Dynamic Range Vinyl Vs Cd

The dynamic range of digital audio systems can exceed that of analog audio systems.

Dynamic range vinyl vs cd.

Vinyl records typically yield 55 65 db. Pcm of any flavor has a flat response to fs. Consumer analog cassette tapes have a dynamic range of 60 to 70 db. When i cut a master for vinyl and a cd master from the same digital master tape they sounded pretty much the same except for the noise floor.

It s just designed to. With the above in mind i began exploring why some vinyl records have greater dynamic range rightly concluding that mastering lay at the heart of the issue. Dynamic range is the difference between the loudest signal and the noise floor. The difference between the loudest and softest sounds an lp can play is about 70 decibels db.

Lp vs digital is a religious war that has been played out by various audiophiles ever since the cd format was introduced in the early 1980s. The dynamic range of a direct cut vinyl record may surpass 70 db. The first one was recorded when the dynamic range of tape and vinyl was fairly limited yet the recording retains plenty of dynamic shading and expression. Analog fm broadcasts rarely have a dynamic range exceeding 50 db.

Vinyl has greater resolution than cd because its dynamic range is higher than for cd at the most audible frequencies. 70ish db than analog analog recordings sometimes have a higher effective dynamic range because their mixes weren t made with boosting loudness as an end goal. Here lp actually wins over cd. Cds appear to sound harsh unlistenable lacking in dynamics plus a myriad of other faults.

The second one was recorded completely digitally with 90db of dynamic range to work with and it has almost no dynamic variation. Vinylphiles claim that cds do not sound as good as lps period. 16 bit cd digital audio has a technical dynamic range of 96 db though many argue the perceived range is higher when taking dithering into account. Cds can handle over 90 db.

Narrow dynamic range sounds very odd to the ear when sounds that are supposed to be loud are quiet and so on. Yes vinyl was noisier. In practical terms this means that cds have more than 10 times the dynamic range of lps. The dynamic range of vinyl when evaluated as the ratio of a peak sinusoidal amplitude to the peak noise density at that sine wave frequency is somewhere around 80 db.

Lp s difference between maximum to average is around 11 56db compared against the cd recording at 11 11db and even the digital rip at 11 35db. Dust particles in the grooves of an lp cause crackles and ticks that are present and audible no matter how well you clean the record.