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From: rentsch@unc.UUCP (Tim Rentsch)
Newsgroups: net.audio
Subject: Re: Analog vs. Digital Challenge
Message-ID: <6697@unc.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 4-Feb-84 15:44:39 EST
Article-I.D.: unc.6697
Posted: Sat Feb  4 15:44:39 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Feb-84 07:28:37 EST
References: <2427@utah-cs.UUCP>
Organization: CS Dept., U. of N. Carolina at Chapel Hill
Lines: 27

Wonderful proposal.  I'm all in favor of it.  Some problems remain:

(1) funding

(2) equipment

(3) playback fidelity

Point three is especially ticklish.  What's the point of doing the test if 
it's going to be done on, e.g., Bose speakers?  Getting accurate reproduction 
*after* the material being tested is crucial -- these days when I hear of 
an experiment which "proves" some claim about audio, the first question I ask
On what equipment was the test done?  The minimum here is amplifier and
speakers.  If that information isn't included, the test is worthless.

Just by the way, if I hear again that CD's have "no information loss" I 
think I'll be sick.  Some things to think about:

 (1) The nyquist limit applies only if the samples are *infinite* precision.
     Last time I checked 16 bits was far short of infinity.

 (2) The implicit claim is that there is no information content above
     20kHz.  Even if I grant that people can't hear sine waves above
     20kHz (which I don't -- but that's another story) that does *not*
     mean that there is no information content above 20kHz.

Tim Rentsch