DAT-heads Digest #744, Volume #6 Wed, 21 May 03 15:50:00 EDT Contents: re: Normalization (David Sadowski) Richard Thompson Taping policy ("Gregory Morgan") Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... (Jeff Lester) Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... (Michael Edmonson) recent Coachella/white stripes F/T (TRANEHEAD@aol.com) ISO: WSP 4-13-03 Louisville Palace (Joshua) Tascam DA-P1 w/Lunatec v2 battery setup options? ("Richard Russell") Re: DAT-heads Digest #743 ("JASON BRANTLEY") Re: Subject: For All You That Must Normalize..... (=?iso-8859-1?Q?G=FCnter_Wandtke?=) Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... (Trevor Astrope) ISO: Bill Frisell Recent Shows (Paul & Jen Beichert) Still looking for Nada Surf US / Canandian tapers ("spnews") Use IDE DVD Burner With Laptop? ("Onno J.R. Bakker") Beyer MV100 or Sound Devices MP2 (Dirk Stelzer) FS: AKG D-99c Binarual recording system (Nick Georges) FS: Blank DDS 60m & 90m (Robert Gray) FS: Beyer MV-100 Pre Amp (William Draper) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: David Sadowski Subject: re: Normalization Reply-To: dsadowski@ameritech.net Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 15:35:41 -0500 I read the article and it really seems to be about how the author does not like the way the new Rush album was mastered. It does not appear to have much to do with live recording of shows using a DAT. All successful recording involves some degree of reduction in the dynamic range between the loudest sounds and the softest sounds. This always creates some sort of compromise, but I believe it is absolutely possible to make a successful recording that preserves the integrity of the sound and creates the best possible listening experience. This process will always involve some sort of limiting, normalization, and compression. I agree with the author that too much of this can degrade the listening experience, since there becomes, essentially, little difference between the loudest and softest sounds. This can be true on some records, but it is even more of a problem on the radio, and one reason that listening to rock radio tends to drive me crazy. They want radio broadcasts nowadays to be at a constant volume level no matter what so you can set the level in one place and leave it there. Excepting the commercials, of course, which tend to be louder. All of which has little to do with live recording. The rig I use (PCM-M1) has, essentially, adjustable compression, and it is only through trial and error that I have determined how much to use, and when to use it. The same is true of the recordings I normalize using a wave editor. When done properly, the result is a better recording and one where the listener's attention is not drawn towards the overuse of compression. ------------------------------ From: "Gregory Morgan" Subject: Richard Thompson Taping policy Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 14:22:24 -0700 Richard Thompson does not allow taping under any circumstances. He is strongly against it and has put out "official bootlegs" available at shows to attempt to curb the desire to tape him. This doesn't stop it, it just makes it harder. Cheers, Gregory, who taped Richard Thompson at the Filmore last Saturday and will do the same next Saturday in Santa Cruz _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail ------------------------------ From: Jeff Lester Subject: Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 14:48:38 -0700 (PDT) Klay Anderson forwarded: >...here is a nice little article on a few aspects of CD mastering and >marketing and why louder is not better: > >http://www.prorec.com/prorec/articles.nsf/articles/8A133F52D0FD71AB86256C2E0 >05DAF1C Your subject header makes it seem like "normalizing" is a bad thing, hardly the point of the article referenced: "Why Be Normal? The idea behind peak limiting of digital audio started simply enough. Before people got the idea to use a peak limiter on their digital audio, the process of normalizing was used. Normalizing is a strange word that simply means "increase the volume of the signal by whatever amount is needed to bring the highest peak up to 0 dB, full-scale. Normalizing audio during a CD transfer is simply an easy way to get the audio as loud as it can be without changing the dynamics whatsoever. From an audiophile point of view it is the proper technique to get the hottest signal on CD with no distortion of the signal at all." The article is against peak limiting and compression, not normalizing. Now I've heard some bad things about normalization, but it's not at all clear to me what the problem is. -Jeff Lester ------------------------------ From: Michael Edmonson Subject: Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... Reply-To: edmonson@sdf.lonestar.org Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 21:52:55 +0000 > ...here is a nice little article on a few aspects of CD mastering and > marketing and why louder is not better: > > http://www.prorec.com/prorec/articles.nsf/articles/8A133F52D0FD71AB86256C2E005DAF1C That's a really good article, definitely a cautionary tale of what happens when hard limiting is abused. However, I don't think it should be taken as an indictment of normalization and proper use of limiting to reclaim headroom. As the article points out, normalizing simply "get(s) the audio as loud as it can be without changing the dynamics whatsoever." And proper use of limiting "results in an imperceptible change to a small number of peaks in the signal [so] the whole signal can be made louder, sometimes considerably so." Just because record companies have taken to mangling their releases with overaggressive limiting doesn't mean it has ceased to be a useful tool. If I see that a spike of feedback or loud applause is the only thing preventing me from being able to substantially amplify my recording, will I hesitate to use a hard limiter? Not for a second. -Michael ------------------------------ From: TRANEHEAD@aol.com Subject: recent Coachella/white stripes F/T Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 18:43:01 -0400 i have both nights from the warfield, coachella (plus Stooges,PRML SCRM, QOTSA, Beasties), boston bcast, masonic temple 16 apr. available for trade. i'm looking for the show at hammerstein ballroom with loretta lynn as guest. also looking for recent shows by the Kills. thanks. ------------------------------ From: Joshua Subject: ISO: WSP 4-13-03 Louisville Palace Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 15:48:25 -0700 (PDT) hey hey Looking for the Tuesday night show from the Palace last week, lots of goodies to trade... BWT: I'll b&p 7-29-99 Doc Watson & Ricky Skaggs from Rockygrass a couple years back..... thanks! -Josh __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com ------------------------------ From: "Richard Russell" Subject: Tascam DA-P1 w/Lunatec v2 battery setup options? Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 18:16:39 -0500 Hi folks, is anyone using a single rechargeable battery setup to power both a Tascam DA-P1 with a V2 (or some similar combo)? I'm currently using one battery pack (D-cells) for the DA-P1 (7-1/2 volts) and a rechargeable lead battery for the v2 (6 volts, i think). It ain't pretty, but it works. I'd love to come up with a solution involving a single rechargeable battery. Looking for ideas - I'm going to be doing some festival recording in a month, so trying to scale back on the amount of gear I'm carrying... (The v2 has to have enough juice to be able to provide phantom power for several hours.) Thanks! Richard ------------------------------ From: "JASON BRANTLEY" Subject: Re: DAT-heads Digest #743 Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 17:44:25 -0600 Hey Klay, I don't think the article was neccesarily saying that normailizing is bad, it was just showing an inappropriate use of the function. Obviously, this article is pointing out example is of what not to do, rather than stating normalizing IS BAD. Assuming you have some headroom above your peak point, I see no problem normalizing the .wav form. I normally will only normalize to only 95-98% and only if there is real need for it. Like the article states the problem arises when you apply limiters or compressors on your peak points to gain more headroom. This is going to diminsh the overall dynamic range of the .wav form and is typically not a good idea, although I've found it helpful to compress or limit loud bursts of crowd noise in order to gain headroom to bring the volume of the actual music up in mastering live performance recordings occasionally. P.S. I haven't heard that CD but just from looking at the pictures of the .wav forms, it was obviously a total hack job. Whomever is to blame should be sued IMO. Hard to believe something that badly mastered could come from RUSH. Wow! 2 cents JB > >From: Klay Anderson >Subject: For All You That Must Normalize..... >Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 07:14:05 -0600 > >...here is a nice little article on a few aspects of CD mastering and >marketing and why louder is not better: > >http://www.prorec.com/prorec/articles.nsf/articles/8A133F52D0FD71AB86256C2E0 >05DAF1C > >Thanks! > >-- >Regards, > >Klay Anderson, D.A.,Q.B.E. >Klay Anderson Audio, Inc. >http://www.klay.com >1.800.FOR.KLAY > _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your messages with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail ------------------------------ From: =?iso-8859-1?Q?G=FCnter_Wandtke?= Subject: Re: Subject: For All You That Must Normalize..... Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 09:42:08 +1000 Thank you for this link, very interesting article ! In Soundforge 4.0 it is possible to replicate the mistakes mentioned by using the "Normalize using Average RSM Power" and setting the dB Level too hot. It has the option to "Apply Dynamic Compression if clipping occurs". This way of normalizing is actually very useful when processing the average audience recording : The clapping is often double as loud as the music and dynamically compressed clapping to my ears sounds not very different to undistorted clapping. Before using this function I would spend hours to manually reduce the volume of clapping peaks with the amplitude envelope function ! I just did some experiments, using the "dynamic compression" for peaks and normalizing to the maximum possible Average RSM Power level I was not able to replicate the graphics in this article. When zooming in the graphics looked nothing like the squarewaves depicted, but still looked nice and round and sounded ok too. This article is from 2000, so maybe normalization techniques in the meantime has come some way to make CDs sound loud and still ok ? The Normalization process used on that Rush CD must have been a particularly cheap and nasty one. Here is what Soundforge Helpfiles got to say about the different ways of dealing with clipping when normalizing to very loud levels: If Clipping Occurs These options allow you to choose how you want the Normalize function to handle any clipping that could occurs as the sound file is processed when using the RMS option. Apply Dynamic Compression With this option selected, any peaks that would clip are limited to below 0 dB using non-zero attack and release times to minimize distortion. In other words, a time-varying gain is used to ensure that no hard clipping occurs. This option is useful for getting very loud (it is common knowledge that louder is better, right?), yet clear sound during the mastering process. Also, you achieve best results when converting 16-bit audio to 8-bit or other compressed formats if the audio has been maximized before the conversions occur. Normalize Peak Value to 0 dB With this option selected, the selection's peak amplitude level is normalized to 0 dB. This applies the maximum possible constant gain which doesn't clip to the selection. Less gain is applied than would be necessary to achieve the Normalize to RMS level. Ignore (saturate) With this option selected any sound data that would clip is allowed to clip. This may not be a problem if the clipping samples are very short and infrequent, but will sound horrendous if much clipping occurs. Stop Processing With this option selected any sound data that would clip cause the Normalize function to stop processing and display a message to that effect. ------------------------------ From: Trevor Astrope Subject: Re: For All You That Must Normalize..... Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 21:51:16 -0400 (EDT) Even Dark Side of the Moon isn't sacred. There's a Stereophile article that shows how the cd layer of the 30th anniversary re-issue was put through a peak limiter and has clipped samples... http://www.stereophile.com/shownews.cgi?1649 Personally, I don't find anything wrong with normalizing if you don't clip samples. Aggressive peak limiting is just evil. However, I've done it for non-trader friends who ask me to do it, because louder is better to some people and who am I to judge. They just end up ripping the songs to mp3 anyway. Bwt, ftp access for Red Hot Chili Peppers 05/15/03 (AT933/C > D7) for the first 3 people to email me. ------------------------------ From: Paul & Jen Beichert Subject: ISO: Bill Frisell Recent Shows Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 22:44:26 -0400 Looking for any shows on the current Frisell Tour. Lots of HQ Frisell and related to trade - please contact me if you've taped Bill lately. Thanks - Paul ------------------------------ From: "spnews" Subject: Still looking for Nada Surf US / Canandian tapers Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 07:51:26 +0200 Nada Surf are currently touring in the USA and Canada. I'm looking for tapers of these shows. The band allow audience recording. SBD recording may be possible as well if you talk to Matthew, the singer, before the show. Here are the tour dates : 5/21/2003: Dallas, TX - Gypsy Tea Room - 17+ 5/22/2003: Little Rock, AR - Vinos 5/23/2003: Lawrence, KS - The Bottleneck 5/24/2003: Omaha, NE - Sokol Underground 5/25/2003: Minneapolis, MN - Ascot Room 5/27/2003: Columbus, OH - Little Brothers - 18+ 5/28/2003: Detroit, MI - Shelter 5/29/2003: Toronto, Canada - Horseshoe Tavern 5/30/2003: Montreal - La Sala Rosa - 18+ 5/31/2003: Ottowa - Babylon 6/1/2003: Quebec City - Kashmir 6/4/2003: Hoboken, NJ - Maxwells 6/5/2003: Brooklyn, NY - Southpaw 6/6/2003: Albany, NY - Valentines Plenty to trade as well as as others bands (latests masters : Blur, Calexico, Doves...) ------------------------------ From: "Onno J.R. Bakker" Subject: Use IDE DVD Burner With Laptop? Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 10:49:11 +0200 The Pyro 1394 drive kit works wel with my (older) A03 pioneer burner (IDE) on a pcmcia 1394 card in any laptop Since the Vaio has built in 1394 you 'don't need that card. http://www.adstech.com/products/PYRO1394DriveKit/intro/API800intro.asp?pid=A PI-800 Onno ------------------------------ From: 520078325885-0001@t-online.de (Dirk Stelzer) Subject: Beyer MV100 or Sound Devices MP2 Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 13:03:20 +0200 Hey folks, I'm planning to upgrade my taping rig, i currently own this stealth rig: DPA 4061 > Line-in of mod.24 bit SBM-1 > TCD-D100. Which of these two preamps do you guys rather recommend to use with this setup. I heard that the Beyer MV 100 and the mod.SBM-1 sound really great together but how about the MP2? Which of these two sounds better with the DPAs? Both preamps are quite stealthable but which one is smaller in size? Since the DPAs tend to produce a little too much bass on recordings of metal/rock shows (actually they reproduce exactly what you hear at the show) i'd like to attenuate the low frequencies a bit, so i'd need a lowcut filter, i guess both preamps have one? All info is appreciated Dirk ------------------------------ From: Nick Georges Subject: FS: AKG D-99c Binarual recording system Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 08:09:46 -0400 FS; AKG D99c "Harry" Binarual recording system. this is a real binaural head that mounts on a mic stand (it has a lighting mount thread size actualy). phantom powered, XLR output. Very cool piece from the 70's I believe. Not a lot of info out there, and even AKG is pretty clueless about it. $200 shipped to your door. ------------------------------ From: Robert Gray Subject: FS: Blank DDS 60m & 90m Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 09:41:23 -0400 Howdy folks, After cleaning out the closet in my home office I've had a chance to take inventory and can now offer the following for sale: 104 Sony DG90P 65 Sony DG60P 19 Maxell HS-4/60s That is 188 blank DDS DAT tape of varying length and manufacturer (see above). I will be happy to let these go for $1.00/tape with *major* preference given to the person who wants the whole bunch. I'll pay shipping, too (!). According to my calculations that would come to $188.00 (USPS Money Order or PayPal only). Good deal. These tapes are sealed and boxed and have been sitting in my closet for a few years now. I bought them from Jamey & Aaron at Masterpiece AV way back when, and soon after I started migrating to CD-R. I have no need for them now and want them to be used by someone. Important: Please contact me off-list. No need to clog Dat Heads with your replies to me. BWT: 2 copies of Diana Krall 6/13/00 Bushnell Court, Hartford, CT (sbd.-- my copy says DSB*>CD*) on 2 x CD-R (includes 4 track soundcheck on disk 1). Also happy to trade this gem for more Diana Krall sbds. or hi qual. auds on CD-R. I'll choose BWT winners randomly after the next Digest hits and will contact only the winners. Thanks for your patience. Rob ------------------------------ From: William Draper Subject: FS: Beyer MV-100 Pre Amp Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 15:00:37 -0400 in great shape. cosmetically flawless. looking for $300 (obo of course) and i'll pay for shipping. would like paypal payment if possible. wed ------------------------------ ** FOR YOUR REFERENCE ** To unsubscribe from this digest, please send email to dat-heads-unsubscribe@datheads.phish.net If your email address has changed, you may (optionally) send the message to dat-heads-unsubscribe-oldaddress=olddomain@datheads.phish.net and the old address will be removed. 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