On Sat, 25 May 2024 06:46:29 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

> And those sharp needles wearing away a little bit more from the delicate
> grooves with every play. Not to mention embedding the dust ever deeper
> into the soft, yielding plastic, where you can never get it out.

That's why there were special cloths and dust covers.

> There’s a reason we normal people left that technology behind in the
> 1970s. That’s where it belongs.

There weren't many options in the '70s other than 8-tracks, Cassettes
eventually caught up, mostly for car players but really took off when the
Walkman came out in '79. CDs hit the market in '82, were very expensive,
and were usually weird classical stuff.

I will admit that a USB turntable seems like something caught in a time
warp. Maybe somebody will bring back wire recorders.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 07:46:56 -0400, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> A while back, a friend of mine's husband was trying to sell me on vinyl
> as I was buying some of his CDs. He was telling me how the sound is
> better, this and that. The entire time, I was reminding myself of the
> constant popping I would hear when listening to albums as a kid. The
> slightest thing would ruin the sound on that vinyls.

Well, yeah, a kid with grape jelly on his fingers did tend to degrade
vinyl records. I had fairly decent equipment and didn't get the frying
bacon effect once I got past the 78/45/33 1/3 rpm automatic changer stage.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 13:58:10 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:

> As for popping... that usually happened when records were mistreated...
> or warped.

I was on the Netflix DVD plan until they dropped it. I thought DVDs would
be a step up from VHS rentals but apparently the general public uses DVDs
for frisbees or drink coasters when they're not watching them. DVDs are a
lot sturdier than vinyl but humans haven't improved.

Speaking of mistreating -- I remember a Cub Scout project that consisted
of making candy dishes out of 78 rpm records. Heat them up in the over,
bend the edges into flutes, apply paint, and you were good. I wonder how
many classics were lost?

We worked up to etching aluminum trays in Boy Scouts. Must have run out of
78s. Somehow I doubt 12 year olds messing around with lye is an approved
activity these days.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 08:16:31 -0400, Joel wrote:

> Larry likes to pretend he knows about everything.

I wish he knew about NNTP clients that don't entirely fuck up the text.

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

>CDs hit the market in '82, were very expensive

For my 14th birthday, I got a CDDA player by Pioneer, fresh 1991 model
at the time, with a 20 bit DAC. I thought it was amazing - until I
replaced it with a DVD-Audio/SACD player in 2004. And before long, I
got a DVD-Audio grade sound card for my computer, too. Primitive DAC
chips were *trash*, and *that* is where the myth of vinyl sounding
better came from. An old CDDA disc, played on a modern device, will
sound far better than it would've when it was released, because the
equipment in the early days sucked.

--
Joel W. Crump

Amendment XIV
Section 1.

[...] No state shall make or enforce any law which shall
abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the
United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;
nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal
protection of the laws.

Dobbs rewrites this, it is invalid precedent. States are
liable for denying needed abortions, e.g. TX.

On 2024-05-25 9:54 a.m., RonB wrote:
> On 2024-05-25, Chris Ahlstrom <OFeem1987@teleworm.us> wrote:
>> Relf wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:
>>
>>> DistroMan, RonB, Uncle_Matuch, rBowman,
>>> Ahlstrom, DFS, ChrisV, Huntzinger & Crump,
>>>
>>> You guys should try (Up_Mixed) Stereo_To_Surround_Sound someday;
>>> until then, you won't know what you're missing.
>>
>> I don't care what I'm missing. Happy with what I have.
>
> I don't listen to music enough to be obsessive about it. The quality I'm
> getting now seems really good to me. I don't need any extra work to make it
> better (which would probably be lost with my ears anyhow).

We all started on Napster with 128kbps music files. That might be why
many of us don't care. 128kbps sounded damned good.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
TG: @AndrzejMatuch
Catholic, paleoconservative, Christ is king.

On 2024-05-25 9:58 a.m., RonB wrote:
> On 2024-05-25, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>> On 2024-05-25 3:08 a.m., RonB wrote:
>>> On 2024-05-25, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>>> On 25 May 2024 04:33:40 GMT, rbowman wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> CDs? Who said anything about that digital crap? I'm talking about an era
>>>>> with 20 lb turntables with built in strobe rings so you could get the
>>>>> speed exactly right. Styli cut from diamonds mined by virgins in South
>>>>> Africa. Tone arms with verniers on the counterweights so you could get
>>>>> the tracking force exactly right. Built in spirit levels in case the
>>>>> world was tilting. Pure analog, baby.
>>>>
>>>> And those sharp needles wearing away a little bit more from the delicate
>>>> grooves with every play. Not to mention embedding the dust ever deeper
>>>> into the soft, yielding plastic, where you can never get it out.
>>>>
>>>> There’s a reason we normal people left that technology behind in the
>>>> 1970s. That’s where it belongs.
>>>
>>> And yet it's making a comeback with some audiophiles. I bought a ton of
>>> records when CDs first came out. They were cheap.
>>
>> A while back, a friend of mine's husband was trying to sell me on vinyl
>> as I was buying some of his CDs. He was telling me how the sound is
>> better, this and that. The entire time, I was reminding myself of the
>> constant popping I would hear when listening to albums as a kid. The
>> slightest thing would ruin the sound on that vinyls.
>>
>> If the technology were so great, video vinyls wouldn't have bankrupted
>> RCA in the 1980s.
>
> That probably had more to do with poor management than the medium, as other
> record companies didn't go bankrupt.
>
> As for popping... that usually happened when records were mistreated... or
> warped.

Nah, vinyl pretty much killed RCA. You might want to read this:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitance_Electronic_Disc>

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
TG: @AndrzejMatuch
Catholic, paleoconservative, Christ is king.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 07:52:23 -0500, chrisv wrote:

> Heh. I personally battled that kind of ignorance, on many occasions.
> They would claims 0's and 1's "missed something" that analog did not,
> for example.

I'm not claiming I can hear any difference but ADC/DAC will have
quantization and other errors.

On 2024-05-25 10:13 a.m., RonB wrote:
> On 2024-05-25, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>> On 2024-05-24 7:46 p.m., RonB wrote:
>>> On 2024-05-24, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>>> <snips>
>>>>>
>>>>> You would have better ears than I have to tell the difference.
>>>>
>>>> The ears are one thing, but even if you only know about the
>>>> specifications, you would know that what Spotify offers can't compete.
>>>> Apple's lossy codec is the best there is, so a song encoded at 256kbps
>>>> using it will sound magnificent no matter what kind of speakers you use.
>>>> If that is not sufficient for you, it also offers lossless at no extra
>>>> charge. Meanwhile, the default for Spotify is AAC at 128kbps, using an
>>>> inferior codec that is probably the one offered by Nero. High quality
>>>> there is 256kbps, more or less on par with what Apple Music offers at
>>>> the low end but, again, with a worse encoder. There is no lossless option.
>>>
>>> I'm not an audiophile and I'm certainly not going to buy a $1,500 iPhone or
>>> $2,000 Mac simply to listen to music. What I've got sounds great to me.
>>
>> I think that most people are getting their phones the way that I got my
>> 13: through their service provider at a lower price than if they bought
>> it outright for two years worth of monthly payments. I recall that if I
>> had decided to buy the iPhone 13 directly, I would have paid around
>> $1,300. Through monthly payments for two years, the total price amount
>> to around $900. That was if I wanted to actually own the device too. If
>> I had opted to lease it, I would have paid considerably less.
>>
>> As for the Mac, you're buying one because you plan on editing videos or
>> making music. If that's not what you're doing, you want the Mac because
>> it has better battery life, better updates and a more comprehensible
>> operating system than Windows. Otherwise, Windows is fine.
>
> As I've mentioned before, Mac OS seems "clumsy" to me. Seems like you have
> to take more steps to do the same thing you can do more directly in Linux.
> But, I'm guessing, if I used it more I would get used to it. No real reason
> to get used to it though (for me anyhow).

The terminal is definitely a lot more satisfying in both Windows and
Linux than it is in MacOS. Things such as snapping windows to one side
or a corner also doesn't work, so you have to play around with them for
longer. However, the bundled technology like wireless and Bluetooth
works a lot better than it just in Windows, and the operating system
itself is a lot more consistent in its design than either Windows or ay
GUI in Linux is. There is a lot to like about it. If anyone were to put
a gun to my head and force me to abandon Windows for the Mac, I wouldn't
mind.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
TG: @AndrzejMatuch
Catholic, paleoconservative, Christ is king.

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

>> Larry likes to pretend he knows about everything.
>
>I wish he knew about NNTP clients that don't entirely fuck up the text.

Isn't he using the same one as you?

--
Joel W. Crump

Amendment XIV
Section 1.

[...] No state shall make or enforce any law which shall
abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the
United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;
nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal
protection of the laws.

Dobbs rewrites this, it is invalid precedent. States are
liable for denying needed abortions, e.g. TX.

On 2024-05-25 10:18 a.m., RonB wrote:
> On 2024-05-25, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>> On 2024-05-24 7:51 p.m., RonB wrote:
>>> On 2024-05-24, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>>>> On 2024-05-24 11:32 a.m., Chris Ahlstrom wrote:
>>>>> Andrzej Matuch wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:
>>>>>
>>>>>> On 2024-05-24 8:30 a.m., Chris Ahlstrom wrote:
>>>>>>> Andrzej Matuch wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On 2024-05-24 3:00 a.m., RonB wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On 2024-05-24, Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> <brevsnip>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> Probably because some people think that Apple Music also requires Apple
>>>>>>>>>> hardware. Even without Apple hardware, the sound quality is superior as
>>>>>>>>>> is the selection.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> You would have better ears than I have to tell the difference.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The ears are one thing, but even if you only know about the
>>>>>>>> specifications, you would know that what Spotify offers can't compete.
>>>>>>>> Apple's lossy codec is the best there is, so a song encoded at 256kbps
>>>>>>>> using it will sound magnificent no matter what kind of speakers you use.
>>>>>>>> If that is not sufficient for you, it also offers lossless at no extra
>>>>>>>> charge. Meanwhile, the default for Spotify is AAC at 128kbps, using an
>>>>>>>> inferior codec that is probably the one offered by Nero. High quality
>>>>>>>> there is 256kbps, more or less on par with what Apple Music offers at
>>>>>>>> the low end but, again, with a worse encoder. There is no lossless option.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> But is the "loss" noticeable to human ears?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It is. There is an additional punch to the Apple AAC encoder that is
>>>>>> lacking in Nero's. Nero's does a good job, but it isn't as good. It's
>>>>>> better than MP3 though.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> And if so, does it matter? I enjoy a tune the same whether I listen to it
>>>>>>> through earbuds, $15 logitech speakers, whether in quiet or a bit of
>>>>>>> background noise. Most of musical information is low frequency (under 5 kHz),
>>>>>>> though the harmonics increase that up to maybe 16 kHz.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For people who aren't audiophiles, there isn't a difference in audio
>>>>>> quality, but they will likely notice the greater selection from Apple. I
>>>>>> also think that Apple has an excellent interface, with YouTube's being
>>>>>> the absolute worst.
>>>>>
>>>>> I stopped listening to YouTube while walking. Sick of commerials in the middle
>>>>> of a 10-minute tune. Also the slightest accidental touch of the phone screen
>>>>> can stop the playback.
>>>>>
>>>>> Switched to SomaFM... their Secret Agent channel has some good walkin' tunes.
>>>>
>>>> YouTube Music doesn't have commercials if you pay for it. It also
>>>> removes ads from YouTube itself, making for a much more pleasant viewing
>>>> experience there too.
>>>
>>> It doesn't have ads if you use uBlock Origin either.
>>
>> True, but my being a Catholic makes me reluctant to use services in a
>> way that doesn't benefit the provider. I stopped blocking ads a while
>> back and pay to support the sites I most often frequent. If I am not
>> interested in paying and a site becomes needlessly annoying to use, I
>> simply check out an alternative.
>
> I look at it differently. The site is available. uBlock Origin is available.
> I'm not shedding any tears for Google. If there is a small site I do unblock
> ads on it. If it's a huge corporate site, I don't care. I especially despise
> ads on a site where I buy something.

For me, the ads are only fair. I've used Brave for a while and blocked a
bunch of ads, but it eventually became clear that if the webmaster
didn't mind my not seeing the ads, they would have removed them
themselves. The fact that the site is often bombarded with that crap
means that they do rely on the income they receive from it, and I have
no right to use their content without their source of income without
their permission. I'm trying to be a better person with age.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
TG: @AndrzejMatuch
Catholic, paleoconservative, Christ is king.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 15:50:51 -0400, Joel wrote:

> The *ONLY* reason Vista "succeeded" was because of OEM installs, dude.
> No one "upgraded" from XP to Vista. People *downgraded* Vista *to* XP,
> in fact.

I recently put Lubuntu on an old XP laptop. Nothing remarkable there
except I'd never upgraded to Vista.

Even on my work machines the progression was XP -> 7 -> 10, skipping the
every other release disasters. MS did break the pattern with 11.

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

>> The *ONLY* reason Vista "succeeded" was because of OEM installs, dude.
>> No one "upgraded" from XP to Vista. People *downgraded* Vista *to* XP,
>> in fact.
>
>I recently put Lubuntu on an old XP laptop. Nothing remarkable there
>except I'd never upgraded to Vista.
>
>Even on my work machines the progression was XP -> 7 -> 10, skipping the
>every other release disasters. MS did break the pattern with 11.

8.x was better than 7, just put Classic Shell's start menu on and
boom. Vista was uniquely a beta version of the NT series.

--
Joel W. Crump

Amendment XIV
Section 1.

[...] No state shall make or enforce any law which shall
abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the
United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;
nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal
protection of the laws.

Dobbs rewrites this, it is invalid precedent. States are
liable for denying needed abortions, e.g. TX.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 18:09:11 -0400, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> The terminal is definitely a lot more satisfying in both Windows and
> Linux than it is in MacOS.

I've never worked on a Mac but Windows Terminal is something they should
have done years ago along with multiple desktops. The tabbed explorer is
good too.

I'm a minority opinion but MS seems to be more interested in bling that
real improvements. (looking at you Aero)

On 5/24/2024 7:49 AM, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> Considering what Microsoft is planning with the Recall feature, I don't
> feel comfortable sticking around. Even DFS is concerned.

Virtually zero concern. I was just playing with you, because you made
it sound like Recall is already part of Windows and is non-optional.

You'll first have to buy a new Copilot+ PC, then turn on the Recall
feature (assuming of course that MS would not be so arrogant as to force
such a risky thing on users) and let it capture everything you do.

I think it's a ridiculous, potentially privacy-invading app. I can't
think of who would benefit by having a screenshot every few seconds for
months.

For me, once or twice a week I'll search my browser history for a site I
want to revisit.

If desperate you can recover a lot of your activity with a NirSoft
utility called LastActivityView.

https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/computer_activity_view.html

Between that and your browser history, there's a solid trail of what
you've done on your computer.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 18:06:52 -0400, Joel wrote:

> rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
>
>>> Larry likes to pretend he knows about everything.
>>
>>I wish he knew about NNTP clients that don't entirely fuck up the text.
>
>
> Isn't he using the same one as you?

I don't know but the posts with all the rainbow crap come through with a
lot of UTF-8 encoding.

On May 25, 2024 at 3:44:51 PM EDT, "DFS" <nospam@dfs.com> wrote:

> On 5/25/2024 1:11 PM, Joel wrote:
>> shitv <chrisv@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> "So sorry, but Vista is a big sales and financial success for MS - and
>>> will shortly finish wiping the floor with Linux and it's 392 free
>>> distros." - some dumb fsck
>
>
> And it did wipe the floor with Linux - as EVERY desktop Windows version
> has - reaching 24% market share within a couple/few years, while Linux
> never even reached 2% within 20 years.
>
>
>
>> That really is funny,
>
>
> It WAS funny to see various drunk cola idiots declare Vista a "failure".
> I watched it in realtime, here on cola.

Vista WAS a failure, due to its absurd (at the time) hardware requirements.
I personally installed XP on a desktop tower that came with Vista. I later
wiped Vista and installed 7. That ran WAY better than Vista ever did.

Very few businesses used Vista either, for the same reason. When business
don't adopt a version of Windows, that makes it a failure. That list includes
ME, Vista and 8/8.1.

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

>>>I wish he knew about NNTP clients that don't entirely fuck up the text.
>>
>> Isn't he using the same one as you?
>
>I don't know but the posts with all the rainbow crap come through with a
>lot of UTF-8 encoding.

Isn't that Jen's posts?

--
Joel W. Crump

Amendment XIV
Section 1.

[...] No state shall make or enforce any law which shall
abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the
United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;
nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal
protection of the laws.

Dobbs rewrites this, it is invalid precedent. States are
liable for denying needed abortions, e.g. TX.

Relf wrote:

>You (ChrisV) replied ( to me ):
>> > You guys should try (Up_Mixed) Stereo_To_Surround_Sound someday;
>> > until then, you won't know what you're missing.
>>
>> Where do you find such recordings to try ?
>
>Any/Every song/movie can be Up_Mixed to 7.1 (8 Channel).

.... and sound "fake" and unnatural. Fine, if you like that...

>> [ Surround_Sound drivers ] simulate surround-sound from stereo,
>> but I've never really played with it...
>
>Sans Stereo_To_Surround_Sound Up_Mix, Movies & Songs sound like crap.

Not.

>I use surroundsound headphones ( the Logitech g635 USB HeadSet ).

I wonder how that works...

--
'[TomB] even at one point claimed that having a system act as a system
is "opposed to what GNU/Linux is all about".' - some thing, lying
shamelessy (but no one can quote it lying)

rbowman wrote:

> chrisv wrote:
>>
>> Heh. I personally battled that kind of ignorance, on many occasions.
>> They would claims 0's and 1's "missed something" that analog did not,
>> for example.
>
>I'm not claiming I can hear any difference but ADC/DAC will have
>quantization and other errors.

No it won't. Solved problem. Research "dither".

--
"Some Linux users were very much against the idea of choice if people
did not choose Linux." - some thing, lying shamelessly (but no one
can quote it lying)

Tyrone wrote:

>Vista WAS a failure, due to its absurd (at the time) hardware requirements.
>I personally installed XP on a desktop tower that came with Vista. I later
>wiped Vista and installed 7. That ran WAY better than Vista ever did.
>
>Very few businesses used Vista either, for the same reason. When business
>don't adopt a version of Windows, that makes it a failure. That list includes
>ME, Vista and 8/8.1.

"And yet it has 20x the amount on Linux users give or take. If that's
failure then ...." - "True Linux advocate" Hadron Quark, explaining
that if Vista is a failure, Linux is REALLY a failure.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 07:13:05 -0400, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> Considering this, third-parties should stop trying to
> develop for Windows and MacOS and try to make their offerings available
> to alternative systems like Linux instead.

That’s already been happening. Why do you think Microsoft had to bring out
WSL? It was to stem the tide of developers abandoning Windows.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 06:43:51 -0400, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> I just don't expect [Microsoft] to sacrifice complete control.

In the Open Source world, *nobody* has “complete control”. You just have
to deal with it.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 15:44:51 -0400, DFS wrote:

> On 5/25/2024 1:11 PM, Joel wrote:
>>
>> shitv <chrisv@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> "So sorry, but Vista is a big sales and financial success for MS - and
>>> will shortly finish wiping the floor with Linux and it's 392 free
>>> distros." - some dumb fsck
>
> And it did wipe the floor with Linux ...

Sure it did. So “Aero Glass” 3D effects worked really well, did it? To the
point where users were filing lawsuits over the confusion between “Vista-
capable” and “Vista-ready”.

Meanwhile, real-time Compiz effects were running quite comfortably under
Linux, on hardware as modest as this Asus Eee 701 with its 900-MHz single-
core Celeron, that I still have just nearby.

On Sat, 25 May 2024 07:17:29 -0400, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> On 2024-05-24 7:42 p.m., Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>
>> That was strictly a limitation of the original Itunes software ...
>
> Good to know, but that just confirms that Linux will always be playing
> catch-up in supporting hardware.

It was offering features that the vendors’ own proprietary software would
not.