My guess why many remasterings fail to please us is in part that they simply aren’t what we’re used to…things have been altered in some way or another that doesn’t sit right after X years or decades of listening to that music. If you sat there and heard them together and A/B’d with the source used for the remaster, you would likely say, “Yup, sounds better, I can hear more of it, the vocal is clearer, etc,”. But that’s not the same as it sounding like what you’ve heard all your life.
Another aspect, particularly with remastering older material, is either the Original Master is not available (it has to be done from whatever sub-master is extant) and/or the Original ain’t what it once was in terms of condition. And often the hardware it was originally mastered on is no longer available, or it is being digitized, etc. Lotta factors.
Just upgraded to snowmass a few days ago, and I hear micro cuts every 10mn or so, soft, they sound like mute-in mute-out, did anyone experience it? They seem linked to electric activity in the house like turning on and off lights.
Never happened before, and I didn’t change anything at all on my grid or equipement!
Nothing a power regenerator can’t solve I suppose but hey I didn’t need one that badly so far!
In addition to Bad’s salient point when comparing the original master with a remaster, improving upon a competent original master is difficult; the first mastering engineer typically already did at least a decent job.
Remasters can be better or simply different. Better because improvements in technology, techniques, etc. Different in choices made and reflecting current taste in sound reproduction.
Keep in mind essentially every mix of a recording goes to a mastering engineer for final polishing.
Thank you for the information on mastering. I found the reading informative and enjoyed it. Specific to Beggars Banquet, I guess it is up to me to buy a copy to determine if Bill Wyman’s bass sounds “better”.
I have the 2002 Abkco Remastered SACD (I think possibly the best so far) and the 50th Anniversary now. The latter sounds better with clearly more pronounced, thereby well shaped and little louder deeper bass.
If the ramp up on the mute takes about a second or two it’s a new “feature” of Snowmass. It mutes at any transition of sample rates, DSD/PCM changes and changes in the preemphasis flag or clock stopping. When the clock starts again or the transition has passed it starts ramping up with the new material.
The net effect for some is that a previously unnoticed connection problem or a problem with the player not quite getting the bits there in time might be exposed. For some it’s a loose connection, for some a bad cable, for some a buffer not big enough in their player. A few people have reported it when a dimmer isn’t off or at full, or a particular lamp is on. Tho a power conditioner would probably solve such problems, something less radical might work well too. Perhaps checking your connections, grounds or changing which outlet some part of your system is plugged into.
Thanks Ted, nice to find an explanation to this. My streamer is probably at fault since it’s a raspberry pi with linear power supply but a bit cheap. I have a dedicated line for the audio equipment with nothing else in the house using that power phase, but of course the ground is another matter. I’ve already ordered a P10 a few days ago, can’t wait to take delivery of it!
Apart from that sensitivity, I’m very happy with snowmass!
Elk, what I wonder is how jitter free the original transfers into digital were, versus how much better they are on remasters, assuming original analog tapes? (Uninterested in MQA.)
I’ll throw in wrench in the thread and discuss the original topic for a bit.
I got my amp back, so I now have a system. I updated my DSD to Snowmass V2.
I created a partition on a 16 GB SD card smaller than 2056 kB, formatted it FAT16 (which actually requires a command line in Windows 10, apparently), and copied the update files over to the root of the SD card. I turned the DSD off, did a power drain, inserted the card, powered on the DSD, let it update, powered it off, removed the SD card, performed another power drain, powered up the DSD again. Everything seems just fine, as the update took and it sounds great.
This is my ritual now, and I’m sticking to it. Well, except for all the partitioning and formatting, since that’s done now.
If you ever take the SD card out of the computer without using the OS’s eject function you may well need to do another format (or at least a filesystem repair.)
Public Service Announcement (repeating myself here):
If you are less then impressed with Snowmass (MK I or MK II), meaning you really liked your previous installed firmware and you really don’t hear what all the Snowmass fuss is about, it is possible that Snowmass has not properly loaded onto/into your DirectStream Sr. I cannot explain the issue but, in my case, I had to upload Snowmass and reload Red Cloud twice, before Snowmass made its presence known. IOW, the third loading of the new firmware did the trick. For most people Snowmass is obviously different (most say really better) than any of the firmware that came before it. So, if you don’t really hear a major difference/improvement, try the retrograde/upgrade cycle at least three times before throwing in the towel. FWIW.
