[smargo]

I just spoke to george louis for about 30 minutes and he is very excited about his product, I sent him a cd this morning to have it duplicated. He is not selling any of his units until people at least send him a cd to burn for their own use despite people already sending him checks in the mail for his machine.

He mentioned that clark from the positive feedback article had recently received 3 more duplicated cd's from him and george louis thought they sounded even better than the the one he reviewed. Of course we haven't heard from clark about these.

Anyway Im trying it out, and i and i hope others will comment. He did say that if someone did want his duplicator - there would be a 3 week turnaround. No trials, not set up to handle it. Hey Im skeptical but Ill try.

We have given so much hype to other things, why not this.

Regards,
smargo

[geofstro]

It would be great if you could compare a CD "remastered" with George Louis system with the same CD using the Eximus software.

If I understand correctly George Louis is not doing any upsampling; but applying a "resolution enhancing" algorithm. Eximus, on the other hand do resample as well as apply "resolution enhancement" but claim it's the "resolution enhamcement" that counts for the bulk of the improvement.

I prefer the software only approach of Eximus, since I already have enough CDR/RW DVDR/RW drives. Surely the crux of George Louis system is the resolution enhancing software. I wish he would unbundle this, assuming it can run on a standard PC. Nevertheless it's the result that matters most.

geoff

[Rob Babcock]

It'd be a little work, but you could that, geofstro.  The Eximius trail version limits the disc to 4 songs, but within that you could sure copy it before you send it to that other guy.  The trial version is free, you only pay for the unlock code to use the full features.

Curiously, I've never tried any lower samling rate.  Eximius lets you use 18 or 20 bits (if I'm remembering right) instead of 24 with a corresponding increase in max album length.  Since 2 hours of music is pretty much always plenty I've never tried lower rates to see how it sounds.   Guess I could for the helluvit...

[geofstro]

Thanks Rob,

I'm going to evaluate Eximus over the weekend and if I like the result I'll buy a copy, then do a full CD. I'll send the same CD to the guy in CA and when I get it back make a comparison between the two 'enhanced' versions.

geoff

[Rob Babcock]

Just bear in mind that DVD burning is a little different than CD-Rs (and please forgive me if this is obvious stuff to you ).  Eximius will create the file, but you do need a burning utility to actually make the disc.  If you use Nero, take care that it doesn't truncate the file to 48 klhz.  I use Nero and have no problems, but eventually I'll probably buy the burning suite from Eximius, too.

The Eximius software will let you burn 2 titles with 4 songs each with the free trial version, but some players won't switch to the second title (my Denon, for instance).

Lastly, some DVD players are finicky about what DVD-Rs they'll use.  Pioneer decks seem to play everything; my Denon is a tad fussy.  You can get good results from a cheapo Pioneer, but if you go that route just use it as a transport.

[geofstro]

Thanks Rob,

It should have been obvious to me as I'm used to burning DVD's. I will be using Nero, though and the point about ensuring I don't let it truncate to 48khz is definitley useful.

I'm assuming that in addition to burning the file to a DVD I could also play it back on the PC directly from the hard drive. Am I right?

Thanks again

geoff

[Rob Babcock]

Yeah, you should be able to play it on the PC just fine.  It would be cool to store a bunch of "virtual discs" on the computer, but I doubt it'd be practical.  The files will be very large- a rule of thumb is to double the room it would take on CD and add a bit (to cover the video- for an audio recording to work at all on DVD you have to "fool" it by adding video, in this case plain black).  Imagine storing 4 GB files on your PC!   The ol' HD would fill up pretty darned fast.

[geofstro]

Thanks again Rob. I just wanted to experiment by listening to one or two to begin with. without necessarily burning them.

I suppose if someone wanted to dedicate a hard drive as a DVD+Audio jukebox, there are 500gb drives out there which would hold close to 125 of these and that translates to at least 250 hours of music. 125 DVD's would take up a fair amount of shelf space compared to the size of the hard drive. Some of the money saved on DVD-R's could also be offset againt the cost of the hard drive.

My arithmetic may not be spot on; but you get the point.

geoff

[geofstro]

I've been experimenting with the Eximus software and so far I'm very impressed with the results.

Eximus claim that although they upsample to 96khz 24bit, most of the improvements don't come as a result of the upsampling itself; but rather they result from the ability to lower the noise floor, thereby recovering information that was on the CD all along, though it couldn't be read or recovered with any CD playback system.

What I've heard seems to bear this out. The first DVD I burnt, I listened to on a standalone DVD player, which is limited to 48khz output via s/pdif out. It may also have been truncating the 24 bits to something lower, such as 20 or less. So I wasn't hearing the enhanced music in its full glory. Nevertheless, the sound was smooth in the way that good 'ol analog is smooth and with presence and plenty of detail. My only reservations were that maybe it was a little too smooth and lacking a tad of impact and edge that can be heard on the original CD. This was on a DVD player that is normally lacking with standard CD playback. Sounding a bit emaciated, normally.

One comment on the Eximus forum was that it seemed to add a little extra reverb, which could be false, as not present on the original CD.

When I play a DVD created with this software back on my HTPC using PowerDVD, I am able to play at the full 96khz/24bit resolution and the result is, as expected, even better. I now no longer feel any excitement missing as compared to the original CD, unless such excitment was the result of what we've all come to know as the typical CD sound.

The only limitation with using a software DVD player such as PowerDVD to do this, is that it uses Windows WDM drivers which utilise windows Kmixer for controlling volume. I've never understood how much of an issue this really is when using S/PDIF out, and setting the volume to max in the software. It seems that the ultimate, however would be to play the files created by DVD2One Audio remaster through ASIO.

This entails ripping the 24/96KHZ files from the DVD and converting them to WAVs. Several people on the Eximus forum have asked that the software itself should have an option to create WAVs. Anyway, I found a way to do this and the results using Foobar 2K to play back the 96KHZ/24bit wav via ASIO beat the previous methods by a further margin.

To rip and convert the file created by DVD2One Audio remaster use this software plus vstrip and follow the instructions: http://www.rarewares.org/files/others/lpcm24.zip

Hope it helps

geoff

[smargo]

Just listened to my copy of George Dukes "After Hours" made in 1998. I chose this cd becuse I am intimately familiar with the recording and it is well recorded. Comparing the RealityCheck™ CD to the original:

1. Copy is definitly smoother

2. More articulate.

3. Instruments more fleshed out.

I would say also little subtle improvements overall - but not enough to go gaga. I mean I wasn't sitting there saying "Oh my god, I got to have the machine that makes the copies. It is another tweaky item that adds small improvement - but i can live without it - get real - It's Not that amazing.

I have only tried 1 cd and perhaps I nedd to try a couple of others, before I make blanket statements. Frankly I am a little dissapointed. Where is the giant killer?

Take my comments with a grain of salt until you try for yourself!

Regards,
smargo

[geofstro]

smargo,

Do you have a PC?

If so, it would be really cool if you could enhance the original of that same CD using the DVD2One Audioremaster program from Eximus, to determine which you prefer.

I wanted to make this comparison; but it seems that George is less open these days to allowing anyone to just try a CD unless they make a serious commitment towards buying the machine (read $300 deposit). I'm not prepared to do that without clear evidence that it does a better job than DVD2One audio remaster, which is free to tryout for 14 days.

If you do decide to try DVD2One Audioremaster, you can get over the 4 songs per album limit during the trial by first ripping the CD with EAC to one uncompressed CD image, WAV file. DVD2One Audioremaster will then see this as a single song on one album.

Hope it helps

geoff

[Rob Babcock]

Now that the holidays are winding down, has anyone done any more experimenting with Eximius or Reality Check?  In an email correspondance, the creator of the Eximius software expressed doubts that he could bring a hardware version to market due to the economics of it and the lack of reviews.  That's a bummer.  I hate having to copy all my discs to get the benefits- I'd much rather have an on-the-fly encoder.

I'm also a bit frustrated by the hassles of DVD-R.  No matter how careful you are, you'll just get some coasters with DVD.  Unless it's just me.  Plus, compatibility of burned DVDs simply isn't that good compared to CD-R.  I love my Eximius software, but I'm intrigued by Reality Check, too.  It would be cool to be able to use CD-Rs that will play in every player.

I sent some "DVD-M's" (my term for a 'DVD-Music' disc burned with Eximius) to a fellow AC'er.  Once he's had a chance to listen to them I hope he'll post his comments as to sound quality and whether or not they play reliably in his machine (a Denon DVD-2900, if I recall- not sure).  My Denon '2200 won't play them reliably, but the modded Pioneer I bought from Carlman seems to be pretty solid with them.  Anyway, I sent him 8 different discs ranging from Mediaeval Baebes to Iron Maiden &  Dire Straits to Dvorak- enough, hopefully, to get a good idea how it sounds.

[geofstro]

Rob,

I've produced a few DVD-R coasters myself, so you're not unique. I've been using an old Pioneer burner in a firewire enclosure. It chugs along at 1X like an old steam engine; but at that speed I seem to be able to burn Verbatim DVD-R's reliably.

DVD-R's are less compatible, as you say. Additionally, you will only be hearing the enhanced music at its best if you use a DVD player that outputs 96KHZ/24 Bit via S/PDIF to a DAC or receiver that can also accept 96/24.

I have a standalone player that is limited to 48khz (not sure if truncates the bits to 20 or less as well). I can still hear the improvements via this player into a good dac (Meitner Bidat) at 48khz, though.

If you have a good sound card in your PC, of course, you don't actually need to burn a DVD, you can use a software DVD player to play the DVD from its VIDEO_TS folder. PowerDVD 6.0 supports this via S/PDIF out.

Of course, if you don't burn them you will eat up hard disk space; but I like to play them back from the hard drive to determine what they sound like before committing to DVD-R.

In fact on my PC I find the Eximus software so fast, that I find myself often encoding a couple of disks just so I can hear the enhanced version off the hard drive and erasing them from the drive after listening.

Sound quality wise, I've had the best result when converting the RAW PCM files that the Eximus software produces to a WAV using a program called LPCM24. I then play the resulting 96/24 wav file back through Foobar 2k using ASIO. This avoids the deleterious effects of windows kmixer which is used via WAVE or DIRECT SOUND when playing from PowerDVD or WinDVD6.

What I'd like is a software DVD player that supports ASIO.

For me the enhanced versions using Eximus always sound smoother, more analogue like with greater retrieval of detail. The most dramatic result seems to be on the worst sounding disks. Particularly early digital classical recordings.

It won't get rid of all the ills of poor recordings; but it does make them listenable and enjoyable in my limited experience of using this software.

I actuall prefer the software approach of Eximus despite the compatibility restraints with DVD-R.

I'd love to try RealityCD's as well; but as a mentioned in my previous post, he seems less open to just letting people try a CD or two, than at the time the review at Positive Fedback was written. In fact Positive Feedback readers were supposed to be able to take advantage of a single CD enhanced for just 5 bucks; but he wasn't prepared to do that for me.

There's nothing stopping you from shrinking down an Eximus enhanced CD to CD standard and burning on a CD-R. I tried it with one album, though, and found the results disappointing. Your mileage, may vary.

geoff

[Rob Babcock]

Cool- I didn't know there was a way to turn the Eximius file into wav.files.  That would rock.  Some of us have been hounding Eximius to add the ability to output wav.files in the next update, but I don't know if they will or not.

[geofstro]

I already posted the url to the software for doing this in a previous post; but here it is again, in case you missed it:

To rip and convert the file created by DVD2One Audio remaster use this software plus vstrip and follow the instructions: http://www.rarewares.org/files/others/lpcm24.zip

geoff