Word: analogy
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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There are two ways to generate an antinoise wave. The analog approach, first developed in the 1930s using vacuum-tube technology, works something like a seesaw. A mechanism drives a loud speaker that pushes the air when incoming sound waves rise and pulls it back when the sound waves fall. Alternatively, antinoise waves can be created digitally, using a signal processor to convert incoming sound waves into a stream of numbers. Given those numbers, computers can quickly calculate the frequency and amplitude of the mirror-image waves. Those specifications are then fed to a conventional speaker and broadcast into...
...antinoise system is perfect. The digital devices work well with repetitive noises, like the sounds of fans and turbines, but cannot stop random or unexpected noises. Analog systems fight low, random noises but do it by eliminating all low-frequency sounds, good or bad. And none of the antinoise devices currently on the market are very good at canceling high- pitched squeals and whistles. The problem: calculating antiwaves for sounds higher than middle C requires more computing power than today's chips can provide. For now, the most cost-effective way to block those tones is still to stick your...
...sound. Like the compact disc, DAT is the product of a digital recording method that uses computer chips to break sound down into billions of bits of information, which are stored on magnetic tape. The process reproduces sound more faithfully and with less background hiss and crackling than traditional analog recording techniques...
...heart of the new features are computer circuits that change standard analog TV signals, which are broadcast as a series of undulating waves, into digital impulses -- strings of 0s and 1s. The digital signals can then be transformed by microprocessors -- tiny computers on silicon chips -- to achieve a variety of exotic effects. When the processing is complete, the signals are changed back to analog for display on an ordinary TV picture tube...
Many record companies have been reissuing pre-digital ("analog") recordings in CD form. Many of these old recordings--some date back 50 years--have considerably better sound quality than they did on record format, and the fact that the recordings themselves are being reissued often means that they are high-quality performances. For the time being, though, CDs are still a luxury item, and many college students are waiting for a post-graduation job before buying a CD player...