Thinking about getting out of vinyl

NJPOLKER

hearingimpared wrote: »

Face it Drew, vinyl is superior in sound to that dry sterile digital existance you've sentenced yourself to.:eek::D:p

Joe,
Thats funny And you know thats funny which makes it even funnier :D

If I thought for a second things here sounded "dry sterile" as you say I'd have bought a TT and set it up right next to my sweet spot. Where there is a will there is a way. I have no will to own a TT.

NJPOLKER

hearingimpared wrote: »

1000 times better.

Joey,
Oh yeah one more thing. Have you been drinking Budweiser?? To make a statement like that you have to be messed up or a Emotiva guy. So that kind of narrows it down some

I hope you hate to be called Joey.

kevhed72

shack wrote: »

I find that vinyl forces me to listen to "entire" albums. And in my mind that is a good thing. With any form of digitial it is so easy to click past anything you may "think" you don't want to hear. Lots of albums were made to be progressions or there is good music you never heard or forgot about. As much as I like to put 5 CDs in the changer and sit down for an evening...I also like to sit down and listen to one side of an LP for 20+ minutes.

Very good point, as I have discovered that many times, the "best" songs on an album are not the top 50 song that most people will buy an album for in the first place (or at least before MP3s). Also, the best albums have a continuity of all the songs on the album. When I purchased my first CD changer, I did so thinking it would be so much more convenient. The downside is the changer promotes a short attention span when listening to music. My next CDP will be a single for sure...

dkg999

Vinyl vs CD must be our new "cables don't matter" debate, eh?

Both formats have their advantages and it's not really a "versus" scenario in my mind. The price of entry for good CD sound quality is around $1000 IMHO, for either a good CDP or transport/DAC combination. The price of entry for good vinyl sound quality is significantly higher at around $2000 by the time you get a good TT, phono pre, record cleaner, supplies, accessories, etc. Again, IMHO. Vinyl can sound amazingly good and the sound quality of a well mastered and cared for LP can be simply stunning with this amazing presence and depth coming through your system.

I think the reason we still have issues with CD's is that the technical development pretty much stopped at the time the format was released. SACD went nowhere, HDCD seems to be dead, XRCD can't get out of its own way, Blu-ray CD is still somewhere in the development queue. There's got to be ways to get better sound quality out of the redbook format than what companies have spent money to develop.

shack

dkg999 wrote:

There's got to be ways to get better sound quality out of the redbook format than what companies have spent money to develop.

But why would they? The vast majority of the buying pubic has spoken...and for them, MP3/digital downloading (etc) is more than good enough. Only we audio geeks are clamoring for better SQ. We are also the ones that will spend the $ to get that improved SQ. So there will be niche recordings for the high end as there has always been...like MFSL. SACD may continue for a while as a niche product, at a higher price. Some already say that the shiny silver disc is already a relic soon to disappear thanks to digital downloading and so forth. Why would the industry invest to make the redbook format "better" when most buyers could care less?

So the solution (and the future IMO) is more of what we have now. Spend more to get the "audiophile" recordings, spend more to purchase specialized gear to improve what is already there, buy SACD (at higher costs - WHEN available), buy vinyl (and go through the rituals not to mention the costs). etc, etc.

There are those that feel that eventually we will be able to get digital downloads in audiophile quality. Maybe...but the problem is still on the production side. Why go to the effort when the masses don't want/don't care about it?

dkg999

Good points Shack! I should of noted that my comments were from the audiophile willing to spend more to get more perspective. The masses want noise cheap (well free really!), that is all. It's amazing how the vinyl resurgence is somewhat being driven by better sound quality. That's why all the friends of my teenage kids think they want vinyl records, because they sound better. Of course they have little disposable income, so their votes really don't count much .......... yet.

It is nice though to leave the flea market yesterday with about 10 new vinyl LP's, one of which was a somewhat rare BB King LP, for $14 in total. After investing about 30 min in each with my record cleaning routine, at least 80% of them will sound fantastic.

wayne3burk

For some the finding good albums in the dollar section of Goodwill, and collecting the body of work of an artist (on vinyl) is part of the experience. I suppose until you have no room left in your house for vinyl

hearingimpared

NJPOLKER wrote: »

Joey,
Oh yeah one more thing. Have you been drinking Budweiser?? To make a statement like that you have to be messed up or a Emotiva guy. So that kind of narrows it down some

I hope you hate to be called Joey.

NO, NO, and NO!:p

hearingimpared

dkg999 wrote: »

Vinyl vs CD must be our new "cables don't matter" debate, eh?

Both formats have their advantages and it's not really a "versus" scenario in my mind. The price of entry for good CD sound quality is around $1000 IMHO, for either a good CDP or transport/DAC combination. The price of entry for good vinyl sound quality is significantly higher at around $2000 by the time you get a good TT, phono pre, record cleaner, supplies, accessories, etc. Again, IMHO. Vinyl can sound amazingly good and the sound quality of a well mastered and cared for LP can be simply stunning with this amazing presence and depth coming through your system.

I think the reason we still have issues with CD's is that the technical development pretty much stopped at the time the format was released. SACD went nowhere, HDCD seems to be dead, XRCD can't get out of its own way, Blu-ray CD is still somewhere in the development queue. There's got to be ways to get better sound quality out of the redbook format than what companies have spent money to develop.

Doug, I think that is a very conservative number.

dkg999

Joe - I consider my vinyl rig as solid mid-fi, but it's pretty good as far as sound quality. Pro-ject RM5-SE w/speedbox II $950 new, Pro-ject Tube Box II SE $350 used, VPI 16.5 RCM $350 used, plus Herbies Mat, brushes, cleaning fluids, etc. and I'm not too far off of the $2000, so it can be done.

hearingimpared

dkg999 wrote: »

Joe - I consider my vinyl rig as solid mid-fi, but it's pretty good as far as sound quality. Pro-ject RM5-SE w/speedbox II $950 new, Pro-ject Tube Box II SE $350 used, VPI 16.5 RCM $350 used, plus Herbies Mat, brushes, cleaning fluids, etc. and I'm not too far off of the $2000, so it can be done.

When you put it that way I can't argue your point at all.:)

SCompRacer

dkg999 wrote: »

but it's pretty good as far as sound quality.

I think it's better than pretty good, like very good. Your entire system actually. All you need is some treatment (acoustic room treatment ).

dkg999

Room treatments are on the list of things to explore! I just need a better room to put the treatments in. Working on that too!

BlueFox

dkg999 wrote: »

I think the reason we still have issues with CD's is that the technical development pretty much stopped at the time the format was released. SACD went nowhere, HDCD seems to be dead, XRCD can't get out of its own way, Blu-ray CD is still somewhere in the development queue. There's got to be ways to get better sound quality out of the redbook format than what companies have spent money to develop.

It is still going on, but at the high-end. However, over time, high-end features will trickle down into lower priced players, and/or standalone DACs. A recent discovery in CD playback was the existence of digital pre-ringing, an artificat of digital recording that introduces distortion before the music occurs. (Don't ask. Read the technical papers). Meridian developed a filter to eliminate this pre-ringing, and suppossedly it makes a big difference in CD sound quality. The drawback is it cost $15K to hear this improvement.

This is an excellent review and worth taking the time to read.

"The real beauty of the 808i.2 lies inside, however. The CD data are upsampled to a 176.4kHz sample rate and 24-bit depth by Meridian's proprietary Resolution Enhancement algorithm before being sent to high-quality but unidentified delta-sigma DAC chips. But along the way, the data are subjected to a new kind of reconstruction filter that Meridian calls an "apodizing" device."

"While the linear-phase Finite Impulse Response filters routinely used in digital audio can offer superb performance in the frequency domain, in the time domain they introduce preresponses that occur prior to the main peak of the impulse response, something that never occurs in nature and thus will not be masked by the music."

http://stereophile.com/cdplayers/meridian_8082808i2_signature_reference_cd_playerpreamplifier/#

dkg999

BlueFox - I had read that article previously. Step back and take a look at what you wrote and the article on how much work Meridian had to do to get excellent sound out of a CD/digital recording. Seems like a lot of technology to fix CD's, eh!

F1nut

Eh, they've been trying to fix the TT for a very long time....turns out that dragging a sharp point thru grooves spinning 'round and 'round wasn't a good idea to start with.

BlueFox

dkg999 wrote: »

BlueFox - I had read that article previously. Step back and take a look at what you wrote and the article on how much work Meridian had to do to get excellent sound out of a CD/digital recording. Seems like a lot of technology to fix CD's, eh!

True. Generally speaking, everything is difficult at first, but once it is done, thanks to Moore's Law, it usually becomes very cheap and easy. Plus, it provides a base to build on for future improvements.

Look at all the work that has gone into something as simple as a mechanical spinning platter, tonearm, cartridge, line stage, etc. to extract good sound from another form of plastic. The $15K for the Meridian CD player is dirt cheap compared to what a good turntable, and associated parts, cost.

dkg999

F1nut wrote: »

Eh, they've been trying to fix the TT for a very long time....turns out that dragging a sharp point thru grooves spinning 'round and 'round wasn't a good idea to start with.

Hopefully the "fix" curve isn't as extended for CD's :eek: If it is we should have CD's perfected by, oh let's ballpark it at 2050 I think they've scheduled TT's to be fixed in 2025

hearingimpared

F1nut wrote: »

Eh, they've been trying to fix the TT for a very long time....turns out that dragging a sharp point thru grooves spinning 'round and 'round wasn't a good idea to start with.

:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p In case you can't hear it they are raspberries!:D

SCompRacer

Can't embed a youtube outside the clubhouse so linkage to....Vinyl vs CD:D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfROAYxBq3I

hearingimpared

SCompRacer wrote: »

Can't embed a youtube outside the clubhouse so linkage to....Vinyl vs CD:D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfROAYxBq3I

Ha ha ha what a goofy guy.

madmax

Keep your records. Some day when the time is right you will be glad you did. Funny someone is ready to get out of vinyl when many others are finding it to be the wave of the future.
madmax