CatManDo

Indee, these are the first hi-rez releases of most albums. According to the information posted on the Steve Hoffman forum, these are the transfers made for the 2011 reissue campaign, now available in hi-rez for the first time (except a few albums released on Blu-ray in the Immersion box sets). The dynamic range is 1dB higher for some of the albums, compared to the 2011 CDs. It's strange that these releases came out with no previous announcement, when fans have been asking for years to get hi-rez versions, especially of Animals and the Wall.

Since I bought my first Raspberry Pi (4) a month ago, I've been trying various uses for this great device. I installed the volumio OS. I was pleasantly surprised that volumio worked with the T+A DAC8DSD although it wasn't listed in the supported DACs. But there were some restrictions: - when the DAC was connected to the Raspberry Pi (USB), the Raspi would not boot. I had to start it first (or just leave it on) and connect the DAC after that. Very inconvenient - I could play PCM up to 24/352 on volumio and it was passed in that format to the DAC. However, DSD files (64, 128, 256) were all converted to 24/352 PCM. So I can't have the benefit of the seperate DSD circuit of the DAC. Playback was fine (no drop outs or other problems), sound quality seemed perfect (I didn't do a deep listening test though), and the remote control with the Android app or the browser interface on the PC was very convenient I also need to figure out how to keep the music library alive. I made volumio scan a folder with a few thousand albums on a network drive, which took a long time but worked fine. But after disconnecting and reconnecting from the network, the library was empty, although the settings stated the network folder was accessible. So I could not use the library. I would prefer a more lightweight interface, without cover images and additional album information. Just the basics, to be able to browse to an album folder on a network drive and play the album. So for the moment I have no practical use for volumio on the Rasperry Pi, but I will continue to try it. As an alternative Raspberry Pi audio player, I also tried picoreplayer, but I don't like the architecture, as it requires using the Logitech Media Server on the server PC.

Maybe not suitable for checking an entire collection, but I use the Dynamic Range Meter plugin in foobar2000 for every new album ripped or downloaded. It scans all the files of an album in about 10 seconds and stops in case of a file playback error. This made it possible for me to detect faulty files without having to listen to them. https://audio-file.org/2020/06/03/foo_dynamic_range-foobar-dynamic-range/

Somebody in the Steve Hoffman forum in 2014 managed to rip such a disc using the VLC player (videolan.org) https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/watermarked-cd-how-to-rip.397480/page-2 (post #27)

Sorry Rafael, I can't help you with that. I'm a big fan of Dynaudio (I have a pair of Confidence C2), but I haven't heard any of the newer models. You'll have to take account of the amp you have or are planning on buying when comparing the passive and active versions. Since your room is of quadratic shape, there is the risk of standing waves, which lead to boomy bass. This could be better corrected with active speakers that have bass level controls, whereas most amps today no longer have tone controls.

In this case, it's not just about active vs passive. The Focus 20 XD has analogue inputs, but also includes DACs that accept a wired or a wireless connection. So it's worth checking if these additional features fit into your configuration and plans. The wireless connection could give you new possibilities for the placement of your sources. Personally, I'm a bit reluctant to buy speakers with built-in DACs, because I tend to keep speakers for 10 years and more, and it's not sure the DACs and the connectivity will still be up to date then. For example, the wireless connection of the Focus 20 XD is limited to 24/96 PCM signals. The digital input accepts PCM only, not DSD. After some years, the speaker software may become limited, with no update available. But at least here there is the analogue input fall back solution in case the DACs become too limited.

The Brahms 4 recording by Carlos Kleiber is a PCM recording from 1980, so don't expect miracles from a hi-rez transfer. https://www.discogs.com/Johannes-Brahms-Wiener-Philharmoniker-Carlos-Kleiber-Symphonie-No-4/release/3507687 Deutsche Grammophon still made many analogue recordings in the early 1980's, which can benefit more from a hi-rez format. 16/44 PCM was considered the superior recording format at the time, that's why Karajan re-recorded in the 1980's on PCM many popular works that he had already recorded for DG in the 1970's. But from today's perspective, it's a sonic limitation.

Indeed, many classical SACDs have no frequencies above 22 or 24kHz. But that's not because they were made from a CD master (that happens too with some reissues, unfortunately), but because a 24/44 or 24/48 PCM recording is the original source. Smaller european labels like BIS, Audite, CPO and others, who released many SACDs, have continued to record in 24/44 or 24/48 multichannel PCM when 24/96 had long been the standard. But it was justified to release those recordings on SACD, because multichannel sound is considered the main selling point of SACD vs CD. I discovered this when I ripped my entire SACD collection (>1000 discs) and made a spectrogram analysis (convert a track from ISO to PCM 24/88, then open in an analyzing tool). The biggest culprit concerning fake hi-rez releases is the german Delta Music label, which also does the Membran reissues https://www.hraudio.net/music.php?format=0&genre=0&label=187 https://www.hraudio.net/discsbylabel.php?label=353 All of their SACDs, even when an analogue master exists, have no content over 22kHz, i.e. they probably used a CD master as a source. In addition to that, they added fake multichannel sound, even when the source material was mono.

Have you tried the various filters of the Dac 8 ? Some have a rather significant impact on the sound. In my experience, "Oversampling 4 (pure Bezier interpolator)" sounds extremely clean indeed, while "Oversampling 3 (Bezier-interpolator plus IIR-filter)" sounds warmer and softer. I prefer the precise, detailed filter, except for aggressive sounding recordings which need to be tamed. That concerns PCM playback. Many people on this forum use DSD upsampling in the software player to send a DSD signal to the T+A, the DSD DAC part being considered it's strongest point. I use DSD input only for my collection of DSD files (ripped SACDs).

For such a historic session, fans will want every bit of music, especially complete alternate takes. False starts on the other hand much are less interesting, when they don't include a solo. Most of the bonus material had already been released in the "Heavyweight Champion" box set from 1995. I don't think a high res release and yet another remaster is really worth it for this album, since these Coltrane Atlantic sessions don't sound that great, compared to other recordings from around the same time (on Columbia, Blue Note, Impulse!, etc). Bass is very muddy, no upper treble, even some distortion (the Trane & Bags session) At least this reissue seems to come from the original session tapes, unlike other Atlantic albums for which the original tapes were burnt in a 1978 warehouse fire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Records#Long_Branch_warehouse_fire

1. Classical music and jazz have been pronounced dead multiple times in the last 50 years, although they use traditional acoustic instruments 2: Exposure to new music is now easier than anytime in history. In the 1990's I had to go to a public library and borrow a couple of CDs per week in order to discover little known music I had read (in expensive magazines) or heard about. At that time, most people only heard music on the radio, which was mostly Top100 stuff, i.e. worse than streaming algorithms. 3. Pop acts have always tried to compose songs with the aim of making a hit, and followed popular trends by copying. No computer required for that

Fortunately, the Coltrane case (hi-rez download having worse DR than the CD released at the same time) is extremely rare. If this happened more often, who would buy a download unless someone other had tested the files before? Right now, the DR value of a new CD release appears in the DR database quite soon (more people buy the CD version than the expensive hi-rez download). You can assume the hi-rez version is the same. If the CD is bad, you are warned. But if the hi-rez download risks being worse than the CD, it would put me off from buying $15-20 downloads without a quality guarantee.

My guess is that they didn't go for a cheap joke, but wanted to do something socially responsible (encouraging people to wear masks to fight Covid) and combine it with an ad for their product. It didn't turn out well. You can't put in the same message a deadly virus and some harmless electric noise that only a few audiophiles care about.

I don't know if this was already mentioned here. I've had a few albums on my favourites list for a long time (for possible later purchase) that have since then been removed from the Qobuz download store. No problem with the albums becoming unavailable (there must be reasons), but from a practical side, this meant that I could not remove those albums from my Favourites list on the website. The "remove" button is not there on the album line and I can not go on the album page either to remove it from Favourites by hitting the "heart" button, since the page no longer exists. So I'm stuck with these dead entries in my Favourites. I only found out later that I could still remove these albums from my Favourites on the Qobuz app, which also removed them from the Favourites on the website. Just a small glitch, but it could be annoying if a lot of albums (a certain label, for example) suddenly become unavailable.

My guess is that they don't care, or are not aware of it (I would check the DR values and the spectrogram of the files before sending them to the download stores, but I'm just an amateur nerd with too much time ...). Having different amounts of compression applied to different formats of a new release is actually very rare. In this case, the BD-A master was probably made separately (maybe even in a different studio, as a multi-channel mix was also made for the BD-A), which explains the different mastering also in stereo. The CD and BD-A have different mastering credits. But in the end the label sent the hi-rez version of the more compressed CD mastering to the download stores. https://www.discogs.com/Dream-Theater-Distance-Over-Time/release/14199931