New Vinyl LP's

[Radio Wrangler]

There was a horrible period when al those returned discs and the unsold ones went back for recycling. It was said at the time that they were ground up and added to the vinyl supply for pressing new records. It was also said that it would have been too expensive to have taken the paper labels off first.

I looked at a number of records with prominent swish....swish....swish noise floors with a microscope at work and I'm certain what I saw were embedded fibres.

Shure "An audio obstacle course" later some people used the Telarc recording of the 1812 overture.

David

[Gulliver]

I don't buy that many records, perhaps 10-12 a year, but the last time I had one off-centre was back in the late 90s when I picked up Bell & Sebastian's "If You're Feeling Sinister"

I've found that in the last 10 years or so the quality of vinyl has generally gone up. gone are the days when the CD master was used without any special attention to the vinyl. Perhaps it's the kind of music I listen to but today's vinyl seems pretty good to me.

I've been collecting LPs since 1978 but many of mine are considerably older.

[barretter]

Originally Posted by Nuvistor

Re post 5 and 18.
Is that.
If recovering audio from a master tape to CD do not use RIAA.
If recovering from LP to CD use RIAA to boost bass and cut treble when using magnetic but not if ceramic cartridge.?

Do you mean recording when you write recovering? I thought my previous post made it clear that RIAA pre-emphasis is only used when making the stampers for producing LPs (or EPs or 12" singles) not when making a CD from a master-tape.
If you wish to make a CD from an LP you will have to use a phono-stage/amplifier which will have amplification (as the signal from an LP is very small) and RIAA de-emphasis (to correct the distortion introduced by RIAA pre-emphasis).

[soundhog]

I probably buy around 100 new albums per year (and countless old ones), so you've done well dodging the problems. The only pressing plant who seem able to centre stampers correctly are GZ Media, with the only badly off centre record I have from that plant being a 10 year old Stereolab album. Other plants like MPO in France (who messed up two runs of the last Half Man Half Biscuit LP - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kgy5lWII5Q8) and Optimal in Germany are pot luck, while plants like Rainbo in the USA (who did this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xe8OZg4pJkM) are notorious for not caring. However, this one from last month takes the cake and all the biscuits... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4js8kUBW5DE

Funnily enough, I recently found an original pressing of Lou Reed's Transformer album, produced at the old Orlake plant in Dagenham in 1972, and side two is massively off. I'm also fairly sure that every single copy of the 'Say When' 7" by Lene Lovich was wonky. I remember taking back four copies of a Charlatans album in the mid 1990s because every one was off centre, before it dawned on me that they'd *all* be like that, so I gave up.

I'm probably going on a bit here, so I'll apologise for it now, but it is one of my main bugbears in life! One 45 of my work that was put out a couple of years ago was a very bad pressing indeed, so that cut particularly deep, but I was powerless to do anything about it.

[Nuvistor]

Hi Barretter,
yes recording and you did make it clear about the master tape, just trying to get the difference between any emphasis applied clear in my mind.
Frank

[joebog1]

Vinyl pressings are still commonly available! I don't buy that many any more, as the wife will kick me out because of " that junk"!!!
I already have thousands of LP's anyway. I also have hundreds of CD's!!
I have every release of Linux from at least 3 different English magazines since about 1990.
I have ZERO Compressed Distortion!! Isnt that what CD stands for ? It started with floppy disks, Shugart 8 inch diameter 180 kilobyte were the first I used.
I couldn't afford them of course, they cost over $1000 just for the Shugart drive
and I earned the princely sum of about $300 a week, had a wife and the first kidlet

For those people complaining of surface noise I have a record washer. Its basically a 16RPM record player connected to a 2000 watt wet n dry vacuum cleaner.
BUT very good results can be obtained by using a cleaning agent called " Liquinox", which was invented for cleaning hard drive components before assembly, and cleaning medical operating theatre tools, the knives and forks and such. It cost 15 yankee dollars for a yankee quart, and is diluted at a rate of 100:1 with distilled/deionised water.
I rest the LP on a clean towel and spray the LP surface ( label and all) with a hand spray pump, until its very damp NOT soaking.
Its then scrubbed into the LP following the grooves of course, using a STIFF natural fibre nail brush. ( that's what I got with my diskwasher, but a nail brush doesnt cost $1300)
Rinse the LP under running water and dry with a CLEAN linen tea towel
following the grooves of course .
It will remove 95% of the static electricity ( which causes MOST of the snaps and crackles) and almost ALL the dirt and ground in dust.
If you don't believe me, try it on an old LP that you consider " unplayable".
The solution is also superb for cleaning camera optics, glasses, binoculars etc,
so even if you don't like the results on LP,s you will have 101 quarts of glasses cleaning solution

Best regards to all
Joe

[paulsherwin]

Dirt on a record is a completely different issue from pressing noise. You can't wash pressing noise off.

One of the reasons that CDs were embraced as such a godsend in 1983 was the abysmal vinyl pressing quality which became standard after 1972. Off centre stampings were very, very common and it was sometimes effectively impossible to buy a noise free pressing. I remember trying to buy a clean copy of Gryphon's 'Midnight Mushrumps' album in 1974. This has an unusually wide dynamic range for a rock album (it's prog rock) and the quiet passages were completely unlistenable. I changed it umpteen times and all copies were the same. Eventually I just gave up and took a refund.

People who bang on about how wonderful vinyl records sound tend to conveniently forget about this stuff.

[threeseven]

Post 26 reminds me of the Keith Monks record cleaning machine, anyone remember that?
One the record shops I used in the 70's had one and offered a cleaning service at £0.75 per record. I had a number of albums treated very successfully.
Post 27 is correct, pressing surface noise was a scourge, it was the reason for me returning umpteen defective albums.
Ironically, surface noise is now intentionally introduced on some CD's as a sound effect!!

[russell_w_b]

Has anyone on here ever tried cleaning an LP by coating it in PVA glue then peeling it off?

[Nuvistor]

I asked the question due to my lack of any knowledge on new LP's because of their resurgence, I don't think I will be buying LP's and record playing equipment there appears to be a few pitfalls, my CD's and AAC downloads quite satisfy me.
I do remember the poor LP's in the 70's, the reason for them being poor I presume that as cost cutting due to trying to sell in a poor economy.
Thanks for all the input.

[unitaudio]

I tried cleaning a 7" single with PVA. It was a disaster. I left it for 3 days to dry but PVA was still left in the grooves instead of peeling out. Good job it wasn't an important record!

Regards,
Paul

[threeseven]

I wonder if a model making product called Maskol would work? It's used to mask off area's when painting plastic kits. It dries to a skin like film and just peels off after painting is completed.

[mole42uk]

Originally Posted by paulsherwin

<snip> a clean copy of Gryphon's 'Midnight Mushrumps' album in 1974.<snip>

I got a clean one - I think I've still got it. I think I obtained it directly from the band while they were in Regents Park on a photo shoot.....didn't get it autographed, though.

[mickyfinn]

When I was a hifi nut back in the day(1980)I bought "Solo In Soho" which was Phil Lynotts solo album.The rumour was that because he had a lot to do with its production and he played bass there was a lot of emphasis on the bass track.I remember reading(rightly or wrongly)that cheap stereos couldn't follow the groove and the needle kept jumping out so they had to release another version to compensate.I could feel the bass in my stomach from my Hi-Fi answers " compact"(around 3ft tall)monitors.I still have the original record.
Mick

[ColinTheAmpMan1]

Originally Posted by paulsherwin

I remember trying to buy a clean copy of Gryphon's 'Midnight Mushrumps' album in 1974. This has an unusually wide dynamic range for a rock album (it's prog rock) and the quiet passages were completely unlistenable.

Good Lord! I didn't think anyone would remember this album. I never owned one, but I do have an unused sticker advertising it. I think it may even still be sticky. I must have picked it up while at University.
If anyone would find it useful, they are welcome to it.
Colin.

[Nickthedentist]

I'd say "variable" sums it up. Some are superb, others utter rubbish.

[turretslug]

Originally Posted by unitaudio

I tried cleaning a 7" single with PVA. It was a disaster. I left it for 3 days to dry but PVA was still left in the grooves instead of peeling out. Good job it wasn't an important record!

Thanks for that! I often used to hear it suggested, but never came across anyone who would back it up with first-hand testimony
One of those things that might seem possible in principle, but good to know that it actually isn't in practice.

[TonyDuell]

I remember my father, who was a serious record fanatic (and who didn't fall for audiophool nonsense) getting some stuff which you coated onto a record, let dry, and then peeled off, taking all the dirt with it. Not simple PVA glue, but a specific stuff sold for the purpose.

It worked. It worked well. It worked too well. Not only did it remove all the dirt, but also any loose fibres, bits of gunk, that were moulded into the record in manufacture. The result was an increase in surface noise.

[paulsherwin]

Originally Posted by ColinTheAmpMan1

Good Lord! I didn't think anyone would remember this album. I never owned one, but I do have an unused sticker advertising it. I think it may even still be sticky. I must have picked it up while at University.
If anyone would find it useful, they are welcome to it.
Colin.

I finally bought the CD reissue 20 years ago. Very nice sound - if you wind a pair of headphones up high you can hear the Chipping Norton Studios 24 track hiss despite the Dolby A. If you tried that with one of my vinyl copies you'd deafen yourself. I still play it now and then.

I won't be troubling you for the promotional sticker Colin

[joebog1]

Agreed Paul,
I have some atrocious LP,s as well. Although I don't think Australia had as many as I seem to read into the English experience in this thread. I am an audiophool as you probably noticed in the photographs of my 807 amp. All said the cleaning solution does work very well. It doesn't of course recentre the hole, or cure crappy vinyl.
The few new LP,s I have purchased (all from USA) have all been 180 or 200 gram pressings and have been very well made.
I watched each of my kids replace their CD player at least three times each, and was forced to listen to overblown bass, and screeching trebles, along with the crumpling cellophane paper, that I "think" was supposed to be cymbals,- that periodic white noise ( with apologies to Delia Derbyshire) that is mixed into the track.
Each time their CD players died I ventured inside to have a look and gave up. I did have a business that repaired SOME CD players, and I had the necessary tools required.

To repair my player now I just need a new idler wheel for my 401, I can still buy stylii, albeit not Shure originals, and to repair my amp a couple of 12AX7s a couple of 12AU7s and some 6BM8s. There's no "eye" to adjust, there's no "test CD" required. PLUS my Tannoys seem to love valves and hate digital. It could of course, just be me
I do like the way the Sony set of seedie chips process the bass 50 milliseconds AFTER it processes the treble. The Philips system does both together.

Yep !!! I'm stuck in the past, and will still argue a really good LP will blow ANY CD into the weeds !!

best wishes to all, and a refreshing discussion this is.

Joe