Dynamic Range (DR) for Hires Releases?

[HomerJAU]

Would there be any interest in me adding DR to the hires poll information, probably just in the PDF report that gets created when a new Poll Summary gets created. This would be just the album average DR, not individual tracks, and only for current and future hires releases.

I already have DR for quite a few of my albums in the hires list but I’d need DR from other members here for titles I don’t have to eventually get a DR measurement for all the hires releases.

So two questions:

1. Who is interested in seeing DR for the hires releases listed in the Poll Summary report?
2. Who measures DR regularly, like me, and would be willing to provide some album DRs so I can add to the report?

Based on feedback here I may or may not go ahead with this.

 

[J. PUPSTER]

Would there be any interest in me adding DR to the hires poll information, probably just in the PDF report that gets created when a new Poll Summary gets created. This would be just the album average DR, not individual tracks, and only for current and future hires releases.

I already have DR for quite a few of my albums in the hires list but I’d need DR from other members here for titles I don’t have to eventually get a DR measurement for all the hires releases.

So two questions:

1. Who is interested in seeing DR for the hires releases listed in the Poll Summary report?
2. Who measures DR regularly, like me, and would be willing to provide some album DRs so I can add to the report?

Based on feedback here I may or may not go ahead with this.

I would be happy to contribute, if you needed help with the DRs. I believe it would be an interesting resource. Obviously some are more telling than others

 

[HomerJAU]

I’ve used the online Loudess War database when buying stereo but it doesn’t have many surround releases at all.

 

[humprof]

I don't measure DR, but like you I think it would be an interesting piece of data to include on the poll pages.

 

[mattB2]

It would be a useful tool. You would need to be careful with some of the older DR results for surround media as I believe there was a problem with the averaging formula which meant that "empty" channels were reducing the result.

 

[Ninecats]

It would be a useful tool. You would need to be careful with some of the older DR results for surround media as I believe there was a problem with the averaging formula which meant that "empty" channels were reducing the result.

Correct. Quads on SACD are usually 5.1 with two silent channels and the dynamic range software reduce the overall result because of these. I suppose you need to remove the silent channels prior to measuring.
As for having it on here, ok for me, I do some measurement every now and then but by doing this I have also realized that higher numbers are not generally better in all cases.

 

[Albert Dagger]

Would there be any interest in me adding DR to the hires poll information, probably just in the PDF report that gets created when a new Poll Summary gets created. This would be just the album average DR, not individual tracks, and only for current and future hires releases.

I already have DR for quite a few of my albums in the hires list but I’d need DR from other members here for titles I don’t have to eventually get a DR measurement for all the hires releases.

So two questions:

1. Who is interested in seeing DR for the hires releases listed in the Poll Summary report?
2. Who measures DR regularly, like me, and would be willing to provide some album DRs so I can add to the report?

Based on feedback here I may or may not go ahead with this.

Id' be interested in seeing the DR values, and I measure the DR of every single DVD/SACD/BR I rip.

 

[ssully]

You can't just run a >2channel mix through a Dr meter. Not only because if silent channels but because different mixes treat C and LFE and surround content differently. You're probably better off downmixing to 2 ch and measuring that.

 

[J. PUPSTER]

You can't just run a >2channel mix through a Dr meter. Not only because if silent channels but because different mixes treat C and LFE and surround content differently. You're probably better off downmixing to 2 ch and measuring that.

Good to point that out; here’s an interesting thread about such difficulties also
https://www.quadraphonicquad.com/fo...nge-readings-and-how-to-interpret-them.23281/

 

[J. PUPSTER]

Different styles of music will have a great deal of variance in bass, as an example, between classical and folk to hip hop or heavy metal. One title I ripped recently was “Dangerously in Love” by Beyoncé (SACD- not released in the USA and has gotten pricey.) But with its consistent heavy bass presence, is it driving the weight of the DR to a lower number? But then that would be appropriate for that style of music (and overall, I thought the sound quality was very good.) I’m all for more discussions on this topic, in order to get a better overall understanding of dynamic range and how it might be, or should not be utilized.

 

[marpow]

I would be very interested and in fact a very cool offering Garry. I use JRiver software for all my listening which analyzes all my individual tracks, DR, bit rate, frequency rates, volume peak levels, wave lengths, etc, I don't hang my hat on all the numbers but as a person who is interested in good quality sound it is a useful tool. Unfortunately can be misleading some times but again a tool as in the end we are all just sitting by ourselves enjoying our hobby.

 

[Beefalo]

I would love to see DR results for our beloved multichannels. They are often ignored on the usual database.

 

[windhoek]

Oh, yes, please and thank you

 

[HomerJAU]

Looks like there’s been enough interest shown so I’ll go ahead with adding DR. Thanks to all who’ve responded. I’m counting ‘Likes’ as a yes too. I’ll do some work on this next week.

I was thinking last night that maybe I can add DR for the non-hires digital releases poll: Audio DVDs & DTS-CDs. But it’s the same deal as hires, I‘ll need help from others here to provide DR for releases I don’t have. Eventually over time we should be able to add DR for just about everything in those two polls!

From memory the silent channel issue with measuring DR is only on the AF SACDs. I’m sure I’ve only seen crazy DR numbers for those releases.

 

[J. PUPSTER]

Looks like there’s been enough interest shown so I’ll go ahead with adding DR. Thanks to all who’ve responded. I’m counting ‘Likes’ as a yes too. I’ll do some work on this next week.

I was thinking last night that maybe I can add DR for the non-hires digital releases poll: Audio DVDs & DTS-CDs. But it’s the same deal as hires, I‘ll need help from others here to provide DR for releases I don’t have. Eventually over time we should be able to add DR for just about everything in those two polls!

From memory the silent channel issue with measuring DR is only on the AF SACDs. I’m sure I’ve only seen crazy DR numbers for those releases.

I don't know about that Garry, here's an excerpt from the @steelydave post?

Things get even more skewed on the D-V discs because of the empty LFE track. Here's a DR rating for 'Caravan' from the Hugo Montenegro 'Others By Brothers' SACD from a couple of years ago:

FL: 12.48 dB
FR: 12.93 dB
C: 0.00 dB
LFE: 0.00 dB
SL: 14.88 dB
SR: 11.71 dB

Official DR Value: DR9

Samplerate: 2822400 Hz / PCM Samplerate: 88200 Hz
Channels: 6
Bits per sample: 1
Bitrate: 16934 kbps
Codec: DST64
Click to expand...

Again, you can see that the individual channel values are really high - one nearly as high as DR15 - but it clocks in overall at a measly DR9.

 

[HomerJAU]

For those of you with Foobar I discovered it can do a DR analysis for multiple album folders in a single batch, creating a DR file in each album folder.

In Foobar2000 after you install the DR component:
Add a Folder and select a root folder
Let Foobar load all the album music folders
Select all files (CTRL-A in Windows)
Right-click: Select the run DR command

Foobar will now process every file by album folder, saving a new DR report file in each folder.

Edit: It can take quite a while to process... Something you can run overnight maybe

 

[HomerJAU]

I don't know about that Garry, here's an excerpt from the @steelydave post?

Thanks. I’ll look into it some more but it’s definitely only SACD rips with silent centre. It looks like it’s the ripper that causes the issue. It’s probably not a true silent (empty) channel.

When I add a silent channel to my Penteo Quad files (FLAC) measuring DR on the 4 or 5 (with silent) has exactly same DR.

 

[steelydave]

I don't know about that Garry, here's an excerpt from the @steelydave post?

Things get even more skewed on the D-V discs because of the empty LFE track. Here's a DR rating for 'Caravan' from the Hugo Montenegro 'Others By Brothers' SACD from a couple of years ago:


Again, you can see that the individual channel values are really high - one nearly as high as DR15 - but it clocks in overall at a measly DR9.

Yeah, the two empty channels expose the major flaw with the DR meter - because it takes the values of all the channels, and then adds them up and divides by the number of channels, any 'empty' channels incorrectly skew the final reading. What it should do is if it sees a channel level of 0dB (or thereabouts) it should just discount the channel entirely in both the addition and division. So for that 4.0 disc it should add the 4 active channels together and then divide by 4.

The "rough" way to get the correct DR is to take the '9', divide by 4 (number of actual channels of content) multiply by 6 (number of authored channels on the disc), which gets you DR 13.5, which is pretty close to the actual DR (12.48 + 12.93 + 14.88 + 11.71) divided by 4 = DR 13.

ETA: Maybe it has to do with the fact that the empty center and LFE channels have ultrasonic DSD noise in them.

 

[HomerJAU]

ETA: Maybe it has to do with the fact that the empty center and LFE channels have ultrasonic DSD noise in them.

That’s what I’m thinking

 

[HomerJAU]

I’ll add a new Tool to my Music Media Helper app to remove the silent C or C + LFE fro selected files, then re-add new silent channels (based on original layout). That should make it easier to actually remeasure DR on those ‘offending’ releases.