Skip to main content

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Getting the best vinyl transfer using different copies (Read 22835 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Getting the best vinyl transfer using different copies

Reply #25
I was wondering how the best approach is to get the absolute best Vinyl transfer. It come to my mind that while it's possible to subtract two different tracks from each other to get the difference, wouldn't it be possible to extract the similarities of two tracks?

I think there's a "Chaos Theory" factor going on, where the record will be more dirty, the AC power might vary imperceptibly, the turntable might not be precisely on-speed... all adding up to the two files not being 100% identical.

You'd be a lot better off worrying about which specific turntable/tonearm combination you're using, which stylus and cartridge you choose, what preamp you're using, how you're cleaning the record, and so on. To me, those factors determine how the vinyl transfer will sound.

Note there are some pro mastering engineers (like Steve Hoffman, over at stevehoffman.tv) who have resorted to playing records coated with a very light layer of linseed oil. They claim this reduces audible distortion with worn vinyl, though it creates quite a mess to clean up after the transfer. J. Gordon Holt in Stereophile magazine used to advise in the 1970s to play records wet, just with distilled water, but I haven't found this really helps much.

The best possible solution is just to get a better copy of the record, then manually redraw the waveforms to remove loud clicks and pops, then use a good processing program (like the tick & pop reduction algorithms from Sony Oxford, Waves, or Algorithmix) to clean up the minor groove noise that remains.

--Vidiot