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Vinyl record production has finally joined the modern age
Viryl has developed a first-in-the-industry: A steamless system [for creating vinyl records] that will make massive boilers and piping systems a thing of the past. Not only does it obviate some of the costs and permits previously involved, but it also becomes a more environmentally friendly process. Vinyl record pressing has finally bootstrapped itself into the modern age on all counts and stands to encourage new pressing plants to support vinyl's resurgent popularity.
Traditionally, the molds used to stamp out vinyl discs are heated by steam which is delivered to the press from a boiler. Viryl's steamless module electrically heats water to the desired 285 degrees Fahrenheit so the molds can melt pucks of PVC into a record. This new method of heating, removes gas, the boiler and extensive plumbing from the equation.
This new setup is a closed system that can live right next to the press, allowing for a smaller footprint in your workspace. It also reduces water waste, although you'll still need cooling lines. One of the biggest factors here, though, is that no boiler means none of the treatment chemicals used to keep a boiler in working order, so the environment wins. A setup that requires less square footage could also make Viryl's new presses a more attractive solution when space is limited or at a premium. Existing customers luck out as well, since it's possible to retrofit presses with the new option.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Thursday December 06 2018, @08:13PM (28 children)
I continue to be baffled why there are so many fans of such wretchedly inferior, limited, and obsolete tech. Is this a backlash against RIAA nastiness, either their copyright extremism or the loudness wars? Or against technology? There's a store near the local college campus that specializes in vinyl records, and Barnes and Noble has cut back on audio CDs to make room for vinyl.
Could it really be pure nostalgia? If they're so in love with old tech, why not commute to work on horseback, seeing as how there aren't too many steam powered passenger trains serving the public these days? And, modern metallurgy could produce much better swords and armor than anyone had in the Middle Ages. I figure a titanium sword would be at least the equivalent of a +2 magic sword.
I've played enough records that I know how bad the tech sucks. Have to handle the LPs gingerly, to avoid scratching or breaking them. And you should keep an eye on the record player in case it suffers a problem that damages the record. Like the ones I've seen and used would automatically return the arm to the cradle when they reached the end of a record. First a lifter would push the arm up, then another motor would engage to move the arm out past the outside edge of the record. But, if the lifter failed to lift (which happened a time or two), the needle would drag against the record, leaving a big scratch across the full radius. Even if you do everything properly, the record is still going to wear. A few dozen plays, and it's worn out. Needles also wear out. Though I understand there are now record players that use lasers to read the music without touching? Then there's storage space. Vinyl is just plain bulky. Why would anyone want their music collection on a hundred plus pounds of vinyl when it could all fit on one thumb drive?
(Score: 2) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Thursday December 06 2018, @08:36PM (1 child)
It's called "vintage".
Vintage is all the crap our parents owned that we couldn't to get rid of fast enough, that somehow became cool to our kids.
I'm old enough to have amassed a sizeable collection of LPs back when I was younger. I literally RUSHED to replace them things with CDs as soon as the latter came out. LPs are fine and dandy when you play them every once in a while on your expensive vintage deck to your hip friends. But when they're the only way to have decent music, and they degrade play after play, and you have to change the needle, and you have to handle the damn records like your life depended on it, and you couldn't play them in your car (well, you could, but that was just utterly ridiculous [wikipedia.org])... well, I say fuck vinyls and good riddance.
I just wish I had kept my records to sell to vintage lovers today and turn a profit. But who knew the hateful format would make a comeback back then eh?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday December 06 2018, @09:03PM
Or in some instances, . . . hoarding.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 06 2018, @08:42PM (5 children)
The "look at my music collection" reason. The bigger it looks the more impressive it is. With MP3's it's hard to tell the relative size and impressiveness of a music collection since a thumb drive could have one MP3 on it or 1000's, and still look the same on the outside.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday December 06 2018, @09:05PM (3 children)
Forget thumb drive. It can fit on a 256 GB micro SD smaller than the finger nail on your pinky finger.
Small enough to lose in the carpet and get vacuumed up -- as would be fitting for so much 'music' these daze.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by takyon on Thursday December 06 2018, @09:23PM (2 children)
512 GB microSD cards are available. 1-2 TB cards can't be too far behind. 2 TB is the maximum limit for many smartphones and other devices, e.g. the Nintendo Switch. 128 TB is the theoretical limit for the newly announced SD Ultra Capacity specification. I haven't heard about anything that will support that, but I'll be greatly amused to see the first devices that could accept 128 TB cards made 10+ years later.
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(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday December 07 2018, @05:04PM (1 child)
Everything I can find on the internet is saying 512GB is the biggest and Newegg has 512GB micro sd cards. But, eBay says they have 1TB and 2TB micro sd cards . . . looks like someone's making some money off suckers. https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?LH_CAds=&_ex_kw=&_fpos=&_fspt=1&_mPrRngCbx=1&_nkw=1+tb+micro+sd+card&_sacat=&_sadis=&_sop=12&_udhi=&_udlo=&_fosrp=1 [ebay.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday December 07 2018, @05:20PM
Yes, there have been fake listings on eBay and even Amazon for memory cards and USB sticks. I've heard of Chinese-made knockoffs that report to the OS that they can store 256 GB or something, when they might just store like 8 GB and write over data continuously.
They might also do a bait and switch with the keywords, looking like they support 32 GB or 2 TB when they are actually just listing the limit of the spec (SDHC is 32 GB, SDXC is 2 TB, and the new SDUC is 128 TB).
Best to get one only if it appears on Slickdeals.net, since the price will be good and it will be real.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday December 06 2018, @10:57PM
Having a huge collection of vinyl is a sign of dedication, time invested. and at a certain point, wealth.
Having a huge collection of MP3s is a sign you can click the copy or download button. It has no perceived value.
(Score: 3, Informative) by drussell on Thursday December 06 2018, @08:46PM (1 child)
You sound like one of those guys who used the wrong scale on the stylus tracking force meter and were off by an order of magnitude or two, like perhaps used lbs instead of g...
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Thursday December 06 2018, @11:48PM
Probably. But when the vinyl was slightly warped (and 33 1/3 rpm LPs were a bit floppier than 45 rpm singles), the arm and needle would jump off the high spots, just like the car in Dukes of Hazzard. The needle often came back down one orbit higher on the spiral track, thus one of the ways that records would do that infamous repeating they were so prone to doing. So we taped a dime to the end of the arm. Sure, that wore the record out faster, but at least that way it could be played.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by theluggage on Thursday December 06 2018, @09:47PM
Hate to break it to you, but people still ride horses, sail in sailing boats, drive cranky and unreliable vintage cars, take photographs on chemical film, make music by plucking strings or blowing into tubes and even ride on (or spend their spare time helping to maintain) steam railways. Its called "leisure" or "entertainment" and its fun (subject to taste) and the whole point is its not meant to be practical. Same goes for playing computer games, or even writing software to do jobs that you're only going to do once or twice...
I mean, these days, you touch a featureless black slab and the music just comes out... . I guess young whipper-snappers today who had pre-natal iPhones and don't remember when that was a novelty so maybe something that you can see working brings some of the magic back?
(if nothing else, the craze for vinyl could ensure that artists still bother with cover art)
Nothing wrong with a bit of "willing suspension of rationality" as long as you know you're doing it... There's a particular problem with vinyl (and vacuum tubes*) though because the audiophile world is so full of snake oil and woo-woo: some people can't seem to admit that "hey, I know its technically inferior but I like the ritual" and instead feel obliged to try and justify it on bogus technical grounds. Probably the same sort of people who bought "adult cover" versions of Harry Potter... tsk. tsk. tsk.
(* OK there may be something to vacuum tubes in a context like guitar amps and electronic music where you actually want the characteristics quirks and imperfections and are going to be driving them to distortion - just don't confuse that with hi-fi - also, there's an app for that!)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 06 2018, @09:51PM (1 child)
Can it really be nostalgia if you haven't lived through it?
(Score: 3, Funny) by theluggage on Friday December 07 2018, @01:03PM
Well, they call it "nostalgia" but it isn't a patch on the proper nostalgia that we used to get...
(Score: 4, Interesting) by deimtee on Thursday December 06 2018, @10:21PM (7 children)
You got a bunch of other smartarse replies, but really it is a combination. Being a Hipster is part of it, but the loudness wars are a major part. It really did fuck up a lot of music to compress the dynamic range and then record it all at the maximum amplitude. The vinyl producers didn't get into that as much, partly because they were old school and partly because vinyl just couldn't handle it.
There are many albums that had different masters for CD and vinyl, and to many people the vinyl does sound better. It's not the medium, it's the content. I'm old enough I still have a bunch of vinyl records that I bought when CDs were just starting. Some of them I have re-acquired on CD, and the cheap 'just copy the same master to CD' versions are much better than vinyl, but the vinyl is often better than the 'remastered for CD' versions. It's because of the content, not the fidelity.
The other major factor was the change in inter-component standards. Old systems had a standard 1 volt maximum signal between components, all the way up until the amplifier inputs. The CD manufacturers - supposedly for S/N ratio reasons - decided they wanted a 2 volt signal, and that drove many old systems into clipping. I think they changed the impedance from 50K ohms too. but I don't remember what to.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday December 06 2018, @11:35PM (4 children)
Very much this. It's perhaps ironic, but it is a case of the technical inferiority of vinyl actually making it largely immune to the marketing machinations that crippled the quality of other formats.
>If the proposed solution to a problem is a tax, then it is just an excuse to tax, not a real problem.
May I offer an alternative?
If the desired goal is to tax, then any problem, real or imagined, presents an opportunity to do so.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday December 07 2018, @12:53PM (3 children)
"May I offer an alternative?
If the desired goal is to tax, then any problem, real or imagined, presents an opportunity to do so."
While I don't disagree, that has a slightly different focus. It refers to the desire to tax, mine is referring to whether or not a problem is real.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday December 07 2018, @02:51PM (2 children)
It's more than a slightly different focus, it's a logically incompatible statement.
Yours says: if tax, then no problem.
Mine says: if tax, then someone wants tax. (Nothing implied about problem.)
Seems to me there's far too many taxes that have been implemented as (usually ineffective) "solutions" to real problems for your statement to be even passingly true.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday December 07 2018, @04:10PM (1 child)
I see what you mean. I have changed it slightly to emphasize more what I meant, as I was implying something about the problem, as well as the desire to tax. I think I could word it better, and will consider it further. :)
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday December 07 2018, @09:19PM
I like it.
It does feel like it's almost something really punchy, but no improvements spring to mind. Best of luck with it.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Friday December 07 2018, @08:38PM (1 child)
The problem isn't the format, but the recording and mastering of modern pop music. There are good modern music, available in superior digital format.
If these hipsters or audiophiles or whatever actually cared about the content, they would buy a vinyl, rip the audio into digital format, then sell the vinyl or keep it as a conversation piece, and possibly share the love on the Internet. Clearly that's not hipsters are using modern vinyls, so clearly hipsters don't care about the content, just the format.
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(Score: 2) by deimtee on Saturday December 08 2018, @01:57AM
Clearly there are different types of vinyl owners:
I did in fact copy vinyl records to tape (and still use those tapes in one of my cars), and I am looking into digitising my old collection, just as soon as I have the time.
I don't buy new vinyl records. If I don't like the way they master digital formats, I just don't buy it. Vote with your wallet.
I very occasionally pick up a second hand one in a junk shop if it looks interesting or I recognize the artist as one I like.
Some people are basically hobbyist vinyl players. They enjoy playing with the records. Their choice and personally I think it's a better hobby than stamp collecting.
Some like to support the artists, so they don't digitize and put it on the net or take it from the net. Or they buy records because they like the cover art.
The problems with interconnect standards mostly no longer apply, but they did establish an early bias in many users. And for some of those people, "Never forget, never forgive".
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 07 2018, @12:51AM
Going to digital from vinyl was a great technical improvement. It made possible the mp3 music player, now incorporated into the cell phone. Everyone can now carry around their private music universe. We got rid of all those physical things and actions that vinyl required.
But in today's world so much of what most people do is digital based, that the physical has regained its attraction. In a digital world, people want some non-digital in their life, and vinyl music is one avenue to get it. It's precisely all the fiddly little bits that people enjoy, because their days are no longer filled with having to deal with all the fiddly little bits of a thousand physical things.
(Score: 2) by dwilson on Friday December 07 2018, @04:38AM (4 children)
Having actually spent some time practicing HEMA [wikipedia.org], I can answer that one: mass. Titanium just doesn't have the mass required for a hand-held weapon. Since force is equal to mass times acceleration, a lighter sword needs to be moving faster to get the same result (You read that right, it's not really about the cutting and sharp edges). The human arm can't generate those kinds of swing speeds, therefore steel trumps titanium as far as swordplay goes, and always will. Same reason we don't use aluminium. I'll give you the modern metallurgy, though. Modern spring steel is worlds better than what they had in the middle ages.
- D
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday December 07 2018, @08:28AM (1 child)
Why don't you just make your titanium sword bigger, until it masses the same as the steel one? The intimidation factor alone should make it +1.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 07 2018, @07:31PM
That works until you have to use it anywhere but a wide open field with only one opponent.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday December 07 2018, @03:21PM (1 child)
Even more than that, titanium isn't actually notably stronger than an equivalent volume of steel, just much lighter, harder, and more corrosion resistant. It sounds like it's also quite brittle, a common problem as hardness increases. I'm sure an anti-rust "enchantment" would have been much appreciated, just not so much on the battlefield. And brittleness in a sword would be a fatal flaw - as I recall Damascus steel was an incredibly labor-intensive solution to ore that produced unusually brittle iron.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 07 2018, @04:14PM
Extremely pure titanium is quite ductile, but it is much more prone to hardening and embrittlement with even small quantities of other metals alloyed in.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 07 2018, @06:42AM
There seems to be a mix of elements.
One part is the worship of the analog, like vaccum tubes and notebooks.
Another is the idea of covering a room with shelves showing off the collection.