A friend of mine (with college level media arts background) noted how at the time (LOL, mid 80s, my how time flies) how much CDs recreated the studio recorded master tape sound, which is what the artist would have heard during mixing and mastering. The point being, none of the intermediate stages of making an actual vinyl record are recorded on vinyl, and therefore, the artist was not working on refining how the sound was on the finished product, rather, they worked on refining the sound on the studio master tape sent to the vinyl record plant, and essentially, hoped for the best.
I've not spent much time over the decades worrying too much about that 'vinyl' sound.
Another friend of mine was gushing how much his favorite FM radio station at the time (80s again) had improved it's sound upon switching from vinyl records to CDs.
Well, sorry J, but here it works the other way. Stereo FM was designed with the technical characteristics of the available media of the time, vinyl records. So s/n ratio, frequency response, whatever, was all matched as well as they could to the specs of vinyl, and there were some compromises made. FM was a tremendous improvement over AM, but some of the technical hurdles of converting existing original mono FM to stereo FM and maintaining compatibility with existing mono FM radio were, well, pretty challenging. Stereo FM transmits a mono FM signal (which was left and right added together) to be compatible with the existing mono radios (and they were still made after stereo was introduced) and then they added an additional signal in the ultrasonic range of the received FM stereo signal that was the difference between the left and right channels. Turns out a stereo FM radio can take the summed signal and add the difference to recover one of the original channels and can take the summed signal and subtract the difference to yield the other channel. That process, while really really clever, is not perfect.
So, J, I suspect the station went to CD more for advertising purposes than for sound.
BTW, you can listen to the 'difference' signal in the privacy of your own home if you want to tinker a little bit. If you have a stereo receiver on your TV or available, connect it to whatever source you like (stereo of course) and connect a speaker from the 'hot' left speaker terminal (usually the red one) to the 'hot' right speaker terminal (the other red one).
You can now listen to the difference between the left and right signals. Depending on how the recording was mixed, you might only hear the instruments and background vocals and no lead singer. If you're really enthralled with this, connect the left and right speakers normally, and put your difference speaker behind your listening position. You now have a 'Hafler' surround system.
I had my stereo wired this way in '86.
I've not spent much time over the decades worrying too much about that 'vinyl' sound.
Another friend of mine was gushing how much his favorite FM radio station at the time (80s again) had improved it's sound upon switching from vinyl records to CDs.
Well, sorry J, but here it works the other way. Stereo FM was designed with the technical characteristics of the available media of the time, vinyl records. So s/n ratio, frequency response, whatever, was all matched as well as they could to the specs of vinyl, and there were some compromises made. FM was a tremendous improvement over AM, but some of the technical hurdles of converting existing original mono FM to stereo FM and maintaining compatibility with existing mono FM radio were, well, pretty challenging. Stereo FM transmits a mono FM signal (which was left and right added together) to be compatible with the existing mono radios (and they were still made after stereo was introduced) and then they added an additional signal in the ultrasonic range of the received FM stereo signal that was the difference between the left and right channels. Turns out a stereo FM radio can take the summed signal and add the difference to recover one of the original channels and can take the summed signal and subtract the difference to yield the other channel. That process, while really really clever, is not perfect.
So, J, I suspect the station went to CD more for advertising purposes than for sound.
BTW, you can listen to the 'difference' signal in the privacy of your own home if you want to tinker a little bit. If you have a stereo receiver on your TV or available, connect it to whatever source you like (stereo of course) and connect a speaker from the 'hot' left speaker terminal (usually the red one) to the 'hot' right speaker terminal (the other red one).
You can now listen to the difference between the left and right signals. Depending on how the recording was mixed, you might only hear the instruments and background vocals and no lead singer. If you're really enthralled with this, connect the left and right speakers normally, and put your difference speaker behind your listening position. You now have a 'Hafler' surround system.
I had my stereo wired this way in '86.
The granting of a pardon is an imputation of guilt, and the acceptance a confession of it.
