Every time I export an audiomixdown in cubase it sounds crap

[ericj23]

good i hoped it was that one

heres how it is

from the article

"But the CDs sounded different… unless you played them on a $10,000 CD player. Then they sounded the same. I copied the audio from the bad pressing into my computer and burned a CD-R from the audio file. The CD-R sounded just like the ref."

he copied the aduio from the bad pressing to his computer and was then able to burn a copy that sounded normal - so the data on the disk was correct - otherwise how could he burn a correct copy from it ? This is reinforced by the pressing plants checks on the disk

but interestingly the bad pressing played correctly on a £10,000 hifi - this is becasue the ultra expensive player has much better lasers and sensors than your average cd player basically it is so accurate that it doesnt make the errors that the cheaper player did

the reason that the errors show up in a red book music cd is that it uses an untimestamped data stream - its just a list of numbers.
if your cd player cannot read these properly it make errors - and digital errors sound awful

now this is crucially different from data inside a computer which is timestamped and has numerous error correction facilities - i.e. computers cannot make these errors

So if the data was correct but it wouldnt play properly on a cheap cd what was the problem ?

well the article states "Somehow the problem was in either the glass masters or the plating process afterwards that makes the stampers that press the CDs"

so you see it had nothing to do with digital - but to do with a fault in the cd pressing master (which is a very analogue peice of metal)

what the author was annoyed about was that no-one at the pressing plant had bothered to listen to the cd -even tho it is clearly possible for the analogue glass plate manufacture to go wrong

OK

now go away please

[hvaring]

"I suggest that artists can bring in their computer so that we avoid the degradation of "rendering" a 2 track mix internally in a hard disc system. The hard disc systems cause some quality loss due to the software's mix engine that blends all those tracks down into two."

What a load of utter bullshit.

// tron
M.Sc., maths & software engineering

[davor]

what the author was annoyed about was that no-one at the pressing plant had bothered to listen to the cd -even tho it is clearly possible for the analogue glass plate manufacture to go wrong

OK

now go away please

Yes but, what is crucial here, is that people like you (mathematically minded) called him crazy, just like you call me: "....the expensive test gear said the pressings were perfect. The quality control people at the record company said we were crazy, the test equipment said the pressings were perfect "

According to NUMBERS they should have sounded identical. Get it. That's why I took it as an example in the first place. HEARING/EARS/HUMAN versus NUMBERS/TEST GEAR/MATHS. Get it? And you still didn't answer what the difference between doing summing up and doing mixdown is. And as I know the answer, it's you who can go away.

[ericj23]

christ i hope english is not your native language

where did i call him crazy - if some people at a pressing plant are ignorant that's just a sad representation of the american education system - its nothing to do with me

and numbers do not make sound - nor did i ever say that - nor do they say they sound should be identical - that's just you showing you don't have a clue about what digital even is

digital is a code which has encoded within it a representation of sound that then must be decoded for sound to be made - but this code is always put on some sort of real device - analogue - there lies mistakes - so playing the same digital code through differnt devices will sound differnt becuase they make different mistakes

so actually numbers do not say they should sound the same

my point which you still have not got anywhere near is that the maths inside a computer is always the same - due to several error corrections built in the computer chips architecture - so the summing done so that a stereo signal goes to your soundcard is exactly the same as the summing done to produce a wav file within the computer


all your stuff about humans/ears etc is all very interesting BUT IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS TOPIC - for some reason the original poster has a difficulty with his exports within his computer - and this should not happen unless something is set up incorrectly

"There's no difference in the exported mixdown compared to what you hear when playing it back real-time in the daw, except if some plugins behave differently when doing offline processing (which is very unlikely).
There's no magic to summing. The difference you can measure between hosts different audio engines end up where the 32bit floating point precision ends, around -150dB SNR, on the master bus. Inaudible."


oh and i can't wait for your explanation of how summing up and mixing down within a computer differ - pseudo science ahoy


that quote was from the first page of a thread that you should really leave because you are not helping the guy with the problem


well except i ahve some stuff to do for work

it's been fun laughing at you

[M'Snah]

M.Sc., maths & software engineering

lol. there's quite a few M.Sc's in this thread , davor is not one of them/us

davor what is your study / major? sociology? cultural anthropology?

[diverdee]

Do any other 'top professional' type mastering engineers agree with this vestman bloke, or is this his lone crusade? (I noticed he never stated others agreed with him - only that he had got a 'dialogue' going)
What is he selling?
are you Mr. Vestman in disguise davor? If not have you got the hots for Mr. Vestman?
Have you got some kind of pathological hatred of maths & numbers in general? (some say they are the building blocks of the universe - or the language that 'god' speaks etc. - Lot of theoretical stuff about 'music is maths' yada, yada,yada) does this offend you or scare you ina anyway?
Do you, davor, believe at all in the efficacy of wrapping ones head in tin foil in order to protect oneself from alien transmissions, or even as part of the esoteric art of mastering?
Do you, davor, live under a bridge by any chance, & if so do you charge the pixies & nixies & other wee folk a toll to let them cross?
&, lastly, does anyone here really give a f**k what you think? I know I don't, i'm bored so i'm feeding the trolls.

[davor]

christ i hope english is not your native language

where did i call him crazy - if some people at a pressing plant are ignorant that's just a sad representation of the american education system - its nothing to do with me

and numbers do not make sound - nor did i ever say that - nor do they say they sound should be identical - that's just you showing you don't have a clue about what digital even is

digital is a code which has encoded within it a representation of sound that then must be decoded for sound to be made - but this code is always put on some sort of real device - analogue - there lies mistakes - so playing the same digital code through differnt devices will sound differnt becuase they make different mistakes

so actually numbers do not say they should sound the same

my point which you still have not got anywhere near is that the maths inside a computer is always the same - due to several error corrections built in the computer chips architecture - so the summing done so that a stereo signal goes to your soundcard is exactly the same as the summing done to produce a wav file within the computer


all your stuff about humans/ears etc is all very interesting BUT IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS TOPIC - for some reason the original poster has a difficulty with his exports within his computer - and this should not happen unless something is set up incorrectly

"There's no difference in the exported mixdown compared to what you hear when playing it back real-time in the daw, except if some plugins behave differently when doing offline processing (which is very unlikely).
There's no magic to summing. The difference you can measure between hosts different audio engines end up where the 32bit floating point precision ends, around -150dB SNR, on the master bus. Inaudible."


oh and i can't wait for your explanation of how summing up and mixing down within a computer differ - pseudo science ahoy


that quote was from the first page of a thread that you should really leave because you are not helping the guy with the problem


well except i ahve some stuff to do for work

it's been fun laughing at you

You are unbelievable. I didn't say you called him crazy, but people like you. You don't have a clue about digital. Jitter doesn't originate in the analogue domain, you genius, but in digital. And that's what caused the difference. It's the transport in your CD player, that part which spins the cd, that causes jitter, a and not DAC. It's you who are ignorant like those people, who took it for granted that the the bit identical pressing should sound identical THROUGH the SAME DAC. It has nothing to do with analogue domain. Jitter has nothing to do with analogue, you ignorant mathematical zealot. You don't have a clue what you're talking about. It's you who said that mixown, and summing up are not the same thing. Now go and laugh at your hearing disability. The fact that something is inaudible to you doesn't mean that its inaudible to everyone. Just mediocre wannabes and geeks like you.

[davor]

Do any other 'top professional' type mastering engineers agree with this vestman bloke, or is this his lone crusade? (I noticed he never stated others agreed with him - only that he had got a 'dialogue' going)
What is he selling?
are you Mr. Vestman in disguise davor? If not have you got the hots for Mr. Vestman?
Have you got some kind of pathological hatred of maths & numbers in general? (some say they are the building blocks of the universe - or the language that 'god' speaks etc. - Lot of theoretical stuff about 'music is maths' yada, yada,yada) does this offend you or scare you ina anyway?
Do you, davor, believe at all in the efficacy of wrapping ones head in tin foil in order to protect oneself from alien transmissions, or even as part of the esoteric art of mastering?
Do you, davor, live under a bridge by any chance, & if so do you charge the pixies & nixies & other wee folk a toll to let them cross?
&, lastly, does anyone here really give a f**k what you think? I know I don't, i'm bored so i'm feeding the trolls.

I'm not him, I just have the same experience as him, as do all the top name sound and mastering engineers. Now a question for you. Do you do any kind of sound engineering for living? If you do, I pity those who would ask for your services. Speaking about maths I would quote once again:

"Still the best piece of test gear is your ears" (Roger Nichols)

[Evan]

Guys, some people want attention. And if they can't get it by being intelligent, they try to get it by being stupid. That's how humans work I'm afraid.

We should at least respect the guy who started this topic, perhaps we can carry this offspring conversation over to a new thread? Now that I think about it, I too could use some love and attention. So, 1+1=5... fight me.

[stefancrs]

You are unbelievable. I didn't say you called him crazy, but people like you. You don't have clue about digital. Jitter doesn't originate in analogue domain, you genius, but in digital. And that's what caused the difference. It's the transport in your CD player, that part which spins the cd, that causes jitter, a and not DAC.

Uhm. Jitter is due to flaws in analouge components. Like the parts that make the cd spin, for instance. You are telling us that the jitter in a cd player is not due to digital stuff, and then you tell us why by saying it's due to the rotation of the cd. Analog stuff. Mechanical stuff. Not digital. Normally jitter occurs due to clocks not being synced, this is also an analog phenomenon, not a digital one. The digital systems usually (always) do what they should do, what they are told to do. The analog stuff might tell them to do the wrong stuff though.

It's you who are ignorant like those people, who took it for granted that the the bit identical pressing should sound identical THROUGH the SAME DAC. It has nothing to do with analogue domain. Jitter has nothing to do with analogue, you ignorant mathematical zealot. You don't have a clue what you're talking about. It's you who said that mixown, and summing up are not the same thing. Now go and laugh at your hearing disability. The fact that something is inaudible to you doesn't mean that its inaudible to everyone. Just mediocre wannabes and geeks like you.

Jitter is all about analog domain. The digital stuff does not cause jitter, it's faulty analog stuff that does. Unprecise clocks usually.

Btw, is stuff at -150dB (snr) audible to you? (not a difference between playback and mixdown, it's the différence between different hosts mixdowns)

[stefancrs]

FWIW, the problem the thread starter had has already been solved

[ericj23]

what was wrong ?

incorrect bit depth was my guess

[diverdee]

I'm glad the dude got his problem solved, i'm kinda sorry I joined in & posted some silly stuff, but this davor guys attitude really got my hackles up - so I took the piss, it's exactly what i'd do with this kinda prig in real life when i'm in this kinda mood, though really they should just be ignored I guess.

[stefancrs]

what was wrong ?

incorrect bit depth was my guess

Incorrect samplerate actually. He exported at 48KHz and played back at 44.1KHz as far as I remember it.

[ericj23]

that would do it - instant dub

gotta go and do some work - just wish it wasn't so dull !