computerparts
100+ Head-Fier
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- Aug 12, 2006
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Quote:
A needledrop just means digitized vinyl. A basic USB turntable will do the job, but won't sound so hot. The best way to do it is to use a high-end turntable and send the analog out via phono preamp to a high quality sound card. If you record at 24/96 or even 24/192, you can get closer to the true analog waveform than 16/44 allows. There's also room for frequencies above the 22KHz cap on CDs. Vinyl doesn't have the frequency range of SACD or DVD-A (particularly LF range), but I've looked at digitized vinyl recordings in a spectrum analyzer and there's often sound well into 30KHz.
I've done some comparisons of CDs ripped to FLAC vs. vinyl in FLAC at 16/44, and the difference can be night/day in favor of the vinyl.
Ah ok, thanks for the clarification. Yes I have tried some vinyl flacs in my setup. Although they did sometimes sound better than their pure digital counterparts, the final sound still depended on the dac to determine the quality. There is some bad recorded vinyl out there in which their digital counterpart was actually recorded better, Nirvana comes to mind. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that 22khz cap only apply to dacs and players that employ digital filtering?
Anyhow I haven't tried any needledrops in the new setup, but to be honest, I don't feel a need to do so either. I will say the AN dac has taken everything I thought I knew about digital and turned it upside down. I can't believe an almost unprocessed and unfiltered digital signal actually sounds very close if not identical to vinyl. I say almost unprocessed because I'm sure my transport is still doing some kind of processing. Eventually, I'm going to hunt down one of the AN transports that lets the signal flow through completely unmolested.