ultra_prescriptivist t1_isvhvfn wrote on October 19, 2022 at 12:18 AM

Reply to comment by RB181 in I'm thinking of buying a Sennheiser HD650, but I had a few questions regarding music soruce material. If anyone could help, it would be much appreciated! by madmidget

Unreliable how?

I've never had any issues with it.

RB181 t1_iswsn2c wrote on October 19, 2022 at 7:39 AM

I don't know the technical details behind it, but DR values for the same master can vary when measured with different tools or versions of the same tool.

For example, Epica - Design Your Universe (2009) is one of my favourite albums, and it was re-released with a remaster in 2019. According to the DR Database, the remaster is worse than the original, yet I have the exact same CDs and to my ears the remaster sounds better (which is what one would expect of a remaster). I'm also pretty sure that the last time I ran a DR measurement tool on those two CDs, the results I got made more sense than what the database says.

ultra_prescriptivist t1_iswyk7i wrote on October 19, 2022 at 9:08 AM

Well for starters, both those masters look pretty similar. I wouldn't expect there to be much audible difference when it comes to DR, at least. There might be other factors that make you enjoy the remaster over the original.

>to my ears the remaster sounds better (which is what one would expect of a remaster)

Not really - the vast majority of remasters, for pop, rock,and electronia albums anyway, sound worse than the originals, since they are usually louder and more dynamically compressed to meet modern industry standards.

RB181 t1_iswzbto wrote on October 19, 2022 at 9:20 AM

I'm pretty sure it's the database's fault because what I am actually hearing is more in accordance with my own measurements than the database (here are the original album and the remastered album if you want to listen for yourself - I haven't noticed any difference between the CDs and streaming releases apart from compression).

And this is just one of the many cases where I've found what the database says to be inaccurate - I can't remember anymore right now but I can run that measurement tool on my albums again if you want.

ultra_prescriptivist t1_isx2s4v wrote on October 19, 2022 at 10:10 AM

For science, I just downloaded mp3 versions of the Ltd. Edition Original Master and the 2019 Remaster and ran them through Foobar with the DR analyzer plugin.

Here are the results, which are almost perfectly identical (only 1 track has a slightly different DR score when compared to the database). So the readings in the database do seem to be accurate.

-/+2DR isn't going to make a huge audible difference. Ultimately, whether or not you hear a difference and prefer one master over the other in this case presumably has little to do with dynamic range compression but rather some variance in the mixing/mastering process that was applied to the remaster.

Where the loudness database does come in handy is in situations where one master has signifcantly better DR than the other, which most of the time is a strong indication of which will sound better.

RB181 t1_isx8ag4 wrote on October 19, 2022 at 11:17 AM

I downloaded the latest version of TT DR Offline Meter (which the database entries for this album claim to be measured with, or compatible), and here are the results for my personal lossless rips of the CDs. The results for the remastered album (NB 5062-0-1 and NB 5062-0-2 acoustic bonus CD) match the database, but not the results for the original album (NB 2345-2 standard edition, not the limited edition). I double-checked the discs to make sure that the catalog numbers match the database. I don't have the old measurement tool or the results I got originally, so I'm not sure if the results were the same (I don't think they were the same though).

Most people I know who have heard both versions of the album agree that the remaster sounds better than the original (if you're curious, you can listen to those MP3s you've got or the YouTube playlists above), while the DR Database would suggest it sounds the same or worse. This is not the only case where I found DR Database entries to be misleading in the past, which is why I stopped caring about DR measurements when purchasing music, but I don't have the time to analyse my whole album collection right now.