Living Stereo SACD Releases

Theaudiotweak...Center was always driven by a L+R mix signal. I did that for about 30 years, but what we have now is much better.

Regardless of how you make the master tape, compression/peak limiting is necessary when you cut an LP, along with LF blend, and the usual RIAA mutilation of the original signal. Much less of this is necessary for a digital disk.

What is meant by "35mm film stock"? Are we talking about optical recording? 35mm magnetic tape running at 30 inches per second was the usual medium for master tapes.

Mercurys prior to number SR90275 (approx) were recorded using analog tape, then 35 mm tape was used - but not exclusively. SR90282 was recorded on analog tape for example. So, many of the great Mercurys were recorded using analog tape. Cheers.

Of the RCA LS SACD's, I find the Ravel Daphnis & Chloe the best in performance and sound. It's also one that will not be replicated on Mercury.

Eldartford, a very insightful response to my post. Your facts are correct, but I must ad clarifications. We must assume that a good copy of the master tape exists at 30 i.p.s., and has not physically broken down over the years. A 7-1/2 i.p.s. copy is a poor substitute!

There are also TWO mastering procedures. The first takes place in the studio; the second takes place at the vinyl or digital medium pressing plant. Mastering for vinyl is modern alchemy, part science, part art, and part "hunch". Further audio processing (read that degradation of fidelity!) was necessary to cut a commercial vinyl record. Again, were not talking about a special pressing like a 45 RPM single-sided 12" disc(s). There are many less constraints when using the original old studio master tape (assuming a good state of preservation), and doing a MODERN digital pressing master, especially if tubes are used in the chain, as Steve Hoffman of DCC does.

Fatparrot...I can't cite the particular disc, but in at least one case the original 30ips tape was unplayable, but an excellent 7.5ips copy of the master was used. (From liner notes).

The original analog tapes probably used dbx noise reduction processing.