Another example for you guys to try is Tasmin Archer - Great Expectations. This album is chock full of great songs, but there is a defect in the (presumably) digital recording. There is a wispy sting in the treble affecting her voice in particular. I don't know whether the ADC conversion sucked, the wrong anti-aliasing filters were selected or what, but it's noticeable and spoils an otherwise dynamic, spacious recording. It doesn't appear in the follow-up Bloom. There hasn't been a remaster since the 1994 release as I guess it would be hard to rescue.

Remixes only work if the original multi-tracks are not spoiled by poor recording.

Coldplay's X&Y is regularly cited by me as the worst recording I know, created for the earbud generation. It sucks in so many ways I wouldn't know where to begin. I doubt any remaster could possibly rescue it. It sounds full of digital artifacts, just horrible.

Damien, as you've been there, I'd like your opinion on something an old hi-fi friend used to repeat. He would always say that microphone selection and placement was far more important than digital format.

How do you feel about that?

The biggest issue is preserving the integrity of the recordings and the transfer quality the rest is just BS and faff.

Most of the tracks I play are red book, they far exceed 90% of of the so called high resolution stuff.

Juts this last week, I lent a streamer to a gent while I fixed his more expensive (signifcantly) unit, he uses roon (poor sod) but he had never listned to local on board files.

lets just say he has recalibrated his listening SQ and he has a big inforstructure before the streaming head unit as well.

Thats a lot of truth Tony, l guess Audiophiles are the perfect target for Hi Res, as from Marketing point of view,we generally want the best sound quality, it's such a smoke and mirrors thing, you hear stories of lost masters,wrong tape used etc, let alone the recording itself and production.

A generally good article IMHO and one I would agree with. It basically comes to this if the original recording is not very good in the first place, whether it is analog or digital then there is not a lot that can be done to improve it, well maybe not, with modern digital mixing technology it is possible to shape envelopes and add to aspects of the mix and enhance what is already there. Will it be true to the original recording, not really just a different mix of it with a different feel, will the listener enjoy it more, possibly possibly not, it it has been massaged for radio or MP3 consumption then it will likely sound OK, but if the same is put onto vinyl it will sound pretty flat, as the article describes.

In my opinion if the recording was good in its day and mixed well, say an analog one for vinyl, then it is likely that the vinyl version and its rendition will sound the best (possibly), although if it is transfer to digital properly it should sound pretty good from CD or if streamed at an good resolution, even high level MP£ can sound OK. Similarly a recording done purely  in the digital medium and mixed well will sound good, and should also be good on vinyl if transferred correctly. As I understand it the issue really if where re-mixing and playing around with the original comes into play, it may sound better, but as often many experience it can sound not so good when compared to the original as it was intended. 

Rightly or wrongly this is what in essence has put me off of going to pure digital, streaming, files of in some case CD for that matter. Back in the late 80's and 90's I went purely digital, CD initially and then early digital files. Back then it became a somewhat disappointing experience from a SQ point of view, and it left me feeling rather disillusioned with the music industry as a whole, recording companies that is. I was confused by it all and started to look at individual favourite albums that I new well to establish which sounded the best, Led Zeppelin I was a case in point, I had the 'original release' on CD , a 320KBPS MP3 version and I sourced a Flac version, and I purchased a re-mixed CD version to compare. What was very apparent to me was that both the CD sounded a bit bright(top endy) and MP3 version sounded slightly dull to how I remembered the sound of the LP record, supposedly from the original masters. The FLAC version sounded OK but I was not sure about it, after investigation I determined it was from the original master but re-mixed, so different. To satisfy my curiosity I borrowed a not very expensive TT and borrowed a copy of the record(2nd pressing run), and listened, and presto the album sounded as I remembered it and how I liked it. I did the same with another favourite of mine, Supertramp - Crime of the Century, and found that the differences were much less, in fact it was very difficult to detect a difference an say which one I preferred, and even now I am just as happy listening to the original vinyl version or SACD or streamed hi-res, this leads me to believe in this instance the original master has not been played around with very much when transfered from one medium to another. 

So I think the quandary we all face is how we find out or know what is the best version released to listen that accurately reflects the original master recording, it may be relevant to some of us and not others, but the problem is when you listen to a recording in any particular media and it sounds odd, is it because it is just bad in the first place or is it because it has been tampered with, a very difficult question to answer in many cases? Perhaps this has always been and issue, I recall and know that vinyl pressing runs of the same album can vary in SQ.

Then, respectfully, the equipment or setup you were listening to was shit.

Mike and I were just listening to Qobuz streams on his system earlier today and I had another session later this afternoon on mine.  If the Qobuz streams you heard were 'nothing natural' then I stand by my first statement.

Your Welcome Martin, lt makes some valid points, with the harsh reality how easy it is to get things wrong from the beginning.

And yet, this 'top notch' equipment is not capable of playing back Qobuz very well?  Not really top notch then, is it?

You made a statement "there is nothing natural about either of these two services at all" and I am calling you out on it.  I'm not going to argue for Tidal because it's not the best.  However, Qobuz is the closest we're ever going to get to master tape in the home.  Untouched studio encoding, as admitted by Qobuz themselves.  No difference between the streams and the files.

My system sounds entirely natural, musical, exciting, dynamic and realistic from Qobuz streams.

Be careful when making sweeping statements.