ripping mono cd's (Pet Sounds for instance)

[russ]

I bought the mono version of Pet Sounds today. Ripped it to mp3 using ITunes but weird things are happening. The sound occaisionally leaps from one speak to another.

Is that supposed to happen or is mp3 a bit shit with mono recordings?

baffled of london....

[Zen-Chan]

Hmm, I own mono Pet Sounds, and ripped it for my iPod, but I've never noticed any side-effects . . .

So, to sum up, I've no idea!

[pogo]

I've had no problems with iTunes and old mono recordings. I use AAC rather than MP3 but I can't see how that would be an issue. Various classical, jazz and pop recordings all work fine, through headphones plugged into my PC.

One thing you can get if your speakers aren't matched, e.g. if they're a different distance from the listener, you can get the sound from one speaker reaching the listener later than the other, making them out of phase so some frequencies cancel out. But because one will also be louder than the other it will dominate so sound will appear to come out of one speaker. This is much more noticable with mono, where the same signal is sent to both speakers, and with music which has a few simple tones or chords, e.g. older more melodic music.

[russ]

cheers pogo. I'm starting to think it was just the way I was sitting in relation to the speakers.

[rowan]

cheers pogo. I'm starting to think it was just the way I was sitting in relation to the speakers.

That really does sound like an out of phase speaker issue. As you move around the room, the sound should appear to come from a constant spot, solidly. If it ducks in and out as you move it's almost certainly out of phase. Just swap the connections of one of your speakers over and it will either get much worse [ie it was right to begin with..] or much better.

edit: Also you can rip to mono mp3 which is about half the filesize. If your source is a CD then it will actually be a two track recording but with the same sound on both tracks [CDs don't have a mono mode.]

[xav]

cheers pogo. I'm starting to think it was just the way I was sitting in relation to the speakers.

Let me guess: on a well-oiled and very spinny office chair?

[russ]

cheers pogo. I'm starting to think it was just the way I was sitting in relation to the speakers.

Let me guess: on a well-oiled and very spinny office chair?

close. a shitty "office chair" from Argos that leans dangerously to left unless I compensate massively to the right.

A kind of vertical see saw...

[Barnard]

sounds like your speakers are out of phase, the +'s and -'s or red and blacks of the wires need to be the same.

one way to test is to put the speakers face to face, if its a pure mono recording the sound will disappear or at least go very quiet, as one speaker is sucking the basslines whilst the other is blowing.

heh, a late reply with same info as above.