CDR Better than original ?

[MajorFubar]

Even in the absense of understanding the technical theory, sometimes it does absolutely no harm to use a healthy dose of common sense to vet your beliefs, and think of the larger implications and consequences if what you think is true was actually true. Usually at that point it dawns on you that you're talking bullsh*t.

 

[Vladimir]

Even in the absense of understanding the technical theory, sometimes it does absolutely no harm to use a healthy dose of common sense to vet your beliefs, and think of the larger implications and consequences if what you think is true was actually true. Usually at that point it dawns on you that you're talking bullsh*t.

"Use common sense" vs "Trust only your ears". Those two might be mutually exclusive by a significant extent.

 

[Electro]

I also heard CD-RW is even better. Captures the details in harpsichord recordings almost as good as vinyl.

LOL are you joking again? This is so stupid. I remember like in early 90s, when CD burning hardware was so expensive, they used to sell some CDs named AUDIO cds. The difference, in the eyes of the sellers, was that those CDs were made to last. It couldn't be any other difference, and that just was a marketing difference, in the way you digitally reproduce 0s and 1s. The the final part, the most important part, is and still will be totally analog: the speakers and especially our ears

This is not true, Cdr player / recorders will only recognise audio Cdr's . There is a code embedded into an audio Cdr that a Cdr player has to read before it will recognise the disc .

If you insert a data Cdr that does not have this code the machine it will not recognise the disc and refuse to function !

There was a hefty premium paid for Audio Cdr's so it was a copy tax if you like , but the disc were identical barring the embedded triggering code .

Both types of disc work in a computer Cdr drive regardless

TDK still make audio Cdr's

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/like/251517608290?limghlpsr=true&hlpv=2&ops=true&viphx=1&hlpht=true&lpid=108&device=c&adtype=pla&crdt=0&ff3=1&ff11=ICEP3.0.0&ff12=67&ff13=80&ff14=108

 

[manicm]

]Look I've been burning music CDs since 2001 for my car until 3 years ago when I purchased a new car with a USB port, so I have a fair amount of experience and I know what I'm talking about.

You joined the party late, I've been burning my own CDs since late last century. But that's irrelevant, you're still wrong, which should be obvious to you if you really think about what you're suggesting. Did you try the test I suggested of comparing a ripped WAV from an original CD to a ripped WAV from a copy of the CD, and proving to yourself that when perfectly aligned they are so absolutely identical that they will pass the null test (unless the copy has been deliberately manipulated in some way)? I'm guessing you didn't. On the whole, different beliefs make the world a richer place, but some beliefs are just plain wrong. Sorry to sound blunt.

I won't sound blunt, I'll just be blunt, years ago I ripped WAVs off an original CD, and from a burned CD, and the WAV from the original always came on top.

 

[manicm]

Why are you repeating this ignorant garbage?

WAV is a file extension for PCM. It is the same thing.

Not that it would matter anyway. It is digital data, and as long as you stay in the lossless domain the rip will be identical to the CD.

And at any point, you can recreate the CD if you wish, exactly as the original.

If you wanted you could rip each track, compress to lossless flac, burn those to a DVD, take them to another computer, transcode back to WAV, and then if you wish, burn a CD, identical to the original. You just need the right tools.

I'm not repeating anything, just saying some early cd-writing software was pretty awful.

 

[manicm]

We recently did a test on a different forum to prove or disprove the claims of members that converting wav to flac and back deteriorates sound quality, which is audible like 'night and day'.

A batch of random named files was generated, some clean wav, some converted wav > flac > wav up to 10 times and users could download the files and listen if there is a difference. After the results we also did a hex analysis of the binary code.

The files: Roswell Rudd, Steve Lacy, Misha Mengelberg, Kent Carter, Hank Bennink - Regeneration - Epistrophy

You didn't need to repeat the blatantly obvious, as I use the free FLAC Front-End decoder/encoder, obviously the decoded WAV file will be identical to the original.

But I believe iTunes will transcode an ALAC file to WAV, and not decode it. Microsoft actually provided a not very well advertised decoder for their own WMA Lossless format, which was not part of the standard Windows Media Player.

 

[unsleepable]

But I believe iTunes will transcode an ALAC file to WAV, and not decode it.

If with transcoding you mean that the resulting file will not be equal to the source because of some transformation, that's not the case.

Out of curiosity, I just tested converting a wav file to alac, and then back to wav with iTunes, and both wav files are identical byte by byte. I would have expected maybe the header or something else to differ, but not even that.

 

[TrevC]

Years ago I had a CD that wouldn't play on the CD player without skipping, so I copied it to a CDR n the computer. That CDR played perfectly without skipping. *biggrin*

.

 

[MajorFubar]

Wow I hadn't realised this thread had been re-bumped after dying off for a couple of days. I sort of dropped out of the debate. If some people are so really convinced the moon is made of green cheese that they won't listen to a reasoned, carefully-explained argument to the contrary, there comes a point where trying to labour the obvious anymore becomes futile. I remain completely happy that having ripped all my CDs to lossless ALACs, I can, should I want to, burn a CD-R that would be such a perfect bit for bit copy that WAVs ripped from the original and the copy would absolutely null each other in a test. That for me definies 'identical' beyond any vagaries. Over and out.

 

[MrReaper182]

I don't know what those people who claim that CDRs sound better than the original recordings were smoking but having recored to CDR in the past I can tell you it is really not true.

 

[mikeparker59]

Just to throw a spanner in the works I have a double cd of Kyung Wha Chung 'The Great Violin Concertos' one of the tracks is unplayable on both my cd players as it stutters and skips. Out of curiosity I ripped it to FLAC using my laptop and Foobar 2000. The FLAC file plays perfectly. I then burned a CDR from the FLAC files which now plays perfectly on the CD players that won't play the original CD. So in this instance the CDR is better, mind you there is no difference in the other tracks that play OK anyway!

 

[dfa2124]

FWIW you can buy CD recorders from the likes of TASCAM that use data CD-Rs perfectly happily. I have one myself.

As for the longevity of CD-Rs I have often read that the Taiyo Yuden media CD-Rs that are still made in Japan are more reliable than the usual cheap blanks that are in shops that are made in India or Taiwan. I have used HHB CD-Rs as well as their website suggests "An advanced phthalocyanine dye delivers consistently low block error rates and a secure archival life in excess of 200 years". OK there some hyperbole there but I think they are probably more reliable than most!

 

[Covenanter]

I think there is a lot of ******** talked about CD degredation! I have CDs that I have owned since CDs came out that are just as good now as they were then.

One good piece of evidence is that lawyers now use CDRs to record transactions. When we sold our company all we got was a CD. If lawyers though CDs would degrade they would not risk doing this!

Chris

 

[MajorFubar]

In this thread people are mostly talking about the degradion of CDRs, not 'real' CDs. I've had quite a few CDRs die on me over a period of 7-10 years. Not necessarily the cheapy unbranded ones either. The issue is not a tabloid-hyped work of fiction that doesn't really exist.

 

[OliG]

I understand the digital is digital argument, but how do you know that the laster reading a CD correctly identifies all 1's as 1's and all 0's as 0's? This could apply equally to copying a CD or simply playing it.

 

[unsleepable]

I believe you just can't, unless you compare the extracted data to the material that was used to record the CD.

With data it's different. If the driver cannot recover from a reading error, it will report a failure. But when reading audio, missing data will typically be interpolated. I'm not sure this is part of any specification, though, so different drives may behave differently.

In the MP3-times I was quite set on Plextor drives to rip my CDs, as they were known to perform best. As of today, I'm happy I don't own a single CD drive and there are digital downloads.

 

[Overdose]

If lawyers though CDs would degrade they would not risk doing this!

Chris

I doubt that most lawyers give a second thought as to the longevity of the discs. Like most people, they expect the data to be fairly safe and secure on a physical medium as long as the medium is kept safe.

 

[andyjm]

I understand the digital is digital argument, but how do you know that the laster reading a CD correctly identifies all 1's as 1's and all 0's as 0's? This could apply equally to copying a CD or simply playing it.

All data transmission and storage systems are subject to errors. This is taken into account during the design, and error correction is built in to the system. With CDs, there is redundancy in the data which allows errors to be detected and corrected (google "Reed Solomon error correction"). Of some relevance to this thread, CD-R use the 'orange book' CDROM standard, which has a higher degree of correction and detection than the CD 'red book' standard.

 

[andyjm]

I think there is a lot of ******** talked about CD degredation! I have CDs that I have owned since CDs came out that are just as good now as they were then.

One good piece of evidence is that lawyers now use CDRs to record transactions. When we sold our company all we got was a CD. If lawyers though CDs would degrade they would not risk doing this!

Chris

CDs and CD-R are not the same.

Giving it a bit of thought, if that dye layer in your CD-R can be altered by the wimpy little laser in your CD burner, might that layer be quite fragile?

Early CD-R dye layers were unstable and would degrade over time just for the hell of it. More recent forumulations (different colour - can never remember which is the longer lasting colour) apparently will last decades in controlled conditions. Even so, leaving a CD-R in direct sunlight will cause the dye to degrade and eventually wipe the CD in a period of weeks.

If the burner was marginal in the first place, even the slow degradation of the new formula CD-Rs may be sufficient to push the CD over the edge into non-readability within a few years - even if correctly stored.

Great huh?

 

[MajorFubar]

I understand the digital is digital argument, but how do you know that the laster reading a CD correctly identifies all 1's as 1's and all 0's as 0's? This could apply equally to copying a CD or simply playing it.

You can't know. Both data CDs and audio CDs are read under an almost constant stream of errors but there are a million and one redundancy checks and checksums to ensure that what's fed to the DAC (or loaded into a computer) is correct. If the errors are so bad that they can't be corrected, you get a skip or a jump (or in the case of a data CD, a read error). Data and audio are stored in different ways, but the principle's basically the same. We don't do stupid things like draw green felt tip round the outside of our computer's app CDs or home-brewed data CDs and claim that having done so this particular installation of Photoshop runs better or that the JPG picture of Junior is crisper with stronger colours and a higher definition. We also more or less accept that a billionth-generation copy of it is going to be exactly the same as the first. Only when you look at it from that perspective do you realise how ludicrous it all is, claiming that that the data is somehow more susceptible to analogue-style vaguaries just because it's audio and not a computer-app or a photo of Junior.

 

[manicm]

I understand the digital is digital argument, but how do you know that the laster reading a CD correctly identifies all 1's as 1's and all 0's as 0's? This could apply equally to copying a CD or simply playing it.

You can't know. Both data CDs and audio CDs are read under an almost constant stream of errors but there are a million and one redundancy checks and checksums to ensure that what's fed to the DAC (or loaded into a computer) is correct. If the errors are so bad that they can't be corrected, you get a skip or a jump (or in the case of a data CD, a read error). Data and audio are stored in different ways, but the principle's basically the same. We don't do stupid things like draw green felt tip round the outside of our computer's app CDs or home-brewed data CDs and claim that having done so this particular installation of Photoshop runs better or that the JPG picture of Junior is crisper with stronger colours and a higher definition. We also more or less accept that a billionth-generation copy of it is going to be exactly the same as the first. Only when you look at it from that perspective do you realise how ludicrous it all is, claiming that that the data is somehow more susceptible to analogue-style vaguaries just because it's audio and not a computer-app or a photo of Junior.

Don't be too quick, the laser/transport part of a CD player is extremely important, 12 years ago I bought a copy of Roger Waters' compilation Flickering Flame. This was on the Sony label which at that time had become notorious for applying all sorts of copyright mechanisms, causing some CDs not to comply with the Red-Book specs. This particular CD played on my hifi player, but could not play/rip it onto my PC. Until I took a black felt-tip pen to its circumference, and lo and behold I managed to play/rip. This was a widely known workaround for some copyright malware.

 

[MajorFubar]

Circumventing the copy protection with a bodge is not the same thing (it's a very clever trick I hadn't heard about though). The dodgy copy protection they used to use played havock with a few players, both PCs and CDPs. The only CD in my collection with it is Tubular Bells 2003. I read a few horror stories at the time from buyers whose PCs and players wouldn't play it. I never personally had any issues playing it on my PC or CDP, and now I've ripped it with a Mac, it's not an issue. I'm not sure Macs had any issue reading these 'copy protected' CDs to start with.