Good to hear Mitch. More to the point, I was very shocked this evening, after running out of Guiness, to discover that I have also run out of Scotch!! Having consoled myself with a large vodka and coke I shall now retire for the night and wish you all happy listening.
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Thanks. Had a bit of vodka myself tonightā¦Jewel of Russia - Ultra. It is the finest vodka I have ever experienced. (and Iāve had my share!)
Nothing so grand here Iām afraid. Smirnoff. Jewel would be wasted on me though after a few pints of the Black 
Joni has now signed off for the evening so Iām done for the day. Vaccinated and happy. Good health all and good night.
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For me, always Russian Vodkas. I havenāt tried that one yet tho ā¦
Itās logical to assume that if a 552 has a tape monitor circuit so the S1 should have
I call myself analog music as a reminiscence to the old days of tape recordings and Vinyl and miss those days of my youth.
In fact AC/DC latest album has been recorded in the studio on Tape and sounds fantastic
Yet though I chose to put my money on a fully digital front end and havenāt bought a vinyl in years.
Also I find analogue recorded albums, even the latest one from AC/DC to sound a bit soft and rolled off compared to the digitally recorded ones. Analogue recordings also suffer at the frequency extremes to my ears.
Digital playback used to be inferior but that was 40 years ago.
Nowadays itās just superb and so enjoyable
I would try to various tweaks to make the streamer sound betterā¦ like chord 8switch and some good entry level Ethernet cables from Chord cablesā¦ before modifying the statement
To put it bluntlyā¦ I would not take a Reel to Reel machine even if it was for freeā¦ thatās how deeply satisfied I am with my digital playbackā¦
I donāt mean to say that the hundreds of tapes are useless but digital as @Naim.Marketing says herself has come a very long way in the last 40 years
As a fan of AC/DC and analogue recordings well I wish they had recorded it digitally as I think it could have sounded even better that way
An example of such a recording is the Tesla live album released last year.
I own the AC/DC live album on Vinyl as it sounds truly great. But the one I play and enjoy is the Tidal version through my Chord Mojo in my car on long commutesā¦ and I never once thought wish I could play the Vinyl in my car.
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Fair enoughā¦tho vinyl in the car would be very interesting on a bumpy roadā¦
As to my experience, playing record on my TT (Kuzma Stabi XL DC) compared to the same recording played on my CD555, one of the finest CD players ever made, nearly always leaves me with a reaffirmed appreciation for the quality of vinyl. There is a reason why so many artists prefer to record in analog today.
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The Jewel of Russia - Ultra (they also make a Classic, good, but not great), is so smooth with a delicious perfumed scent. You can easily drink it warm while thirsty!
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I decided recently to come back more to vinyl, because I find it sounding more real vs digital. My dilemma was , since some years, to choose between a top digital source or top vinyl, as a primary source.
Would be more keen to prefer digital, for convenience, price of albums, quickness in the purchaseā¦
But for serious listening, I am more involved with analogue. Itās not about softness, or coloration, or nostalgiaā¦but really on the realness of the sound.
I have heard the best digital sources available today, but I find it has not reached, yet, what a great vinyl rig can do.
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I could not agree with you more. I wish I could play some 45RPM audiophile LPs for you on my rig. Iām not trying to boast; I just think you would absolutely melt into the sound.
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If you have heard a properly setup Mscaler Dave with the price appropriate streamer and cables it sounds really fantastic to my ears
Maybe on Direct A/B still not exactly the sound of a top Vinyl rig but to my ears I prefer the Chord Combo for the sheer prat and musicality
I know a friend who sold his LP12 when he compared the same recordings on his Dave. And that was without the Mscaler
As I said the chord mojo was enough to stop my vinyl purchases
I have summarised my feelings about this many times, in many waysā¦
If I listen to digital and then analogue, during the analogue I think 'thatās better, much more involvingā¦If I do it the other way around, I think the digital is 'nice, but not as really.
Others will think the opposite,and thatās no problem for me.
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I did an interesting little experiment about 10 years ago which I wrote about on the old forum. I had Neil Youngās Harvest in 24/192 and played it from my Naim DAC and XPS2 to be recorded on one of my Revox recorders, this one a particularly sweet sounding very early 77A (A77) 2 track recorder, on a reasonably fresh BASF Studio Master PEM468 reel at 7 1/2 ips. Over the course of a couple of months I then played it to various friends and visitors and asked them what they thought. I also played the files straight from the DAC as a comparison. What was fascinating was that the majority seemed to prefer the reel playback. Go figureā¦
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I once read a theory that the brain āabsorbsā music better when the eye can see some movement - at a concert you watch the players. With vinyl you can watch the platter spin and R2R is even more mesmerising.
I do own a Revox G36 and some other machines, but they get very little use these days.
Except in this case, all the equipment is positioned behind the sofas. All you see are the speakers. I prefer not to see any other kit when Iām listening to music.
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Richard,
Perhaps like some of the newer TVs, where some people find the pictures to be ātoo sharpā, to the point of being uncomfortable (also being sat too close?), the same may apply to music replay, where being a tad less aggressive (best adjective I can think of), suits the ear better?..I think weāve been here before!
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Possibly. I donāt know though, as the sound direct from the DAC was certainly anything but harsh, sharp or aggressive.
Anyway, I donāt wish to derail Mitchās thread, but I just wanted to say that I do understand the appeal of running tape recorders. Tape is just good fun too.
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Well having read all off the above posts I conclude that naim are bending over backwards to help mitch which is very nice to see, and the forum are trying to help as much as possible, and that analog still rules, all good yep yep
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Is the solution a second R2R machine on your other system to do the recording, and leave the main one for playback? Double the R2R joy!
The sound from digital to my mind is certainly very ācleanā. I think the closest I have come to record (which I do miss occasionally) is DSD.
Iāll admit however I dont understand the appeal from recording from one format to another. People who record their records to harddrive, I just dont understand it lol.
Not reallyā¦ digital does modify the original audio when reconstructed. Remember digital to analogue conversion is ultimately an in exact process, and choices are to be made on how the audio is reconstructed, ergo the audio is modified by the method reconstruction. This is why DACs sound different and focus on different characteristics.
The way I see it unless the entire chain is analogue, which is exceedingly rare then vinyl or analogue tape is simply part of the digital to analogue reconstruction process.
I do think there is a naive view that so called ādigitalā sound is exactā¦ itās anything but by definition ā¦ but it can be stored, transported and replicated without degradationā¦ which is its real advantage.
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