[LingLing1337]

And no, I'm not talking about today's turntables. I'm talking about the old school (70's-80's) turntables.

My dad was talking to me about audio, and I'm glad I'm getting to be involved in this since he was quite the audiophile "back in the day". He had a really nice turntable, of course decked out, and a really nice amp and tuner, completely dialed. But he argues that, I quote "It's progressed from (Some disc measurements) to cassettes, to CD's, and now MP3's. But as perfectly detailed as music may get, nothing will ever replicate the sound a turntable can produce".

What do you guys think about this?

 

[Sparky191]

Depends on how good the gear, the source material and the ears listening to it.

 

[jwilldermood]

No doubt about it. A mid-range TT with a decent cartridge will kick the crap out of my iPOD. You have to have good records though. Vinyl is the original hi-rez. Convenience is what has driven the move to digital, not fidelity.

 

[Luke]

Sorry, I can't let this go.

You take a DDD CD, convert it to .wav, transfer it to a good DAP (I still use my JB3) that has a dedicated line out, and you run that into a nice amp.

You take a 70s turntable and nice pick up with a vinyl record, and run that into a nice amp.

You compare the two. How can the 70s turntable produce better fidelity?

I can understand some people who say they would prefer the sound of vinyl, for notalgic reasons or whatnot, but I can't understand how it's possible that the fidelity from a vinyl record is superior.

 

[jonnywolfet]

forget fidelity. What is cooler? one of those scratched up white box things that everyone else has, lifelessly playing music that is made up of 0's and 1's without any pops or crackles. Or a great big heavy turntable with a shelf full of awesome albums that you can paw through lovingly, admiring the artwork on the gatefolds, and wonder at the amazing fact that a grove on a piece of flat plastic is making sweet music.
No contest IMHO, for a home source, owning a turntable means lots of playing with gear, lots of handling of fragile equipment, and all that satisfaction that owning a vinyl setup brings.

Vinyl is awesome cool, no one can argue with that.

(edit) Plus, if your lucky like me, you'll get all your dad's old vinyls and carts that he doesn't use anymore (actually, i got the whole shebang from my dad, the linn, the records, the satisfaction....)

 

[gloco]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luke /img/forum/go_quote.gif Sorry, I can't let this go. You take a DDD CD, convert it to .wav, transfer it to a good DAP (I still use my JB3) that has a dedicated line out, and you run that into a nice amp. You take a 70s turntable and nice pick up with a vinyl record, and run that into a nice amp. You compare the two. How can the 70s turntable produce better fidelity? I can understand some people who say they would prefer the sound of vinyl, for notalgic reasons or whatnot, but I can't understand how it's possible that the fidelity from a vinyl record is superior.

Vinyl isn't necessarily superior to digital sources. Vinyl has something that digital sources seem to lack: warmth. How often do you read reviews of high end sources and the reviewer claims the source has a nice warm, forgiving sound? How often do we all read about how these audiophile companies are trying to reproduce the sound of vinyl? Well, there must be a reason, right?

It's not about fidelity, it's about how "fun" or "musical" your source sounds. Midrange is our friend. It makes music sound more appealing to our ears. CD's are often described as sounding cold or their treble range as brittle (often causing hearing fatigue). Vinyl is often described as euphonic (pleasing to the ear, less likely to cause hearing fatigue).

Personally I use both a TT and a CD source. Which one do I prefer? Well, some records simply sound better than their digital bretheren. So, it's really a matter of choice and taste.

 

[Sparky191]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luke /img/forum/go_quote.gif Sorry, I can't let this go. You take a DDD CD, convert it to .wav, transfer it to a good DAP (I still use my JB3) that has a dedicated line out, and you run that into a nice amp. You take a 70s turntable and nice pick up with a vinyl record, and run that into a nice amp. You compare the two. How can the 70s turntable produce better fidelity? I can understand some people who say they would prefer the sound of vinyl, for notalgic reasons or whatnot, but I can't understand how it's possible that the fidelity from a vinyl record is superior.

Ones analog the other digital. How much fidelity you loose when you hear it depends on everything in the chain between the original recording and your brain. CD's are limited to 20kHz. Its often debated that people can't hear anything more, and others will debate that some people can. Of course if CD was perfect we wouldn't have SACD and DVD-A. Theres also the other side that a lot of CD's have been remastered differently, usually (apparently) worse than the mastering on the Vinyl. Which is whay some people hunt out the original CD's and not the remasters, or specific remasters on the Redbook part of SACD's etc.

I don't have the high end gear or the ears and shouldn't make any comment. But I do find CD's more clinical than some of my old dire quality cassettes. The cassettes sound warmer to me. Maybe they are worse fidelity, but in some cases I prefer the sound of the cassette, and sometimes I prefer the CD. I think it depends on the specific album and mastering you are talking about.

Its quite similar to different debates about different encoders. I would have a preference for ATRAC recordings to MP3 at the same fidelity/bitrate. I think ATRAC sounds better, more natural. But because a good Lame MP3 is so close and easier to use, I'm happy to use MP3 over ATRAC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analog_...#Analog_warmth

 

[Lord Chaos]

If you have a well-recorded vinyl record, and if it's well pressed, with the hole in the middle, and if it's clean, that analog groove produces magical sound... if you have a good turntable and a good cartridge and a good pre-amp.

If you have a well-recorded CD, and play it on a stable transport and have high-quality digital-to-analog conversion, you can also have magical sound.

The two will be differently magical. I'm astounded at how good music sounds coming from a computer with a good DAC and good headphones. I think the weakness that people hear in most digital sound installations comes from the mediocre quailty of the digital-to-analog conversion.

 

[steviebee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jonnywolfet /img/forum/go_quote.gif Plus, if your lucky like me, you'll get all your dad's old vinyls and carts that he doesn't use anymore (actually, i got the whole shebang from my dad, the linn, the records, the satisfaction....)

You got a Linn given to you?! You lucky, lucky ba......

Man, I had to buy mine...tell me you didn't get an Ittok/Asak thrown in for good measure!

As for the topic - totally agree. For home, vinyl wins out. Plus, I'm just a sucker for gatefolds....I even like those vinyl replica CD Japanese jobs - pure class.

 

[ILikeMusic]

Quote:

but I can't understand how it's possible that the fidelity from a vinyl record is superior.

It isn't, at least not by any objective measure. But just like a photograph of a beautiful woman or nature scene, sometimes more resolution isn't necessarily better...

 

[ozz]

i will take the better channel seperation and signal to noise ratio
also better dynamics and broader frequency response of the cd
over records and i will take sacd and dvd-a over red book cd's.

 

[GeeMan]

"Newer" doesn't always mean "better". In terms of digital versions of (originally) analogue inventions, "newer" often means "worse" - but with the benefit of convenience.

OK, at this point I have to admit that I'm one of those people who prefer the sound from black disks to those from silver disks - though I will admit that SACD and DVD-A disks can sound exceptionally good.

One of the reasons why CDs grew in popularity over vinyl was from the point of user convenience. You could sit in your armchair and change tracks, repeat, shuffle and never had to get up to turn the disk over. Just as today, MP3s grow in popularity because they're convenient. You can email them to your friends, download them (ahem, legally of course) from websites and stick a gazillion of them on your iPod/iRiver/iWhatever.

Do they sound as good as the CD? No, but they sound 'good enough'. And they're convenient.

You can use the same analogy with other technologies. For example, in resolution terms the resulting image from a $200 digital camera is usually much worse that the resulting image from a $200 film-based camera using slow film, a tripod and good processing chemistry (well, at the moment anyway). So why does Joe Shmo consumer buy $200 digital cameras? Because they can make CDs and mail them to their family. They can make websites. They can upload pictures of their portable rig to headphone forums (

). Joe Shmo buys a digital camera because it's more convenient.

Over the years I've spent ridiculous amounts of money on audio reproduction equipment. In fact it's only been in the last couple of years that I've found a CD player that I can listen to without pulling faces at the speakers (though I agree that bad CD mastering plays a bigger part).

I'm not interested in terms such as resolution, dynamics, S/N ratios, DACs or whatever. For me, I buy the kit so that I can get as close as I can to the music. I can't tell you why I find listening to vinyl more involving that listening to CD; just that I do. And so do a lot of others. I find it fascintaing that vinyl is currently undergoing a bit of a resurgence - and not just from the DJ-crowd.

I don't buy records. I don't buy CDs. I buy music.

 

[bigshot]

Assuming the compression codec is high enough to prevent artifacting, an iPod will perform just as well as a turntable with less noise. Most differences people cite in promoting vinyl over digital involve differences in mastering. If you take a well mastered LP and transfer it to a digital file and play it on your iPod, you will have the best of both worlds.

See ya
Steve

 

[Sparky191]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif Assuming the compression codec is high enough to prevent artifacting, an iPod will perform just as well as a turntable with less noise. Most differences people cite in promoting vinyl over digital involve differences in mastering. If you take a well mastered LP and transfer it to a digital file and play it on your iPod, you will have the best of both worlds. See ya Steve

Perhaps that is why I sometimes prefer the MP3 of my old cassettes than I do the spanking new CD of the same tracks. Mind you it could be I'm more familar with the tracks on the cassette, and thus the imperfections than I am the CD perfect tracks. Mind you sometime I prefer the new CD and drop the cassette in the bin.

 

[chadbang]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lord Chaos /img/forum/go_quote.gif If you have a well-recorded vinyl record, and if it's well pressed, with the hole in the middle, and if it's clean, that analog groove produces magical sound... if you have a good turntable and a good cartridge and a good pre-amp. If you have a well-recorded CD, and play it on a stable transport and have high-quality digital-to-analog conversion, you can also have magical sound.

This is a wise man.

You can't unequivocably say either format will sound better. I have a $700 turntable set up that oversall sounds worse than my $300 cd player. But a couple records shine. On the other hand, sometimes the sound from my ipod is attrocious. But every once in a while it sings out magically. I think the production values and recording of an album play a huge part in determining audiophile heaven in the end...