten the range). Damn, this thread was one of the most educative I have encountered during the time I've been reading these forums.

I'm not actually saying you can hear those frequencies, I'm saying (not claiming to know, but it is what I have heard) they make the audible frequencies sound different. Suppose you have a big bass-hum of which a certain part of the spectrum is inaudible, now the mid and high frequencies (as they always do) 'float' on the low frequencies (in a soundwave). (Don't know how to explain it better, sorry) So, the mid and high frequencies must be in some way affected by the presence of the sub-sonic hum. So even though you cannot directly perceive that hum, maybe you can hear the other frequencies 'sound a bit different' because of it. Maybe this produces the 'warmer' sound people claim to hear. I doubt ultra-high frequencies make any difference though.

[Edit: Although maybe not audible, it is a fact that ultra-low frequences by themselves do deliver a more powerful 'punch', that can be felt physically.]

Another point about cd's and records:

Records seem to have a bit more 'swing' to it. I have tried comparing records to (the same songs on) cd's, and vinyl has the effect of being slightly 'wobbly' in places, because well, the tempo isn't dictated by a processorclock, but by a 'machine' that is less accurate, even in the most expensive turntables. It could be that this 'wobblines' is what causes people to perceive more 'swing' in music played from records... I seem to be able to hear it. But maybe it's all in the 'ear' of the beholder... lol - It's a point to think about though.

I prefer Vinyl, because they look cooler.

i think the main thing that attracts people to records is that they're collectiable, thats one reason I still buy records. (plus tallahassee has an awesome record store)

How so? A 50 Hz tone and a 5 Hz tone playing at the same time does not produce a 55 Hz tone. It produces a 50 Hz tone and a 5 Hz tone playing at the same time. You still can't hear the 5 Hz, nor has the 5 Hz affected the 50 Hz tone.

Also, I've never heard vinyl been called "warm" sounding, only tube equipment and amps. The "warm" sound is harmonic distortion created largely from the output transformers. Tubes also exhibit a soft clipping effect, where solid state devices clip hard. The effect is subtle, really. Oh, and tubes switch much slower than transistors, so that's another factor. Outside of those, it's mostly placebo. Tubes glow, they are warm, so you think it sounds warmer.

You're looking at it in a linear fashion--a 5hz tone and a 50hz tone could create a harmony while played together caused by productive or destructive interference that changes the tone completely. It's not that hard of a concept to grasp.

A friend of mine has Zeppelin's House of the Holy on vinyl. He got it still sealed. It sounds amazing. Ten times better than cd.

I think it's already been said, but as long as the sampling frequency is more than twice the maximum frequency of the sound wave, then no information is lost. CDs are 44100 Hz, human hearing goes up to 20000 Hz. Now, the fact that it's "only" 16 bits is something to be improved upon, I guess...

[QUOTE=Dj Yoshi]You're looking at it in a linear fashion--a 5hz tone and a 50hz tone could create a harmony while played together caused by productive or destructive interference that changes the tone completely. It's not that hard of a concept to grasp.[/QUOTE]
Actually, you're right. But the resulting tone is still within the audible spectrum, and that is what gets recorded.

Well, since I have neither records nor anything to play them with, I'm going with CD's.

So why couldn't one oustide of the audible spectrum create interference with one within it to create a tone EASILY within bounds of the audible spectrum?

Riddle me that.

It can, and the effects of it would be recorded. If the result is within the audible spectrum, you'll hear it. If not, then no.

I think alot of the preference for vinyl has to do with the mix. It definately seems like older albums are slightly remixed for cd. It's not a question of quality I think. As I said before, it's not that it really sounds better, it just SOUNDS better... You know?

The Zeppelin album sounded much different than the remasters. It was BETTER.

Well, yes, that's most of it. And a lot of that is personal taste. Although some masterings, most notably ones by MFSL (Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs) are made from the original master tapes. Good examples would be Dark Side Of The Moon and The Wall from Pink Floyd. They are simply brilliant, surpassing the original vinyls, easily. And they should, being made from the original master tapes, which the LPs were made from.

cd's

Unless they seperately record it and then compile those recordings, or make any electronic music which is added after recording. And it's hard to tell which recordings are done with the entire band there or with separate tracks--not to mention working on the album after it's finished.

Actually you're wrong about that. One of the psychoacoustic effects I studied was combination tones. Basically combining two tones will produce, in the brain of the listener, the sum and difference of the two frequencies. So if you're hearing 5 hz and 50 hz, you're also hearing 45 hz and 55 hz.

However, in your example, my explanation is irrelevant since the human ear can't hear 5 hz. And good luck finding a speaker that can produce a 5 hz tone.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_tone

The thing is, there is an audible difference between 44.1 khz and 48 khz. I'm sure Jim can back me up on that.

I also agree on the "only" 16 bits part. The dynamic range sucks, although, like Emon said, most modern recordings hardly have 6 dB's of dynamic range anyways. Even modern country music is over-limited and mastered into huge blocks of a waveform. Disgusting.

Yeah, that's how they make those silly hypnosis CDs. They use "5 Hz hypnotic tones" or some crap that they produce with a 50 and 55 Hz tone or something.

Yoshi, even still, not many instruments go that low, and for the ones that do...I doubt there would be that big of a difference. It's nothing proper recording techniques shouldn't be able to take care of. And even still, you're still limited by recording hardware...I mean, someone correct me on this, but most dynamic drivers have huuge bass rolloff after 20 Hz (by design) so I doubt microphones are any different. Same goes for above 20 KHz.

And even still, the benefits of a regular CD still completely outweigh anything vinyl has to offer. And as Jon said, you can store ANY kind of data on a CD. You could have a 32-bit, 192 KHz PCM format with a frequency response of 5-50 KHz if you wanted.

Heh. Okay, and how did you arrive at that conclusion?

Spending a LOT (read: a couple years) of time recording the same sources at both sample rates, always in 24-bit. 48 khz has a subtle smoothness to the high freq's, sounds more natural and is generally more pleasing, however you only really notice the difference with a decent mic (quality ribbon or condenser, like a 414, or even better a C-4000 or a U-87) on a delicate and complex sound source (ex. acoustic guitar or violin). Otherwise, the extra bandwidth is probably just wasted.

However, anything over 48 khz is over-kill, IMO.

I hate records.

And did you do any double blind tests? If not, how can you be sure it's not all in your head? And if you did do double blind tests, did you REPEAT them? I.e. three tries isn't enough.

I got a Darkside of the Moon MFSL for $30 on E-bay.

Hands down the best $30 I've ever spent on anything.. EVER.

When I was making my first posts in this thread, I was going to post there's a huge difference between 22kHz and 44kHz. Then I halted myself for a moment, and resampled some random music pieces from 44 to 22 kHz. After that test, I decided not to post anything about any huge differences.

Keeping that in mind, I have to be somewhat skeptical about differences between 44 and 48 kHz.

I'm sure there's some difference between 22 and 44, even if subtle or only in certain situations. And I mean, I have nothing against using 48, 96 or even 192, it certainly won't hurt (other than larger files that is). It's just that every time you think a change is subtle, like "smoother" sounding, you'll probably want to do a double blind test to see if you can really tell the difference. I've done so on several occasions and found that I couldn't tell the difference.

Oh, and of course if you're doing any signal processing I do suppose higher sample rates are good for preventing aliasing and all that.

Your problem is you're only looking at the example--not the theory. A lot of equipment can record and reproduce sound over/under the physical human hearing spectrum--that doesn't meant that said tones can't be just right to interfere so that they make a tone within the hearing spectrum (or multiple tones).

I have Zoso on Vinyl. Hail me.