Eye opener Vinyl vs digital

I do agree so much!!! Vinyl brings more fund and very harmonic distortionsm a gift to the human ear.

180 Gramm LPs are not better than Vinyl with 140 Gr or 120 Gr

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Thatā€™s fair.

Equally, sometimes tatty vinyl with a few clicks still engages me more than a new and probably remastered expensive replacement, though that may be my earsā€™ fault.

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Youā€™re all wrong, 8 track tapes are the best.

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Until that clunk comes alongā€¦

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The pops and clicks never bothered me in playing records. When the music begins they arenā€™t really noticeable.

I do understand that playing records is a commitment but I certainly believe that itā€™s the best sounding medium that Iā€™ve heard so far. Iā€™ve never heard reel to reel analogue tape so canā€™t comment on that.

The better record players are also very expensive. In fact the entire hobby is expensive for me. I still pick and choose the records that I want to own and slowly build on my collection but CDs are far more cost effective and most of all is streaming.

For anybody who chooses not to commit to vinyl I completely understand. You can achieve an exceptional sound from streaming and CD.

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i know I canā€™t talk with some of my typos - but I really couldnā€™t understand this.

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My opinion, based upon declarations such as yours, is that some people can not hear the difference. To you, and those like you, digital sounds as real/natural as analogue (I am not talking about modern LPs which are basically CD-to-vinyl).

What do you mean by ā€œand those like youā€? If you mean those who prefer digital, youā€™re wrong as, at least to some of us, good digital sounds more natural than most vinyl.

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My point exactly. Iā€™m not claiming digital doesnā€™t sound better to you, only that if your hearing (ears, hearing centre in the brain) perceived recorded sound the same as I and those like me, you would perceive that digital music doesnā€™t sound real, or as real as pure analogue does.

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Iā€™m not so fortunate. My hifi journey began when vinyl was dominant and the clicks and pops drove me to distraction at times. One disc of orchestral music I had at the time had a slow movement with a key and very quiet passage and a click right in the middle of it. When I tried to listen to it, I found myself anticipating the click which took away my emotional connection with the music. Even new records eventually succumbed to the dreaded noise problem and I ended up hardly listening to recorded music. Digital eventually rescued me and I havenā€™t looked back.

Other folkā€™s stories will be different, of course, and thatā€™s great. Variety is the spice of life and all that. My only plea is that each side on the vinyl/digital debate respects and tries not to dismiss or devalue the experience of people on the other side. Hereā€™s hoping.

Roger

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Yes I agree not to dismiss any medium. That wasnā€™t my intention with this discussion.

I completely understand, if I listened to a lot of music with quiet passages i would also react in that way. Itā€™s all a big compromise right. I have a purist approach even though itā€™s not for everybody and when you compare the differences most people, even audiophiles wonā€™t care for the difference. Personally I am willing to put up with the inconvenience of playing records, deal with the noisy click n pops because itā€™s my ultimate reference in terms of sound reproduction.

Having said that Iā€™m not siding with any particular medium. As I said before, I will stream music most of the time and only listen to CD and Vinyl when I want the absolute best sound reproduction because Iā€™m a lazy guy. Plus I really like being able to jump from one song to another using my iphone.

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That is simply stating the (blindingly)obvious. Precisely the same can be said of those who perceive vinyl to sound better than digital. Given that a lot of vinyl was recorded digitally it is clearly not digital that is negative to them, unless they dislike the sound of all that were recorded digitally even before knowing that fact, but how vinyl modifies the sound is positive to them.

Indeed, and how people can say that clicks and pops donā€™t disturb beats me.

That said, with a good clean of the record to remove any dirt sometimes helps and of course owning a great MC cartridge like Akiva or similar is a benefit. Sometimes records cannot be saved and thatā€™s the way it is with vinyl

Nearly every LP now, and most since 1982, include some digital processing. It is for that reason that I have sold nearly all of those I owned, including the expensive MoFi one-step records, because they do not sound as real (on my system anyway) as my older vinyl from the 50ā€™s-70ā€™s. There are a few companies like fone, electronic recording co., and earlier Acoustic Sounds that were recorded pure analogue (however AP is now using digital masters for at least some of their recordings). Most of my records are near mint and do not have clicks and pops. Granted, my analogue LP playback system is very expensive and outside the reach of most audiophiles, and that may account for why it is immediately apparent whenever I play a digital to vinyl recording, but some people on this site have equally expensive digital playback gear and swear that digital sounds more real to them than pure analogue hence my belief that different people hear differently (if they didnā€™t, then one of us is lying to keep from getting depressed over how much they have spent).

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Also not so expensive digital

And/or they listen to music differently, and/or simply have a different taste in the presentation of recorded music. The question of how people listen to music is an interesting one that crops up from time to time. In my case, whilst sometimes I might choose to pick out particular instruments to follow the themes they are playing, in most i stances I simply let myself become immersed in the sound, though quite commonly with music having vocals I may choose to focus on the vocals. These for me are the same whether recorded or live, though with recorded as it is the same performance 10s, 100s of times over how I listen to a particular recording is not necessarily a constant.

Iā€™ve recently resurrected my HiFi and upgraded some components.
Briefly : NDX / 282 / 300DR / Hi-Cap, Thorens TD160S, SME + Rega phono stage. Dynaudio Heritage Specials. I stream Tidal through Roon.

The Thorens came out of the loft after 35 years in storage. Had it serviced and a new Ortofon cartridge fitted.
My Vinyl collections dates back to the 70ā€™s and 80ā€™s. While itā€™s quite nostalgic to listen to the albums of my youth, thereā€™s no doubt in my mind that the digital source is far better. By which I mean the sound is much bigger, more 3D , better definition, greater seperation. Just better in every way.

That said I recognise that my Record Deck may not be on the same level as the digital source.

This is the most likely reason. It would be easy to improve on but it can get expensive :grinning:

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Yep, even if I just went with a Naim Phono Stage Iā€™m probably looking at 4k, new. Preowned may be a better way to goā€¦ But part of me thinks I could put that towards an NDS/555.

I have to say that I find Tidal MQA recordings absolutely amazing and struggle to believe Vinyl could get close to that without significant investment. So from a ā€˜bang for your buckā€™ perspective the streamer upgrade would seem to be the best path for me.

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You may prefer digital. Itā€™s not a crime after all :sunglasses:. My sources are roughly the same standard. I prefer the sound vinyl can give me but tbh most of the time I stream. If you are not convinced re vinyl you would be wise to invest in your digital front end and keep the Thorens as a bit of occasional fun.

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