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EMI and copy control.

BlackMage	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 6:57 AM Bought Jethro Tull's Stormwatch. Turned out that it was some kind of new edition by you know who, EMI! And of course it was copy controlled. Ordered it from the Internet without no note of Copy Control on it. Don't want to subdue our sales because of shitty cd-encryptions, do we? I just love it when I don't find music on my CDs. I just find couple of install files for a Windows Media Player (which I have uninstalled). Of course the files didn't even work to begin with. What the hell does copy control good for you when you don't have stereos? Just a fucking computer. I have a Creative Zen Micro (fuck Apple and iPods, seriously) and the ripping audio that comes with it works on Copy Control cds. So I managed to save my day somewhat. I'm not a huge consumer of music in general. I buy very few cds if the price is right (under 12 dollars) so this was my first touch with this shit that is known as Copy Control. It even seems that Copy Control is very sensitive to scratches. Even a minor scratch will make the cd unplayable. http://notepad.munger.ca/2005/1603.copycontrol.html "A year and a half after the purchase, this non-CD-standard media skips like crazy during playback because of a couple of minor scratches. It is interesting enough to know that in my whole CD collection, many discs have similar minor scratches but none skip in any of my players." What purpose does this thread then serve? I dunno, don't fucking buy copy controlled cds? It's shit beyond imagination. I'm glad I can still listen to the songs without downloading them from the internet AFTER BUYING the fucking cd.
Opossum	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 7:20 AM Off on a tangent here, but here's something really weird. I made two copies of the same CD (which I already own - because there's no way I'm paying $40.00 for a CD and not have back-up copies for my own use). It was during the SAME session, and with no change of options or anything - including usage of the same (for copying) buffer that had already been generated. One copy had all the tracks (and NOTHING else) and seemed to play like a normal music CD. The other copy had an EXE file and some other rubbish including a menu, but no tracks anywhere! How that happened is beyond me.
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 11:13 AM EMI dropped copy control in April 2007, as did Sony BMG after their disastrous and litigious use of copy protection. But Mage, with review to the link you posted, the person in question had a non standard multi format CD, which is probably why he experienced his problems, speculating that copy control caused his problem is just speculation - maybe it did, but more likely the non red book standard nature of the CD was responsible. Never buy CDs with 'extra content' (often video clips) or which run SACD or other audio formats as well as standard CD audio, if you want compatibility. Copy control and DRM in general is just ridiculous and easily bypassed one way or another, record labels are finally waking up to the fact that it has been a big and (in Sony's case) potentially costly faux pas.
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 11:13 AM http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/apr/03/citynews.musicnews
ChillinBuzz	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 11:55 AM Considering the vast majority of users own CD players that can play MP3 now, I'm seeing very little point to audio CDs anymore. The car stereo can handle a CD-RW full of mp3 tracks, the home stereo is broken so that don't count haha, the computer handles everything but a kick up the arse... And now with HD-DVD almost lost against Blu-Ray (which you can bet your bottom, er, valueless dollar will be a pain for making backups on) the CD is becoming this generation's equivalent of the cassette. At least, audio CD formats are anyway.
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 2:19 PM Well, my nice Technics CD player in my home hifi and my 8 year old Car CD player do not handle mp3 (the car audio system usually makes CDs sound like sh*t, hate to think what it would do to some 128 Kbps mp3's d/l'ed from Myspace ) - my little radio alarm CD player doesn't play mp3 either. I have 2 mp3 players and the DVD player can play mp3 but frankly I don't intend on listening to music through my TV set with a static splash screen ! (yes, I could hook it up through the home theater etc, except I am using that for monitoring purposes right now due to blown monitor speakers) The CD is not quite dead just yet. The fact that Radiohead finally relented and released a CD version of their album which immediately put it right back on top of the charts is proof of that for me. It might be a dead format to the under 18's but adult contemporary music still has a place on CD. Higher definition audio formats never took off, DVD Audio (and it sounds great btw) and SACD just never took off. I still like owning a physical box with a cover and printed inserts as opposed to an anonymous download. I know I am a dinosaur and my way of thinking is probably flawed but I am not a huge fan of mp3 (especially low bitrate 128 Kbps or less), except for the obvious fact that it is a good way to showcase your music on the internet. And even then, I prefer Ogg Vorbis, I hope that Dmusic eventually will allow .ogg files. and maybe FLAC for subscribers. I think CDs have another 3 years or so left in them. And they've already been around for 24 years believe it or not, and been the dominant format for the last 18 or so years, that's a bit more longevity than an 8 track cassette at least !! Yes, HD-DVD, Bluray the copy protection they offer will be very strongly defended by the MPIA and if they do audio only, the RIAA.
Distilled1	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 2:29 PM most my CD palyers play any CD CD-r and CDWR mp3s the car man I love it Bose system the DVD players all do as well one I use as a CD player. the only one that dosent is the Technics 5 disk changer and its old but good.
ChillinBuzz	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 2:31 PM i should've added modern somewhere, i am well aware older gear doesn't have the compatibility... and upgrade, you cheapskate!
ChillinBuzz	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 2:33 PM considering i can fit several times more music onto a data CD and i would rather carry around much less plastic and silicon than a jumbo jet, as do most people on the move, unless of course you have some wacky jukebox setup in your car
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 4:49 PM Upgrade, you cheapskate ! That would be me, but honestly, I work hard for a living and still live from paycheck to paycheck and all the spare money I have tends to get spent on recording equipment/plugins. Now I'm going to need to replace my ageing Genelec monitors and I can only afford to get smaller Event, Dynaudio, KRK's or Samson Rubicons or whatever because the equivelent Genelecs cost 850 dollars each these days. (so 1.7k a pair). I also had to replace my audio interface on my laptop because klutzy me broke my Echo Indigo card, so another $250 spent on an Alesis IO14, but this was an essential purchase. I just don't love mp3 enough to want to replace my car CD player I guess. And I like my Technics CD player so much that I will be blubbing like a baby that needs it's botty cleaning when that has to be replaced
Veracohr	Date: January 13, 2008 @ 5:53 PM On 13th Jan 2012, ChillinBuzz said: Considering the vast majority of users own CD players that can play MP3 now, I'm seeing very little point to audio CDs anymore. Because some of us don't like the comprimised sound quality of MP3s.
zedsalt	Date: January 14, 2008 @ 10:25 AM I can consistently tell the difference between a cassette mastered and/or duplicated digitally from an analog-to-analog cassette, but in all honesty...say...a 64k MP3 vs. one of those ginormous, ultrahighdensity music files? I can't tell them apart through a nice pair of headphones.
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 14, 2008 @ 8:25 PM Seriously Zed, unless the reference recording is a sparse, simple track without much going on dynamically in a wide frequency range at any given time (like an acoustic guitar and vocals only singer songwriter track for example), you will really notice the difference, particularly in the sub 100 Hz bass freqs and anything above 8 Khz. Low bitrate kills a lot of that information and unless you compensate your mix accordingly (most don't they just rip an mp3 from a high resolution .wav or .aiff file with no EQ or other mixing adjustments) then you get the flangey cymbals that sound like they were recorded underwater, boosted mid range and bass that is either non existent or muddy as all hell depending on how many errors the converter makes. For websites that need 128 Kbps mp3 (such as free S/C) I totally remix my songs to include less bass (totally high pass 40 Hz, kill anything under as it won't be reproduced but uses up bits that will lead to encoding errors) and low pass 10 Khz, as HF information takes the most effort for and bandwidth for the encoder and it starts to cut this out in notches leading to that horrible phasing you often hear on low bitrate mp3's. Of course, if your mix is basic with sparse instrumentation then this might not apply but if you run a dense mix with lots of different instruments, layered instruments, complex arrangements, layered vocals etc and so on, then it is necessary to rethink the mix to avoid encoding problems, distortions (mp3 encoding can boost signals more than 1 db, so having the limiter set to -0.3 or so like for CD mixes will result in plenty of clipping and unnecessary distortion), etc. Sometimes all of this stuff really makes me want to go back to my 8 track reel to reel tape recorder, because analog overs don't sound bad unless they are about 12 db over.
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 14, 2008 @ 8:30 PM The higher the bitrate, the less errors and notching of audio frequencies occurs, so this is why mp3s recorded at 192 Kbps (and particularly 256 Kbps or higher) mp3's sound a lot truer to the original .wav file and because people tend not to remix differently for mp3 compared to CD Audio, why more complex arrangements and denser mixes sound better at a higher bit rate. But with compensation and a little thought to remixing, you can make a 128 down to about 96 Kbps mp3 sound acceptable without too much compromise of sound quality (you probably wouldn't notice through a boombox or an Ipod if you're on a train or something) but a better hifi system or nice headphones will highlight the lesser sound quality for many people.
Thaspian	Date: January 15, 2008 @ 2:27 AM HPF & LPFing the mix for MP3? :wtf: WTF? real encoders have been doing this for ten years now. Depending on the preset you use, it does so accordingly. I trust LAME's psychoacoustic model brought about from years of nerdy experimentation and ABX tests over arbitrary numbers. Let the encoder make the decision for you. LAME --alt-preset standard is, in most cases, transparent.
zedsalt	Date: January 15, 2008 @ 10:46 AM I was listening to ragas from a radio program and live tracks from a variety of sources (mostly Jam Bands and Funk) through a pair of Koss headphones with 3 1/2" speakers, run through a quarter-to-eighth inch adapter. I went to archive.org, because they have the greatest number of different file formats for the same files (depending on what the contributor chooses to upload, of course). Maybe if I had better equipment, maybe if I had a better ear...I don't know, but I couldn't hear a difference. LQM, you'd love this one: check out the live version (The Culture Room 6/29/02)of Bernie Worrell's Woo Warriors' "Stretchin' Out in a Rubber Band" there at Archive. Wooooo!
LiQuidMetamo...	Date: January 15, 2008 @ 8:13 PM Some encoders do it (they have to compress the audio) many do not and would you trust a preset algorithm to do your mixes. I wouldn't leave that to to the enooder. Lame's encoder is not transparent, I have tested it alongside Fraunhofer and both of them boost levels, especially on sub 192 Kbps. Besides, with respect Thaspian, I think I would trust Bob Katz and Bobby Owsinski's views over yours on this matter (plus my own 22 years of recording experience) Katz and Owsinski both advocate making seperate mp3 mixes.
independentm...	Date: January 15, 2008 @ 9:18 PM I agree. (If you know how to mix/master in the first place...) For best results, you should do a separate mix for mp3 than you did for CD. (Don't just rip the CD master.)

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