audio format wars essay

It's successor must sound better, work better, and have new features such as a digital display for song titles.. They are Philips' Digital Compact Cassette DCC and Sony's Mini Disc MD..

Audio Format Wars

By: Sheldon Khan

Before buying a new car, getting married, or adopting a new audio format

it is wise to ask a few questions, peer under the hood, and ask the advice of

someone you trust Will the new format satisfy your needs not only now but,

also in the future? Will it look (and sound) as good on all the mornings after

you first met?

The analogue cassette is an old and trusted versatile friend that went

with you on those morning jogs and cruised in the car with you on Friday nights

However, the powers that be, have declared our trusted friend to

be in the last

phase of the life cycle It's successor must sound better, work better, and

have new features such as a digital display for song titles There are

currently two formats competing to be the consumers next choice for sound on the

go They are Philips' Digital Compact Cassette (DCC) and Sony's Mini Disc (MD)

What exactly is digital recording? The definition is, "An electronic

format that is designed to duplicate sound, while affording

extremely accurate

control over any changes you might wish to make in the recording" (Mclan &

Wichman,1988) In simple terms it means that the digital

circuitry samples the

signal and then reproduces what it has seen The quality of the recording

depends on the sampling rate of the machine The sampled signal

is then encoded

to the tape or disc in 1's and 0's, just like a computer disk drive would encode

information However, the biggest advantage of digital recording

is the fact

that it eliminates tape "hiss" that is usually found present in analogue

recordings

In the Eighties, a Philips invention captured the

limelight The

Compact Disc introduced us to a new era of digital sound, or

"perfect sound."

In the nineties another Philips invention has taken centre-stage, the Digital

Compact Cassette (DCC) DCC is the marriage of the analogue cassette to Digital

Audio Together they form a union that combines perfect sound, high convince and

greater versatility " DCC is a medium on which audio information

is digitally

encoded and which reproduces CD quality sound" (Philips

Electronics, Sound &

Vision, 1995) A number of features have been incorporated into

DCC tapes and

decks to achieve CD like sound and convince DCC decks can

locate a chosen

track on either side of the tape because track and time codes are recorded on

the tape This combined with autoreverse, which is standard on all DCC decks,

makes track access effortless but, not as fast as a CD Another attractive

feature of DCC is the text mode Text mode allows the deck to display support

information about the recordings on the tape such as the album title, a complete

list of track titles, names of the artists on each track, and lyrics (displayed

in sync with the music) Television screens or remote control units can also be

connected to the deck to display more extensive information The tapes have

recording and playback times of 60, 90, and 100 minutes "The well known

durability of cassettes is enhanced by the use of videochrome tape: chromium

dioxide- or cobalt- doped ferric-oxide" (Philips Electronics, Sound & Vision,

1995) With the new tape shell, the tape and tape drive wheels, which are

exposed on the analogue tape, are concealed by a metal sliding panel called a

"slider" The slider helps protect the tape from dirt and dust which

contributes to tape breakdown This along with the videochorme tape and DCC's

digital error correction system help prevent tape dropout

Numerous digital

first generation DCC to DCC copies can be made Any further copies (ie 2nd,

3rd, etc generation) made from the first generation copy will not

be digital

The biggest advantage that DCC has over the competition is its compatibility

with its analogue predecessor

Sony's Mini Disc is a miniature version of the compact disc that comes

in a plastic shell like that of a 3 1/2 computer floppy "Unlike CD's,

MiniDiscs can be recorded using magneto-optical technology"

(Dmytryk, 1993, p

62) Mageto-optical technology allows a MiniDisc to be recorded

on many times

A MiniDisc is smaller than a DCC tape and has random track access like a CD It

also gives the user the capability to edit songs, and the order that they appear

in on the disc To record on a partially full disc, simply hit Record, with no

concern for cueing Recording starts immediately and the new material is added

as a new track It is also simple to remove dead air and

unwanted material

The deleted time is added to the total time remaining on the disc All of this

makes it very easy to create your own custom compilations The MiniDisc, like

the DCC allows the user to make multiple first generation digital copies But

second and third generation copies will not be digital One of the biggest

advantages that MD has over DCC is it's small slim size and

durability By

comparison the sharp edged DCC cassette seems a bit clunky and less durable

Both MD and DCC use data-compression techniques to

squeeze digital audio

data into a fraction of the space required by a CD or a Digital Audio Cassette

(DAT) " DCC's Precision Adaptive SubCoding (PASC) achieves

slightly better than

4-to-1 compression While Mini Disc's Adaptive TRansform

Acoustic Coding

(ATRAC) is slightly worse at 5-to-1" (Dmytryk, 1993, p 65) Both developers

justify the use of compression with these statements,

"The human ear only hears sounds above a certain loudness (dB)

level, called the hearing threshold The threshold of

hearing depends on

the frequency of the sound Therefore, only sounds

above this

dynamic threshold need to be recorded."(Philips Electronics, Sound & Vision,

1995)

Loud sounds can completely mask softer sounds that are close in

frequency Because our hearing is far more acute in the

mid-range than at

the high or low end of the spectrum, what you hear is

defined by the

frequency content during each time slice." (Dmytryk, 1993 p 65)

In other

words no one will know the difference if certain frequencies are missing

What will all of this new technology cost the average consumer? Well, a

Philips DCC deck cost about $600, pre-recorded DCC tapes cost about $20, and

blank tapes cost about $8 While a MD player cost about $500, the pre-recorded

discs cost about $20 and the blank disc cost about $10 Of

course as the

popularity of the format grows, the cost will drop

Manufacturers are trying to give the public a more

durable and better

sounding medium for those of us that are always on the go

However, since their

introduction about three years ago very few MD and even fewer DCC players have

been sold Some audio experts feel that the reason they have not sold many

units of either format is because the average person thinks that there is

nothing wrong with the sound quality of a good CrO2 (Maxell's XLII) or metal

(Sony's CDit IV) analogue cassette Many people still live by the old saying,

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Manufacturers have built up these new

formats as "the greatest thing since slice bread," in the hopes

of changing the

way people listen to music Yet, the public has not jumped on the band wagon of

either of these new formats However, one thing is certain, the days of the

analogue cassette are numbered

It is only a matter of time before either MD, DCC or some new digital

format such as the recordable CD takes the place of the analogue cassette

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ballou, Glen Handbook For Sound Engineers (2nd ed.) Indiana: Sams, 1991

Davis, Don & Carolyn Sound System Engineering Indianapolis, Indiana: Howard W

Sams & Co Inc, 1975

Dmytryk, George "Digital Debate." Electronic Musician, Vol 9 No.8, 1993,

August: 62-70

Mclan, Peter & Wichman, Larry The Musican's Guide To Home

Recording Toronto:

Simon & Schuster Inc, 1988

Robertson, Patrick The Book Of Firsts New York: Bramhall House, 1974

Sony Home Page www.sony.com e-mail: webmaster@sony.co.jp

Digital Compact

Cassette Philips Electronics N.V (1995)