Real HD ή όχι;

T.Kostas

Established Member
19 August 2009
263
Από το Computeraudiophile.

Many of us download our High-Resolution music from sites like "HDtracks" "High Definition Tape Transfers" (HDTT), and the Linn Records site. We make these purchases confident that we are getting, for our money, 24-bit/192 KHz, 24/176.4, 24/96 or 24-bit/88.2 KHz copies of master tapes either analog or, in the case of Linn, hi-res digital originals. But is that confidence misplaced?

If a recent article in Britain's "Hi-Fi News and Record Review" is anything to go by, we're at least sometimes being cheated. I'm not saying that these download sites are purposely cheating us by not giving us what we think we're buying, what is happening is that these digital transfers aren't actually done by HDTracks, HDTT, and Linn Records, et al, themselves. They get sent the digital copies they offer by whoever owns the masters and the rights to license the music.

According to HFN&RR, a sampling of these three sites show that when the downloads of some of them have been examined by a spectrum analyzer, the analysis shows that many are not hi-rez at all but merely up-sampled standard resolution digital that have been converted from 44.1 or 48 KHz digital copies. I don't know about you, but I have a stand-alone 24/96 up-sampler that can do that on the fly to any 16-bit/44.1 KHz CD or other digital source that I care to play. Why would I want to purchase (for a healthy premium too) a copy of a CD that has been up-sampled from CD quality already? Yet that is what a lot of are getting here.

The sad part about this is that it seems that these download services didn't know that they were short-changing their customers. One case in point was HDTrack's recent addition of the "Frampton Comes Alive" album. HDTRacks was selling this album as 24/96 on their web-site, but after HFN&RR's investigation, the download service's spokesman, Mike Lawson replied: "We appreciate our attention being brought to these titles. "Frampton Comes Alive" has been relabeled as 24/48, and it's still the very best version of that album available anywhere."

Lest classical music and jazz snobs think that they have escaped this problem, The HDTRacks release of Coltrane's "Lush Life" appears to have been filtered twice which indicates that it was up-sampled from 44.1 KHz to 96 KHz. Also from HDTRacks, Is the Pentatone recording of Shostakovich's Symphony #5 which is listed as being 24/88.2 but is really, again, merely 16-bit/44.1 up-sampled.

Linn Records too, has found their share of "ringers" in their catalog as well. Their recoding of Bach's "Brandenberg Concerto's was found to be also up-sampled from a 44.1 KHz original.

When asked to comment, Linn's Catherine Ward informed HFN&RR: "As soon as were aware of this issue, all customers who bought these titles were immediately contacted and informed of the situation. We are taking this one album at at a time and are making each album available on the website when we are satisfied with the quality. The customers who previously purchased these downloads are automatically given the corrected versions of each release when it becomes available."

Τα σχόλιά σας παρακαλώ.
 
Έχω αγοράσει πολλές φορές από το HDtracks και αρκετές από το HDTT. Δεν μπήκα ποτέ στη δοκιμασία να δω το φάσμα της κάθε ηχογράφησης. Το πιο ενοχλητικό πράγμα για μένα, ήταν το απαράδεκτο ορισμένες φορές editing των tracks, που συνάντησα σε τίτλους του HDTracks, ειδικά σε έργα τα οποία παίζονται χωρίς διακοπή.

Αναφέρω για παράδειγμα την 8η του Μάλερ με Μάαζελ, την 11η του Σοστακόβιτς με Πλετνιώφ (αρχή του 2ου και αρχή του 3ου μέρους), την 7η του Σοστακόβιτς σε MDG (αρχή του δεύτερου μέρους). Ειδικά για το τελευταίο, παραπονέθηκα στην HDTracks και μου επέστρεψαν τα χρήματα. Επίσης απ' όσο είδα, αφαίρεσαν τον τίτλο από τον κατάλογο τους.
 
Tο θέμα είναι οτι εμείς μάλλον δεν μπορουμε να κάνουμε κάτι για αυτό! Εννοώ δεν μπορουμε να ξερουμε εκ των προτέρων αν το κάθε αλμπουμ που μας ενδιαφέρει ειναι true hi-rez ή οχι!
Μόνο οι πιο πάνω εταιρίες αν δουνε οτι χάνουνε πωλήσεις σε δουλειές υψηλής ανάλυσης θα μπουν στην διαδικασία να πιεσουν-ελέγξουν τους προμηθευτές τους ωστε οι δουλειές hi-rez που τους πουλάνε να ειναι original!