Are you saying that these re masters are not available except on vinyl?
Iâve had a new cartridge fitted onto my Aro 2 and with only 20 hours play on it iâm in heaven. I too have an NDX 2/XPS DR which i like a lot but unfortunately itâs not being played much in recent days. ÂŁ1,220 for a new cartridge is money very well spent i feel and it comes with a 24 month warranty.
Oh, now to put anther record on 
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I forgot to say Congratulations on your new TT. Weâve been on such a similar journey.
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Thank you marcusman. Purchasing the Solstice turntable has been a fascinating experience for me. I never knew my current system could sound so good. Music has become so exciting again and being able to go to my local record shop and purchase the music i really love, even more so.
Long may this journey continue 
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Time to start a new thread: Solstice with a record clamp, without it, with an isolation turntable shelf, without it, with, without, and shake it all about.
The tongue in cheek rooster.
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Bruss - Are you saying that these re masters are not available except on vinyl?
Yes, I am - see: Fleetwood Mac (Rhino High Fidelity)
And this is far from an isolated case. The same is true too of issues like the Analogue Productions Series: Vinyl Records, SACDs, DVD Audio, Audiophile Equipment|Acoustic Sounds
The vast majority of these premium issues cut from the original master tapes by people like Kevin Gray and Chris Bellman come lavishly packaged with track notes, additional photographs and booklets and are to the best of my knowledge usually only available on vinyl.
They might not be cheap to acquire, but they remain the ultimate way to hear the album in the absence of a reel to reel release - and the difference isnât trivial either in most cases. The Rhino Hi-Fi series for example has been a genuine source of delight over the past couple of years.
JonathanG
Thanks, that makes perfect sense. I am just surprised that they are not being released in digital format- even at a premium price.
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There wouldnât be much point when such releases are all analog with special attention given to the best quality mastering for vinyl, pressing quality, etc.
For me there would be every point. It isnât the vinyl that adds to the sound. It is the re mastering. The vinyl production process is amazing and the clarity that can be achieved is impressive, but the remastering is where the magic happens. If the analog output can be electronically transferred to vinyl it shouldnât be beyond the wit of man to transfer it to digital.
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But the remastering here is by vinyl experts from analogue tapes specifically for vinyl production. I would guess that all these releases have already been remastered for digital production, probably more than once and certainly originally from the analogue tapes (hence the ADD spec).
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Digital sources in the budget range are good until you hear a very properly sorted DAC. I now find budgets DACs grating and unlistenable. Please note Iâm not a hifi snob.
Record players on the other hand at the budget end donât offend me. Even something like Rega p6 or p9 which arenât the most expensive tables sound good to me and definitely not unlistenable.
To answer the question at hand, I think record players are just as good of an option as a brilliant digital source. Not nearly as convenient but sonically brilliant as well and the hobby of collecting records can become addictive.
Iâm format agnostic really and have no doubt a nice streamer can sound fantastic (as can a nice turntable) but where vinyl is increasingly pulling ahead in my view is with these superior masterings of classic albums. Iâve compared them to safety masters running on Studer studio machines on the same tracks at my palâs house on his SME Model 60 and itâs genuinely astonishing how close they get (and how much better they are than standard CD or Tidal streams). The issue is that theyâre fairly expensive to collect in any number, but thereâs no denying that if you have the means to purchase them weâre in an era where vinyl simply is the superior format now, if you really want to hear what was on the original master.
The Kevin Gray 45 RPM cut of Rumours is another utterly jaw dropping record. I sat there running âDreamsâ and âThe Chainâ back to back against the safety master and you really can only just hear the difference - a tiny bit more openess on vocals, a little more metallic sizzle to cymbals but close, oh so close itâs mesmerising and really transports you back to Sausalito in 1976âŚ
Thereâs a presence to the instruments on the recording that simply isnât there on the Tidal Stream or any of the CD versions I have.
Iâve pretty much given up buying CDâs nowadays as although cheap they rarely sound any better than the Tidal Stream if theyâre from the same master. Where the only available Tidal stream has been remastered as with the Stone Roses debut album and the dynamic range has been squashed then I did recently buy an original CD reissue which has superior dynamics, although by all accounts there is a superior 45RPM vinyl release out there which is hard to obtain and wildly expensive secondhand.
As you say though Bruss, itâs not really down to any intrinsic superiority of analogue replay, but more the fact that the best mastering jobs are now being done in the analogue domain for analogue reissue that is short changing those without turntables.
I think the safest policy if you want the highest fidelity is in fact to run vinyl, CD and streaming hardware so at least you can choose the format that offers the closest approach to the original sound. Iâve never really seen much point buying albums that were originally recorded digitally as expensive vinyl issues though which pretty much rules out most pop/rock recorded since the mid 1990âs. The joy for me has been buying premium pressings of older legacy material like Fleetwood Mac.
Tango In the Night is another interesting album. I gather it was originally recorded to 24 track analogue, but in fact they produced all version of the album on all formats from a Sony digital master until Rhino issued the first all analogue version of the album on vinyl earlier this year. I have compared my original 1987 vinyl against Tidal and my original issue CD and now the later all analogue Rhino release and I have mixed feelings on that one. The album always had a very glassy/glossy sheen to it in all previous releases, but the new Rhino AAA vinyl sounds much warmer but to a slightly unnatural degree I think. Itâs academically interesting, but I canât help feeling it also sounds less clear on some of the tracks than the digital versions or even my original vinyl issue so the juryâs out on which is best!
JonathanG
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Genuinely interested in how on earth you get hold of tape safety masters! Does he work at one of the tape vaults?!!!
I would agree though that the biggest challenge by far regardless of format is getting a decent master these days. It a shame that companies seem to think that thereâs only a vinyl audiophile market out there and that if they cut a 24/96 or even 24/48 audiophile digital master at the same time, they might increase their sales. Also another problem with hi-res digital is generally there is no information at all about where the master used came from. Itâs just a lottery.
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I think that ia the problem with streaming. It isnât often clear as to which edition of an album is being made available. It is getting better as the streaming platforms start to cater for hi res files, but a hires stream of a low res master is pointless.
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Quite - the main reason I end up buying a high res version on Qobuz is simply because itâs often cheaper. Anyway⌠let the pops and crackles resume 
Hi Ian, he has a friend at one of the tape storage facilities in Europe and periodically when they are having a clear out his contact there gets in touch with him and offers him some at no doubt a very high price!
Itâs an astonishing experience for sure to hear them.
The other time I have certainly had my mind blown was at PMC Studios in London at their Atmos demo (PMC have done a lot of Atmos mixing work for various organisations). I came away from that convinced that Atmos is the future for high end digital and speaking to the engineer there he felt the same way too. It allows so much bandwidth and fabulous precision with instrumental placement. Crucially at its best it gives that âin the roomâ feeling that you get playing back original or safety masters. Itâs just a pity that high end streamers donât seem to have HDMI Atmos output to drive a multichannel system easily (Atmos down-mixes to the speaker configuration you have automatically).
Iâve never heard digital sources sound more lifelike though than that day, it was simply out of this world. You may find the following video interview we did of interest (hope itâs OK to post here) but I think itâs relevant to the discussion and not advertising, merely an interesting technical interview.
JonathanG
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Would happily discuss further, but this doesnât feel like the right thread to be on with that! Perhaps a new âIs Atmos worth it?â thread?
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I think the future of ATMOS is more nuanced. Being the future of audio in a predominantly 2 speaker world, even with downmixing is a tough path to go down and there are few audiophile ATMOS capable DACs that specialise in ATMOS in, stereo analogue out.
Now as for the future of broadcast audio, I can totally see it. Being object-based audio rather than multichannel, broadcasters have found it allows for a large leap in surround fidelity while managing to be more efficient that multichannel 5,1 or 7.1 at the same time.
Itâs ability to encapsulate ambient dialogue in a single channel space is certainly a leap ahead of what went before. Consider programming that is predominantly spoken albeit in different environment like a echoey corridor or outside. Those subtle cues in voice behaviour would previous require all channels with aspect of voice echo, reverb and so forth discretely recorded on each channel track. The same number of tracks as an action packed blockbuster. But ATMOS allows a single voice âobjectâ when encapsulates itâs own behaviour for location and how diffuse or localised it is. So it can do far more with less. As most broadcast content is actually quite simple, content providers can deliver the more advanced object steering of ATMOS while also significantly saving bandwidth. That really is a game changer for both the consumer and the provider.
For high end consumer audio though, the engineers can be excited as they like. The 2 channel consumer is going to struggle to understand the benefit enough to generate demand to a degree where ATMOS enabled stereo DACs become the norm. As a technology that has been avaialable for over a decade now, I feel like if this was going to happen it would have by now.
Very interesting thoughts Feeling Zen and I suspect you may be right that given the technology has been around for perhaps a decade it would have happened by now if it was going to.
I guess I was coming from the perspective of a user who already has a high end stereo system integrated into an Atmos surround home cinema system. Now granted I havenât gone as far as putting speakers in the ceiling yet (largely because I plan to retire and move house within 3 years) but I certainly will install ceiling speakers once I am in my next house. So for now I am making do with a normal 5.1 type configuration.
The frustration for me is that Tidal offers thousands of tracks already mixed in Atmos which I can play for free, but I canât use them from my Naim NDX2 streamer. I could access them by plugging a laptop in to my AV amplifier via HDMI but thatâs not something I am terribly keen to do. The easiest solution for me would be for music streamers like the Naim to offer HDMI output to plug straight into my AV amp so I could seamlessly enjoy two channel stereo output direct into my Naim pre-amp or opt for Atmos replay via HDMI into my AV amp.
All multichannel music sources before have always required one to purchase new discs (quadraphonic vinyl or Blu-ray audio discs) to enjoy the benefits of true 3d sound fields, but for the first time ever accessing these Atmos mixes can be done without the need to buy any discs at all thanks to Tidal.
I guess the cheapish option would be to get an Apple TV box and maybe I should do that and just load Tidal on it. There does seem to be a market for Atmos music judging by how quickly Blu-ray music discs sell out and the prices they command on the secondhand market.
JonathanG
As someone who has ATMOS 7.2.4 at home, one major problem from an audiophile perspective is that this system is very close in cost to my 2 channel system. To do ATMOS with a similar level gear to my Naim PMC stereo setup would cost several times more⌠And there wouldnât be that many manufacturers to choose from at that level either. Imagine trying to scale up a hard earned 552 to a similar level preamp with 13 channels. Ouch.
The steering down to two speakers is the only viable audiophile option I suspect, but I donât feel like ATMOS is a game change with less than 4 speakers. And upending a room for surround was, is, and always will be pretty niche I expect.
So for many, I expect given the option of chasing this for music replay versus throwing money at a turntable, the latter seems more feasible in the home and more instantly gratifying.
Itâs not always how amazing a technology is (and certainly ATMOS has some incredible wow moments) but also how low or high the barrier is for the consumer to both get it (currently medium barrier) and to realise the benefits over what they have (currently Mt. Everest high barrier).
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