Why do LPs sound better than CDs?

AsSiMiLaTeD

I've seen lots of discussion around here that pretty much just assumes that LPs are superior to CDs. Why? What is it about LPs that make them better or CDs that make them worse?

If LPs are still the best sounding stuff, why did we migrate away from LPs for the mainstream public?

How do LPs compare to the new High Rez formats like SACD?

I'm thinking of getting into vinyl, but wanted to start with some answers to the above questions...Thanks guys...

Shell

I read an interview with Neil Young a couple of years ago and he said he could not stand the way his songs sounded on CD. He held back on releasing much of his stuff to CD. He said it lacked depth and he always felt like something was missing. Now that DVD-A format is out he said he was finally satisfied with the sound quality and is releasing his old stuff. Sorry I tried to find the article but was unable.

PolkThug

Originally posted by Polkmaniac
I've seen lots of discussion around here that pretty much just assumes that LPs are superior to CDs. Why? What is it about LPs that make them better or CDs that make them worse?

If LPs are still the best sounding stuff, why did we migrate away from LPs for the mainstream public?

How do LPs compare to the new High Rez formats like SACD?

I'm thinking of getting into vinyl, but wanted to start with some answers to the above questions...Thanks guys...

LP's capture the whole analog sound waves. With CD's we bastardize the original analog signal by taking a digital sample. When you take a "sample" you lose a lot of the music. New, SACD/DVD-A have higher sampling rates, so less of the original analog sound waves are lost.

Regards,
PolkThug

steveinaz

Somebody all ready stole my idea for a turntable that reads the groove of a record with a combo of 3 lasers...****. Analog sound with no wear & tear, best of both worlds...

This TT still needs some work, from what I read in Stereophile. Apparently, if the album isn't immaculantly clean and in near-perfect condition it makes some strange "tones" in response to dust/fingerprints/scratches, etc.

F1nut

I'll stick with SACD and upsampled CD's after my lastest demo with a 9k TT and about 50k worth of gear, vinyl failed to impress me once again.

hoosier21

Originally posted by steveinaz
Somebody all ready stole my idea for a turntable that reads the groove of a record with a combo of 3 lasers...****. Analog sound with no wear & tear, best of both worlds...

This TT still needs some work, from what I read in Stereophile. Apparently, if the album isn't immaculantly clean and in near-perfect condition it makes some strange "tones" in response to dust/fingerprints/scratches, etc.

That was a horrible review of that TT, it had a few "bugs", the worst was like you said, it saw a piece of dust like it was a boulder, so instead of a small snap it gave off a loud POP. And not to mention the frigging cost of it.

shack

Originally posted by F1nut
I'll stick with SACD and upsampled CD's after my lastest demo with a 9k TT and about 50k worth of gear, vinyl failed to impress me once again.

Ah...another kindred spirit in the world of vinyl audiophiledom...I was beginning to think I was alone here.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Okay, so what is sampling? I see that we take a digital sample when making CDs, but what does that mean really? Does anyone have a good article you can point me to?

thehaens@cox.net

For a good article on sampling, and what it is check out http://www.adireaudio.com/tech_papers/cd_sampling.htm

The problem you are going to find if you really want to get into 2 channel audio is that you are going to spend a lot of money. Personnaly I enjoy my old LP's. And I enjoy them on a mediocre vintage sony turntable. I auditioned a really good high end Linn turntable at Hi Fi Heaven years ago. To find out just what I was missing from making the switch to CD. I brought the same artist CD and LP to the showroom and listened. The LP did sound better, more open, you could literally hear each and every instrument as if you were in a sound room. However, I could never mimmick this in my home with my current set up. A hi end set up in the analog world could easily set you back tens of thousands of dollars. They had cartridges for the turntable that were upwards of 5 thousand a piece. Then throw in a couple for the stylus, another 4-5 for the Linn turntable and you can easily see that this is a hobby better left for the rich. That is if you really want the best. Otherwise, just buy a turn table. Music Hall makes a good one for about 500.00. Plug it in, and enjoy the vinyl.

nemos2

I am wondering if the LP vs CD debate is similar to the SS vs Tube amp question. It seems that both the tube and LP camp share some of the same opnions, and make similar comments as to the difference between the options. Comments like " more open, more warmth" are often seen when talk turns to tubes and LP. The quesiton for me would be if they (LP and tubes) are a better option, then why are there fewer options in those catagories?

I have never heard tube stuff, and only have a few LP's and no player. so......I do not have any real first hand knowledge.

The counter point would be look at the wild popularity of the MP3 format, which is even more compressed and "sampled" than the CD format, yet most of the country does not care, or does not hear the difference.

Food for thought.....

thehaens@cox.net

I guess you have to really hear it. I am not sure if warmth or open is what it actually is, sort of like a cigar or wine afficianodo explaining to me what the cigar or wine characteristics are, if I like it I will smoke it, don't care if it is woody, earthy, buttery smooth.......... But it does sound different. And the only way to describe the difference would be, well...open and warm....Trust me when I say that I am not a 2-Channel Audiophile as some are. Before I forget, I would like to comment on you Mp3. It is wildly populare because 1) it is compressed, smaller, making it tolerable to download over the internet. 2) It is easily downloaded over the internet. 3)It is convenient to load 160 or so songs on a disc. But to say you can't sound the difference, you must be listening to them over your factory car or a bose wave radio or something to that order. If you listen to the over a good home stereo, you will hear the difference. Both the highs, and especially the lows are severely attenutated. Take the challenge, take any of your CD's and make an MP3 at 128kbps. And listen to it over your stereo, all things being equal. You will hear the difference. As for fewer options for Tubes Vs. Solid State. This falls to Automation and getting the product out to the consumers for the mighty dollar. It is much cheaper and profitable, for companys to get a SS amp out, they can be less carefull throughout the process, from manufacturing to packing, to shipping. And quite truthfully more user friendly for the masses. Most people simply don't want to wait till a tube gets to operating temp before listening, although it only takes at longest a couple minutes. We are all about instant gratification. When we turn on the system, we want it to play now. Tube amps are getting more popular though. Some manufacturers like Mcintosh and Fosgate Labs are bringing new lines of Tubes to the table. . Maybe you should try and pick up a cheap tube amp on ebay. Even a 10 wpc amp should suffice. Take a listen and decide for yourself..

nemos2

Thehaens,

I just wanted to clarify,

I HATE THE MP3 FORMAT!

I can hear the difference very easily. On my setup, it is almost shameful to play an MP3. I do not have an mp3 ripped Cd's. OH well.. I do understand the appeal of the MP3 format, but I guess what I was trying to get at was that most people do not care about the quality of the sound.

As for the TUBE vs SS amps, correct me if I am wrong, a SS amp will be less likley to impart its own characteristics on the music, where as a tube amp really imparts its characteristics on the music. My basis for this statement comes from the fact that you change the tube and get a different sound, correct? So, tube amps distort ( although in a positive way by most accounts ) the music more than a good, well made SS amp does.

I am wondering if there is a pararell with the LP vs CD debate?

thehaens@cox.net

You left a very interesting conclusion. Being that if you change tubes you get a different sound. Or characteristics of the tube. This is true. However, I think this holds true to Solid State as well. Otherwise all SS components would sound the same. This certainly is not the case. So it is a good argument, but all components regardless of their make or model are going to have subtle changes, this is due to margins of +/- tolerances in the components the manufactures have. I personally don't have any tube amps anymore. I used an old Heathkit for a while, but had to change out the tubes twice in two years. The guy I bought it from said I may try letting it warm up longer. Plus, my main style of music is rock, guitar and bass driven music. So I don't think this helped out either.

madmax

If you are looking for convienience, portability, great bang for the buck, reasonable sound and no maintenence CD and solid state is the weapon of choice.

After you reach a certain plateau and cannot get your sound any better you have to jump the CD/SS ship. It is not worth it for most people. You have to have a real passion for it. Ask yourself this "would I give up a X to have better sound". Only the crazies will give up something else.
madmax

jesse_dyer

Is the idea that some how pressed vinyl is the end-all of audio. LPs can only be manufactured to within certain tolerances so, i.e., some groove is .5% deeper on one LP than on another. So there must be some maximum level of actual data that is being preserved in the LP (maybe it's incredibly good, but there is a point where, you know, all the atoms at least aren't the same on one record or another). As a corrolary, assuming that the original analog source is perfect and can be sampled perfectly, there must be some digital sampling rate/bit depth that contains more of the information. Using that metric does anybody know how "accurate" LPs are? I'm sure it varies quite a bit depending on whether it's an audiophile company or not, etc, but I'd be interested to know...

And in any case, if analog is the way to go, why hasn't some mad audiophile out there created the ultimate analogue format? Silver disk, tape, whatever there is simply no work being done in that arena as nearly as I can tell.

It's not like these things can't be done on a convenient silver disk since laser disks are analog...

My suspicion is that people like the way the inherent deficiencies of vinyl sound (calling it warm, open, etc), so those people would not be happier with a newer analog format so you might as well give up on those people and stick with better digital and wait for them to die

nemos2

Madmax,

Do you feel that the SACD / DVD-A formats provide some of the "depth" or sound that LP offers? Will this format do a better job of giving "the full picture" in the music.

I think that jesse_dryer has a point, I dont understand how the LP can sound better than a CD, other than the sampling issue. But how / why does the LP have a better sampling rate?

How closley does the sampling rate of DVD-A or SACD compare to that of a standard CD and then a LP?

therockman

To my ears, I do not like vinyl (anymore). I was raised in the days of vinyl, but I feel that they are limited in their reproduction capabilities, and they are to noisy. I much prefer SACD or DVD-A or even a well mastered redbook CD, (16 bit/44.1khz).

madmax

Originally posted by nemos2
Madmax,

Do you feel that the SACD / DVD-A formats provide some of the "depth" or sound that LP offers? Will this format do a better job of giving "the full picture" in the music.

I think that jesse_dryer has a point, I dont understand how the LP can sound better than a CD, other than the sampling issue. But how / why does the LP have a better sampling rate?

How closley does the sampling rate of DVD-A or SACD compare to that of a standard CD and then a LP?

My SACD/DVD-A deck is not the highest quality deck (pioneer DV-47Ai) so I can't really compare it to my TT therefore I can't answer your first question.

LP is a continuous output (analog) device. I guess you could say it has an infinite sample rate. CD's have a sample rate. An analog signal is sampled so many times a second and the results are encoded on the CD. This is only a general representation of what the analog signal looked like. When the CD is played the samples are fed into your CD player electronics and the representation of the analog signal is put back together as best it can be. A lot of this is up to whatever algorithm your CD player uses. It should be close to whatever the original analog signal was but a lot of it is guesses made by the algorithm. Along with the guesses you sometimes get jitter since time is not encoded in the sample data (they rely on the clock being perfect) and the internal processor clock cannot be absolutely perfect.

I may be wrong on the following sample rates but I'll give it a shot. Feel free to correct the numbers if you see an error. I think CD's sample a 16 bit word 44,100 times every second and DVD-A samples up to a 24 bit word 196,000 times. (??) Here is the theory: they say if you sample something twice as fast as you can hear then you won't hear the sampling. CD's are sampled at 44KHZ and people with the best hearing can only hear up to 20khz. DVD-A samples at 196 khz which is way way higher than you can hear. I think the problem comes in that sometimes noise in the audible range is created by the very fast sampling. It will certainly get better as technology moves along.

Here is a good analogy to the problem. If you are familiar with digital cameras then you may know that two cameras, both with the same resolution, may give different results. One is great and the other is terrible. Why is that when they both have the same number of pixels? It is because one camera gets most of the pixels right while the other one makes a lot of errors and gets the pixels wrong. The same thing can be said of audio samples.

Just my 0.02

madmax

PolkThug

Originally posted by madmax
Here is the theory: they say if you sample something twice as fast as you can hear then you won't hear the sampling. CD's are sampled at 44KHZ and people with the best hearing can only hear up to 20khz. DVD-A samples at 196 khz which is way way higher than you can hear.

I think the theory is mixing up two concepts, but I could be totally wrong, as I am just learning about this. I think the sampling rate is different from what frequencies you can hear. I think a higher sampling rate affects the accuracy of all recorded frequencies and not just the high end. The more times per second you can grab a sound 'bit', the better, no matter if it is a bass tone or a high treble tone. However, a high note might benefit a little more.

But, like I said, I don't know much about this stuff yet.

regards,
PolkThug

therockman

Actually, what Mad Max said was basically true. The Nyquist theorem indicates that the sampling rate of any data has to be at least twice the quantity that you want to represent. The theorem was written back in the 1930's when digital audio was not even a consideration, but the application to communcations and information retrieval was very significant. Thus, the rule that you have to sample any data at twice the recovery rate has it's application in digital audio by stating that the audio frequency that one wants to reproduce must be sampled at twice that rate. The statement that human beings only hear approximately 20,000 hertz bandwidth is only one factor in this equation, because there are many musical instruments that create a pure tone that often exceeds 50,000 hertz; the flute, the cymbals and many other instruments reach into the high 80,000 hertz region, even if human beings can't hear these octaves of sound.

The problem with the compact disc sampling the analog sound stream at 44.1 khz is that this sampling rate creates a situation where the resulting sound output has a "brickwall filter." This brickwall filter works to filter out all music and it's harmonic overtones and timbre at a deadflat 20,000 hertz. This brickwall filter can be sensed and adds an unneassarily harsh quality to the reproduced music. It has been proven time and time again that human beings can "sense" the harmonic overtones of music even up to the 40,000 hertz region, even if we can't hear pure tones at that frequency. The fact that a brickwall filter eliminates these harmonic overtones creates a situation where the reproduced music isn't as satisfying and natural as the live music or even it's analog counterpart.

Enter DVD-A and SACD. These new high-rez audio formats extend the frequency range well into the 40,000 hertz region and higher. Thus, these new medium can convey the whole analog signal that exists in the original master tape in such a way that it eliminates the need for the "brick wall" filter. Even DVD-A at the 24 bit 96khz sampling rate can reproduce music up to the 48,000 hertz region, well beyond the human being's hearing range, but high enough to reproduce the original overtones and timbre of the musical instruments.


The word length is a different story. A 16 bit compact disc only has 65.536 different voltage values to represent the original analog signal. A 24 bit word length has over 16.8 million different voltage values to represent the original analog music stream. Everybody knows that you can not represent every musical nuance with only 65,536 different voltage values, where as 16.8 million different voltage values allows you to reproduce the original musical stream much more accurately.


Rocky

therockman

Polk Thug, I must have been writing my last post when you wrote your last post. The sampling rate is only indicative of the highest frequency that you can reproduce, and does not effect anything else, (this is the Nyquist theorem). But if you read my last post, you can increase "resolution" and thus more accurately reproduce a musical signal (even in the bass region) by increasing the word length. This will give you more voltage values to represent the original sound stream, thus creating a more realistic reproduction of the original signal.


Rocky

madmax

Originally posted by therockman
To my ears, I do not like vinyl (anymore). I was raised in the days of vinyl, but I feel that they are limited in their reproduction capabilities, and they are to noisy.

Keep in mind that when I say I like vinyl I am talking about audiophile quality equipment, material and setup. Without really getting into it with all the associated setup and lots of cash or luck it is not very impressive. Analog can be much worse or much better than digital. If recorded, pressed and reproduced properly vinyl can truely match the original master. Once it does you can truely hear the difference. My system is on its way there but isn't yet. One I heard a month or so ago was truely there and I can tell you it put redbook CD's to shame. Forget the noise, colorations etc that people talk about with vinyl. There were none. Now, if I could just move mine to that point!

madmax

nemos2

Thanks therockman, you shed some light on the issue here...

I assumed that the CD format was only a "portion" of the picture on a true recording. SO.....the question is why did the CD format limit the amount of information but on the CD? My guess, CD's have a limit to the amount of data they can hold (~700megs).

Now with DVD-A ( maybe SACD I am not sure) can hold something like 4.7 gigabytes so....is that the reason that the DVD-A format sound better? They have a larger sampling range due to the increased capacity for storage?

Do we know for a fact that the DVD-A format samples a larger range of the sound?

just curious

P.S. good thread guys, I am learning a lot

jesse_dyer

Nobody has responded to either of my 2 main questions which, succinctly are:

1) How accurate is the manufacturing process for LPs? If your pressing is not extremely perfect (and, indeed, being picked up again perfectly by the TT) then all these details that are lost by sampling to create CDs/SACDs/DVD-As aren't even accurate in the vinyl.*

2) Regardless of how good your vinyl, if analog is truly the best way to reproduce music, why hasn't anybody come up with a new analog format that improves upon vinyl?

* Which isn't to say that CDs are somehow manufactured with more accuracy. Obviously the pits are slightly different on each CD but that's not relevant because it doesn't affect the players ability to determine if the bit is a 1 or 0 (except in extreme cases clearly).

wallstreet

Originally posted by Shell
I read an interview with Neil Young a couple of years ago and he said he could not stand the way his songs sounded on CD. He held back on releasing much of his stuff to CD. He said it lacked depth and he always felt like something was missing. Now that DVD-A format is out he said he was finally satisfied with the sound quality and is releasing his old stuff. Sorry I tried to find the article but was unable.

That article was in Sound and Vision.

madmax

The manufacturing process for LP's is not very acurate. I've heard horror stories of people who didn't give a crap being in charge of overall frequency response. HOWEVER, CD's have all the same problems! A lot of people think CD's are perfect and pristine. After all, they are digital... Bunch of bull. As far as the recording process goes some CD's are better amd some LP's are better. It all depends on the people involved!

As far as your question about is analog the best way to produce a sound, well, yes, obviously. Any time you change from one domain to the other then back some things suffer. Damn, there is just no certain answer here. You will always find that one source or the other is better in a given format depending on who did what. I don't know what else to say. Maybe question #1 should be "how acureate is the process to put music on a digital medium"??

madmax

therockman

Madmax, Responding to an earlier post, I have never had the privllege to listen to a trully state of the art vinyl reproduction system, my experience has been with vintage systems that were of medium quality. I know that I would probably just fall in love with vinyl if I had the oppurtunity to listen on a state of the art system, which is one of vinyl's shortcomings. The need to compensate for so many variables makes the vinyl hobby a very demanding hobby.

But all of the variables aside, almost every single vinyl album manufactured in the last 7 years has been mastered in the digital domain. Even the very highest quality vinyl from the late 90's untill present have all gone through the dreaded analog>digital>analog conversion chain, so that even with the highest quality vinyl you are still listening to a digital signal. All of the recent Led Zepplin, The Beatles new Japanese pressings, all of Sony classical releases have been mastered on a PC in the digital domain. So I really don't feel that I would gain much by listening to vinyl, except the elimination of the brickwall filter.

But that qualm aside, yes it is a fact that the "best" way to reproduce music is by having an analog source. An analog source would eliminate the sampling process and the signal would be a constant wave of music. Unfortunately, this "perfect" signal does not exist today when all most all mastering is being done in the digital domain.

So I know that I have not addressed jesse_dyer"s questions, but these remarks were simply aimed at the thread in general.


Rocky

madmax

Originally posted by therockman

But all of the variables aside, almost every single vinyl album manufactured in the last 7 years has been mastered in the digital domain. Even the very highest quality vinyl from the late 90's untill present have all gone through the dreaded analog>digital>analog conversion chain, so that even with the highest quality vinyl you are still listening to a digital signal.


Rocky

Actually,
If you go to Acoustic Sounds webpage and start looking around at the different links of the record companies you will find that not only are a percentange of the new vinyl offerings held in the analog domain but some even go as far as using all tube electronics and either using 2" tape or cutting direct to lp.

You are mostly right in that modern recordings are mixed in the digital domain. It offers a convinence to the person mixing it and to the artist which they cannot get from analog. Most artists and production people are not audiophiles and don't care if a little quality is lost. Unfortunatly as my system got better I could start to hear this. However, even though we all wish an easy consistant answer were available on which format is best there is none.

If you ever get the chance to hear a real TT vs CD shootout with the best electronics do it. It will probably be in an audiophiles home, not a store because most store personel are just not crazy enough to make everything right. It's not for everyone because of the hassle and cost, that is for sure.

What a great thread here!

madmax

jesse_dyer

Originally posted by madmax
The manufacturing process for LP's is not very acurate. I've heard horror stories of people who didn't give a crap being in charge of overall frequency response. HOWEVER, CD's have all the same problems! A lot of people think CD's are perfect and pristine. After all, they are digital... Bunch of bull. As far as the recording process goes some CD's are better amd some LP's are better. It all depends on the people involved!

Right there are manufacturing differences when creating CDs, but they don't matter because even though each CD is slightly different if you measured it precisely enough due to the way it is read all the bits will come back exactly as they were meant to be. Notice that I am not here, nor have I ever been contending the CDs are superior. I am merely saying that this issue is not one they share with analog sources.

As far as your question about is analog the best way to produce a sound, well, yes, obviously. Any time you change from one domain to the other then back some things suffer. Damn, there is just no certain answer here. You will always find that one source or the other is better in a given format depending on who did what. I don't know what else to say. Maybe question #1 should be "how acureate is the process to put music on a digital medium"??

Right. So why doesn't somebody create a better analog format than LP vinyl?

dcarlson

Isn't reel to reel a better analog format?

therockman

Originally posted by dcarlson
Isn't reel to reel a better analog format?

No, deffinately not. There is more loss of information with each playing of a reel to reel tape (or any tape, for that matter) than there is on any other format. It has to do with tape magnetism and how the the tape particals "hold" information.


Rocky