On Wed, 31 May 2017 20:28:14 -0400, Michael Black
wrote:

On Wed, 31 May 2017, wrote:

On Wed, 31 May 2017 11:18:36 -0700, (Dave
Platt) wrote:

In article ,
wrote:

Interesting anecdote: I had an Aiwa bookshelf
system set up in the store and playing a Stevie
Wonder CD. A guy came over and started playing
with it, listening to different tracks etc. He said it
sounded great, and he bought it.


Next day, he came in, saying he had the "same
disc" at home, but that the system did not sound
nearly as good as when he played with it in the
store. Since he said he had the disc, I asked him
to bring his in next time he visited.


The next week he came in with the CD, and I
compared it to the copy in my inventory: His was
a REMASTER....

And, some remasters are dreadful. Not infrequently the remastering
engineer has been of the "louder is better" school, and the remastered
disc suffers from serious signal compression and (more than
occasionally) actual clipping. The dynamic range of the remaster is
often poorer than that of the original CD.

The spectral balance will also often be "played with".

Years ago when Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon came out on CD I
bought a copy and was amazed at how much better it sounded than the
vinyl. Then Happy Trails by Quicksilver Messenger Service came out on
CD and I was anticipating a much better sounding copy. Nope. It
sounded just as bad as my vinyl and reel to reel copies. I guess the
master tapes done by Pink Floyd were much better than the ones that
held Quicksilver's music.
Eric

But Happy Trails was recorded live, though probably some later
"tampering", so one might assume the recording equipment wasn't as great
as in the studio.

ON the other hand, I gather early CDs weren't mastered quite write for the
new medium. I don't know whether it applies here, I have the record, but
don't have it on CD.

Michael
All my recordings of Happy trails were obviously made from the same
master tapes. I can hear the exact same noise in the same places on
them all. In fact, the CD almost sounds like it was recorded from the
LP I have. I saw Quicksilver live in San Jose way back when. It was a
great venue and a great concert. And I was listening to Who Do You
Love just a couple days ago which made me think of the difference in
the quality of the recordings.
Eric