Dmm Vinyl Cut

Unlike conventional disc mastering where the mechanical audio modulation is cut onto a lacquer coated aluminum disc dmm cuts straight into metal copper.

Dmm vinyl cut.

After introducing the new vinyl visual mastering system in 2010 a new era of further development opportunities and improvements of the dmm cutting process began. Which was more accurate. Direct metal mastering dmm is a system of vinyl cutting developed by neumann and teldec telefunken decca in germany during the 1980s in an attempt to increase the reliability of the cutting and pressing process and circumvent some of the common problems that can occur with conventional lacquer masters. The dmm was more precise with sharper transients and better image edge definition while the lacquer cut was smoother warmer and more pleasing on the ears.

Rather than cutting the audio to a lacquer coated disc the dmm lathe cuts straight into a copper plated master disc. Pre echo is caused by the cutting stylus unintentionally transferring some of audio signal into the previous groove wall causing a faint audio signal a pre echo. Vinylcut is a new web database tool that will help the vinyl community to discover and share information on the true source analog or digital and mastering process behind a vinyl record release. Often the reason for playing a vinyl record is to have the warm and analogue sound that is often not present in a dmm cut.

Dmm did though eliminate the problem of pre echo sometimes audible on a lacquer. Dmm lp pressings are sometimes described as having a harshness or forwardness in the high frequencies. The principle of dmm technology the audio signal coming from the mastering workstation or from a tape is transcribed into a metal master plate through a dedicated dmm cutting head. There are many technical reasons why dmm is but i won t bother going into them here but given that abbey road and so many others have gone back to lacquer it s clear that most current vinyl producers prefer lacquer.