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From: greg@olivej.UUCP (Greg Paley)
Newsgroups: net.audio
Subject: Why I'm so hard on CD's
Message-ID: <121@olivej.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 19-Jan-84 14:15:06 EST
Article-I.D.: olivej.121
Posted: Thu Jan 19 14:15:06 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Jan-84 02:46:26 EST
Organization: Olivetti ATC., Cupertino, Ca
Lines: 44


The article which posed the argument as to how the audiophile
community would react if CD's were the standard and LP's the 
new product was quite thought-provoking.  I find that I
tend to complain about the CD's so bitterly not because they
are really that godawful, but because of the way the general
audio press has proclaimed them as paragons of sound 
reproduction and labelled anyone who hears the faults as
"cranks".

I feel that digital recording and CD's as a sound-reproduction
medium have tremendous potential.  However there are problems
(which Denon, a manufacturer of CD players, admitted with 
remarkable frankness in a letter to Absolute Sound that came 
out in Spring of '83).

I also have, from my own experience, a good idea of how
real-life marketing and product planning work.  If the general
audio press proclaim the current product as perfect, and
if enough consumers swallow this rather than using their own
ears, there will be absolutely no incentive to spend the
money to do the necessary R&D to fix the problems.  This
is, in my view, reason enough to raise a stink about what
I and others have heard as serious deficiencies.

Flame me for saying this if you like, but I seriously believe
that the general public believes what it is told by the
media (particularly the printed page) even when what it is
told conflicts with its own perceptions.  I've seen this
over and over again in musical performance as well as 
sound reproduction.  If a tenor with a rasping voice and
strident, constricted high notes is publicized as being
the "Greatest in the World", the public will believe it
and find anything that deviates from this to be lacking.
Similarly, if Stereo Review judges sound reproduction in
terms of sizzling highs and thunderous lows with no
mention of such "details" as natural balance and perspective
and a realistic representation of hall ambience, then this
will set the industry standard.

				Greg Paley
				Olivetti ATC, Cupertino, Ca.