If you want to go down an audiophile rabbit hole, here's a good one

There was also an EQ on some lathes tied to the lead screw so that HF boost could be applied as you got nearer the centre of the disc and the linear speed dropped.

Cheers

Ian

ruffrecords said:

There was also an EQ on some lathes tied to the lead screw so that HF boost could be applied as you got nearer the centre of the disc and the linear speed dropped.

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diameter equalisation.
described in Tremaine #1.

Remind me why all these modern hipsters are embracing vinyl again?  :

JR

JohnRoberts said:

Remind me why all these modern hipsters are embracing vinyl again?  :

JR

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I can see two reasons at play. First of all, it is much more satisfying to buy and own something physical rather than a file in some cloud on a remote server farm or to pay for streaming where you never really own anything. And second, vinyl is actually a novelty for many younger people, even if you find that hard to imagine. If I take myself, I am over 30 and I grew up without ever seeing a single LP. My dad was an early adopter for both cassettes and cds, so no vinyl around. I played the first LP at an age of around 20. So for all those "hipsters" younger than me the LP is actually something new and fresh, combined with nostalgia and some sort of extravagance, since you need a specific playback system. They don't buy it for technical reasons or because of the aural experience (that's the triode-class-A-crowd, less market share), they buy it simply because it is something non-mainstream.

volker said:

I can see two reasons at play. First of all, it is much more satisfying to buy and own something physical rather than a file in some cloud on a remote server farm or to pay for streaming where you never really own anything. And second, vinyl is actually a novelty for many younger people, even if you find that hard to imagine. If I take myself, I am over 30 and I grew up without ever seeing a single LP. My dad was an early adopter for both cassettes and cds, so no vinyl around. I played the first LP at an age of around 20. So for all those "hipsters" younger than me the LP is actually something new and fresh, combined with nostalgia and some sort of extravagance, since you need a specific playback system. They don't buy it for technical reasons or because of the aural experience (that's the triode-class-A-crowd, less market share), they buy it simply because it is something non-mainstream.

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My dad was a recording engineer for RCA records so vinyl holds little mystery for me...

I thought millennials were all about experiences, not owning "stuff".  Live concerts are doing better than recordings these days. Maybe the vinyl is attractive to an older segment than millennials, but a lot younger than me (still a large enough group to harvest a niche from).

JR

> demonstrates pretty well how the music dictates the curve

What does music have to do with it? It is all about the sound!

I can think of a few annoying tracks which, if not pink-ish, might resemble E-V's speaker abuse shaped-noise. (Pinky with more top-cut to preserve tweeters.)

ruffrecords said:

There was also an EQ on some lathes tied to the lead screw so that HF boost could be applied as you got nearer the centre of the disc and the linear speed dropped.

Click to expand...

I run a Neumann VMS66. It took me a second to figure out that things were getting darker towards the center of the disk. I now will automate the computer to add some high end as the side come to a close or just EQ the last song a bit. I also use plugins to combine the low end to mono. Cutting is a lot easier with the computer. My mentor still cuts from tape and its a pretty involved process. There are purists who demand an all analog path but don't understand how much better a cut I can get by dumping the tape to the computer first. 
Another thing people don't know is before Pro Tools when you didn't have a Studer with a delay head, you had to use a digital delay to cut the program. And digital converters were not that good back then.  So a lot of old records are actually poor digital copies of the original master tape.  But vinyl is so noisy it doesn't matter anyhow

JohnRoberts said:

Remind me why all these modern hipsters are embracing vinyl again?  :

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What volker said... People tell me they're kids collect them like baseball cards. Never open them or listen to them.

bluebird said:

Another thing people don't know is before Pro Tools when you didn't have a Studer with a delay head, you had to use a digital delay to cut the program. And digital converters were not that good back then.  So a lot of old records are actually poor digital copies of the original master tape.

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Positively a myth, promoted by the bedroom studio guys over at GS.
as of the mid 1980's, the major mastering rooms in Los Angeles continued to use preview machines,
machines made by:  Studer, MCI, Scully, or Telefunken.
In olden days a repro head was fastened to the side of an Ampex 300.
Howard Holzer promoted the concept early on and even his devotees wouldn't use it.
The reason of the digital delay was cost and convenience as the budget rooms
could not afford multiple sets of eq, compressors, and Dolby.
If you KNOW of a mastering room that used delay, list it.

bluebird said:

Another thing people don't know is before Pro Tools when you didn't have a Studer with a delay head, you had to use a digital delay to cut the program. And digital converters were not that good back then.  So a lot of old records are actually poor digital copies of the original master tape. 

Click to expand...

I remember the idea floating in the air in the early 80's; apparently, the most convinced person about the viability of this method was the DeltaLab distributor (of course). I believe the concept never went further than experimentation (in France). And nobody would consider using anything else than an A80 for mastering.

abbey road d enfer said:

I remember the idea floating in the air in the early 80's; apparently, the most convinced person about the viability of this method was the DeltaLab distributor (of course). I believe the concept never went further than experimentation (in France). And nobody would consider using anything else than an A80 for mastering.

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In France wouldn't they use a Publison for delay?  ;D

JR

JohnRoberts said:

In France wouldn't they use a Publison for delay?  ;D

JR

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Only if they want to harmonize the track. 

bluebird said:

What volker said... People tell me they're kids collect them like baseball cards. Never open them or listen to them.

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I'm Djing and I know quite a lot youngsters who realy dig records and got great skills in playing and mixing them and rock a crowd.
I recently had a gig together with a 18 years old HipHop Dj. All vinyl and he really hit the Party.
He really inspired me that night.
Great music lovers around!

Stil.... not idea what the average LP buyer is like.

bluebird said:

My mentor still cuts from tape and its a pretty involved process.

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Are you talking about Ron M?

bluebird said:

I run a Neumann VMS66. It took me a second to figure out that things were getting darker towards the center of the disk. I now will automate the computer to add some high end as the side come to a close or just EQ the last song a bit. I also use plugins to combine the low end to mono. Cutting is a lot easier with the computer. My mentor still cuts from tape and its a pretty involved process. There are purists who demand an all analog path but don't understand how much better a cut I can get by dumping the tape to the computer first. 
Another thing people don't know is before Pro Tools when you didn't have a Studer with a delay head, you had to use a digital delay to cut the program. And digital converters were not that good back then.  So a lot of old records are actually poor digital copies of the original master tape.  But vinyl is so noisy it doesn't matter anyhow

Click to expand...

While this may already be used, when running through a digital path, even a few mSec of look ahead delay (feeding the side chain before the primary audio path) could anticipate peak limiting and support slower attack rates and/or less overshoot.

Of course too much look ahead time could cause audible phantom modulations.

JR

JohnRoberts said:

While this may already be used, when running through a digital path, even a few mSec of look ahead delay (feeding the side chain before the primary audio path) could anticipate peak limiting and support slower attack rates and/or less overshoot.

Of course too much look ahead time could cause audible phantom modulations.

JR

Click to expand...

Don't you basically need to look one revolution ahead?

Cheers

Ian

pucho812 said:

Are you talking about Ron M?

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Yes Ron McMaster.

gridcurrent said:

Positively a myth, promoted by the bedroom studio guys over at GS.
as of the mid 1980's, the major mastering rooms in Los Angeles continued to use preview machines,
machines made by:  Studer, MCI, Scully, or Telefunken.
In olden days a repro head was fastened to the side of an Ampex 300.
Howard Holzer promoted the concept early on and even his devotees wouldn't use it.
The reason of the digital delay was cost and convenience as the budget rooms
could not afford multiple sets of eq, compressors, and Dolby.
If you KNOW of a mastering room that used delay, list it.

Click to expand...

Wha? why do you feel so strongly about this?  The gentleman I work under (Ron McMaster) who has been cutting professionally for over 30 years knows many fellow cutting engineers who have used digital delay with an ATR. Pictures below is and old delay that was used for cutting from the 1630 machines. Notice there are switches for cutting speed.These were also used with ad/da converters in the same card cage for tape machines.
But if you want it to be a myth thats cool, but I think my sources are pretty legit. I don't work out of my bedroom and I don't read gearslutz either, I have group DIY to read ;D

JohnRoberts said:

While this may already be used, when running through a digital path, even a few mSec of look ahead delay (feeding the side chain before the primary audio path) could anticipate peak limiting and support slower attack rates and/or less overshoot.

Of course too much look ahead time could cause audible phantom modulations.

JR

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Ha whats funny is the limiter you helped me with is for digital mastering while I don't use much limiting when cutting. But if I do its a plugin limiter. I just have to make sure to use the same plugins on the preview and program tracks so they stay  1.1sec apart. Like I said before I don't like putting any more analog mojo on a record than necessary, being its a physical medium being cut into by a sapphire. can't get much more analog than that.
That said, I have much respect for cutters who do it all analog, Its really an art.

Ah yes, the good old Weiss Harmonia Mundi box! We had one of those for use in the VMS80 cutting chain at Whitfield St Studios (Sony Music UK).
When we first bought it, it only had 16 bit cards in, so we upgraded to the 24 bit versions. It also had digital EQ  and a compressor built in. Very nice sounding system.

ruffrecords said:

Don't you basically need to look one revolution ahead?

Cheers

Ian

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Talking about different issues but yes, digital processing could deal with vinyl groove mechanics too.

While vinyl purists probably don't like having a D anywhere on the label, I can't imagine any modern music that has not spent some time in a digital file..

Another old school trick is playing the audio mix backwards so the decays are now the attacks, much slower moving and easier to process. I doubt many cutting lathes are willing to cut backwards, so would require a bunch of unconventional file manipulations, to flip, process, and flip back. 

JR

ruffrecords said:

Don't you basically need to look one revolution ahead?

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Not really; the idea behind the use of the sync head for controlling pitch is simply look-ahead. It allowed the pitch control to anticipate the slow response of the mechanical assembly.
The look-ahead provided by the Studer arrangement was about 130ms (2 inch distance and 15 ips tape speed). Largely enough for the pitch servo to react.
The notion of looking ahead a full rev is not justified. There is no need for the current groove to leave space for the next if the next takes care of its own width.