[trains are bad]

Some of us know that vinyl can sound really good. I don't dispute that at all, it's my favorite format at the moment.

However I was reading an essay by a Steely Dan member, who was describing the history of Katy Lied, and he said that they used a condensor mic too close to a drum, which generated a waveform that had transients so sharp that a vinyl needle couldn't trace it. They ended up having to compress it as a band-aid fix, and this among other problems they had with the recording and mixing resulted in the band hating the record (think it sounds great, but I don't know what it was supposed to sound like).

Is there a situation where some music just won't go on vinyl? I can imagine with electronica, or whatever, that you could have a really 'harsh' artificial waveform, or clipped bass, that just won't 'fit' on vinyl. It's hard to get people to talk about the limitations of vinyl, but I'm interested.

 

[Redo]

If you listen to Steely Dan's recordings, they are so incredibly pristine you almost wonder how they made it so pure in the mid 70's... I would imagine they would love digital because of all the freedom.


And yes, there are plenty of limitations with vinyl. Producing and Mastering studios used to have to work quite hard to get around some analog limitations. In the digital age, there's hardly any limitations.

 

[Meyvn]

Vinyl's frequency response will always be short of what digital is capable of; it's in their nature. The argument of quality is not about frequency bandwidth. It's about simple purity of what is recorded. Analog requires no conversion to and from digital, and is not done in the same sense of units that digital is, so its sheer resolution is fundamentally superior; it's arguable that we've come to the point where that fact is negligible, but I personally don't think it is just yet. At any rate, now that digital recording is so popular, obviously that advantage of vinyl is now gone on 99% of modern recordings, but on older recordings, or the few newer ones that are purely analog, it's just going to be superior in resolution, the same way that film is better than HD cam.

 

[Redo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Meyvn /img/forum/go_quote.gif Analog requires no conversion to and from digital, and is not done in the same sense of units that digital is, so its sheer resolution is fundamentally superior;

There's lots of conversions going on from analog to analog forms. The mastering of multi-track tapes alone degrade quality, and furthurmore the conversion from the mastered tapes to vinyl has a substantial EQ'ing that leave lots of vinyl enthuisiests searching for thousand dollar preamps (and beyond).

With digital, once captured via the ADC, it's a pristine copy that never is modified (unless some flunky doesn't save the base file seperate). Not only that, but there's no waveform limitations in the digital capture. Sure it has to be reconverted, but in a sense, it's much more pure of a waveform then one on a vinyl.

 

[trains are bad]

It is possible that, any waveforms that a vinyl record couldn't reproduce, a speaker couldn't either. I don't know if that's the case though.

I have thought about the whole RIAA thing. Most audiophiles absolutes shun eq, but then, what exactly is a pre-amp...

 

[infinitesymphony]

Some other limitations and problems with vinyl, from Wikipedia:

Quote:

Vinyl records do not break easily, but the soft material is easily scratched. Vinyl readily acquires a static charge, attracting dust that is difficult to remove completely. Dust and scratches cause audio clicks and pops. In extreme cases, they can cause the needle to skip over a series of grooves, or worse yet, cause the needle to skip backwards, creating a "locked groove" that repeats the same 1.8 seconds of track (at 33⅓ rpm) over and over again. Locked grooves were not uncommon and were even heard occasionally in broadcasts. Vinyl records can be warped by heat, improper storage, or manufacturing defects such as excessively tight plastic shrinkwrap on the album cover. A small degree of warp was common, and allowing for it was part of the art of turntable and tonearm design. "Wow" (once-per-revolution pitch variation) could result from warp, or from a spindle hole that was not precisely centered. ... A further limitation of the record is that with a constant rotational speed, the quality of the sound may differ across the width of the record because the inner groove modulations are more compressed than those of the outer tracks. The result is that inner tracks have distortion that can be noticeable at higher recording levels. 7" singles were typically poorer quality for a variety of the reasons mentioned above, and in the 1970s the 12" single, played at 45 rpm, became popular for DJ use and for fans and collectors. Another problem arises because of the geometry of the tonearm. Master recordings are cut on a recording lathe, where a sapphire stylus moves radially across the blank, suspended on a straight track and driven by a lead screw. Most turntables use a pivoting tonearm, introducing side forces and pitch and azimuth errors, and thus distortion in the playback signal. Various mechanisms were devised in attempts to compensate, with varying degrees of success.

 

[tom hankins]

Quote:

Originally Posted by trains are bad /img/forum/go_quote.gif Some of us know that vinyl can sound really good. I don't dispute that at all, it's my favorite format at the moment. However I was reading an essay by a Steely Dan member, who was describing the history of Katy Lied, and he said that they used a condensor mic too close to a drum, which generated a waveform that had transients so sharp that a vinyl needle couldn't trace it. They ended up having to compress it as a band-aid fix, and this among other problems they had with the recording and mixing resulted in the band hating the record (think it sounds great, but I don't know what it was supposed to sound like). Is there a situation where some music just won't go on vinyl? I can imagine with electronica, or whatever, that you could have a really 'harsh' artificial waveform, or clipped bass, that just won't 'fit' on vinyl. It's hard to get people to talk about the limitations of vinyl, but I'm interested.

Dance, trance and electronica in general sound great on vinyl! I am not going to debate which sounds better, Vinyl or digital. I have decided that vinyl is more enjoyable to me. They sound different. These are generalizations but, on the average vinyl gives me a little more depth in soundstage and the bass is almost always more texured and detailed. Of course everything is recording dependent, but in most cases I like the vinyl version better. My sources do both very well. I find I listen to a MUCH LARGER variety of music on vinyl that I would not even start to buy on CD. Another thing I have learned using vinyl is to take albums as a whole more than as a bunch of songs. I rarely skip songs or listen to less than the whole album from begining to end(at least one side).
Anyway I'm off track here. I have found no type of music that vinyl (or digital) does not do very good.

 

[Jon L]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tom hankins /img/forum/go_quote.gif Another thing I have learned using vinyl is to take albums as a whole more than as a bunch of songs. I rarely skip songs or listen to less than the whole album from begining to end(at least one side).

Yeah, I was the same way when I still played vinyl. But looking back, it was b/c I lacked that extra few % of energy to get off my couch, walk over to the record player, lift the needle up and put it down on the next song I wanted.

It's so much easier to change tracks with a remote in hand, so people just have less tolerance to sitting there and listening to songs they may not necessarily play on purpose.

Going a couple of steps further, I now have full excess to hundreds of Gigs of lossless files right from my couch using my wireless LCD as remote. Now I have even less tolerance to songs I would rather not waste time on. And you know what? That's a good thing. I don't even have enough time to listen to songs I REALLY NEED to listen to...

 

[tom hankins]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jon L /img/forum/go_quote.gif Yeah, I was the same way when I still played vinyl. But looking back, it was b/c I lacked that extra few % of energy to get off my couch, walk over to the record player, lift the needle up and put it down on the next song I wanted. It's so much easier to change tracks with a remote in hand, so people just have less tolerance to sitting there and listening to songs they may not necessarily play on purpose. Going a couple of steps further, I now have full excess to hundreds of Gigs of lossless files right from my couch using my wireless LCD as remote. Now I have even less tolerance to songs I would rather not waste time on. And you know what? That's a good thing. I don't even have enough time to listen to songs I REALLY NEED to listen to...

I agree its easier to change songs with a CDP. Thats a given.
Dont confuss my enjoying listening to the whole albums from start to finish with a lack of energy, or not enough time to listen to every song. I have plenty of both.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Until I recently, I've always believed (based upon listening) that LP had the edge.
Have to say that I now think that some of the newer CD players really are VERY close to vinyl on sonic grounds.
For example, I've heard a high end Kuzma against an Opus CD21, and thought they were VERY similar.

 

[trains are bad]

One of the advantages of vinyl, for me, is that its relative inconvenience tends to tame my musical impatience.

 

[drarthurwells]

Originally Posted by Meyvn:
Analog requires no conversion to and from digital, and is not done in the same sense of units that digital is, so its sheer resolution is fundamentally superior;

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redo /img/forum/go_quote.gif There's lots of conversions going on from analog to analog forms. The mastering of multi-track tapes alone degrade quality, and furthurmore the conversion from the mastered tapes to vinyl has a substantial EQ'ing that leave lots of vinyl enthuisiests searching for thousand dollar preamps (and beyond). With digital, once captured via the ADC, it's a pristine copy that never is modified (unless some flunky doesn't save the base file seperate). Not only that, but there's no waveform limitations in the digital capture. Sure it has to be reconverted, but in a sense, it's much more pure of a waveform then one on a vinyl.

I think Meyvn's point of sampling is an important one. Digital CDs use about 1/20 of the information of analog - the digital waveform is a small sample of the original material whereas the analog waveform is relatively whole.

The brain tries to convert the small sample of digital information to the full analog information, and is generally able to fairly well create the illusion of the analog but it is actually incomplete.

 

[markl]

Quote:

If you listen to Steely Dan's recordings, they are so incredibly pristine you almost wonder how they made it so pure in the mid 70's...

Man, that was the peak of analog recording, it doesn't get any better than mid-late 70's. It's been all down-hill since then...

 

[ssportclay]

How does the poem go? Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.Humpty Dumpty had a big fall.Anyway, you get the idea.In order for Hi-Fidelity to happen,the signal leaving the microphone must look exactly like the signal entering the speakers.Any alteration of that signal is undesirable.Running a signal through a digital converter an back again destroys the signal beyond repair,never to be fully recovered.Although digital is capable of sounding pleasent,vinyl rules and is worth the extra trouble for those who really care.

 

[tom hankins]

Quote:

Originally Posted by markl /img/forum/go_quote.gif Man, that was the peak of analog recording, it doesn't get any better than mid-late 70's. It's been all down-hill since then...

Mark, the new vinyl is just as good. The 45rpms even better.