Vinyl better than digital? This may be why
- Thread starter marou
- Start date
The_Lhc
Well-known member
The only trouble with that argument is that whilst CDs may have a dynamic range of 100dB the mastering on them causes that range to be massively reduced (the so-called "loudness wars"), so that should make those "low-level details" even more apparent than they are on vinyl.
So the more you compress, the more a recording will sound like live (unamplified) music? Not in my experience. As Lhc mentioned, the loudness wars would surely make every system sound extremely natural and live. Do they? Erm...
There are obviously different reasons for vinyl being superior to CD.
There are obviously different reasons for vinyl being superior to CD.
BigH
Well-known member
Yes most modern (last 10 years or so) cds (pop) have less DR than vinyl, jazz and classical have not been so affected by the loudness mastering thank goodness. If you look at DR database you will see jazz are often near the top at around 16-20 while most rock/pop since 2000 are about 7, vinyl is about 12. I think the top pop/rock cd is Copperhead Road at 17.
I think the part about live music is wrong, if you compress music it will sound less like live, ie have less dynamic range.
I think the part about live music is wrong, if you compress music it will sound less like live, ie have less dynamic range.
Covenanter
Well-known member
It is the compression. I rarely listen to modern "pop" recordings on my hifi because I find them hard to get along with. Adele's "21" is one of these and it sounds far better in my car because that's the type of equipemnt it is designed to sound good on!
Vinyl isn't better than CD. However a lot of hifi enthusiasts like the sound of the distortion you get from vinyl.
Chris
Vinyl isn't better than CD. However a lot of hifi enthusiasts like the sound of the distortion you get from vinyl.
Chris
marou said:
no offence mate but this article is one big load of BS. the guy is clearly clueless about what he's writing. live music has 120dB dynamic range? I'd like to see an example.
BigH
Well-known member
oldric_naubhoff said:
He probably means that the sound level can reach that, but yes I agree he does not seem to know what he is talking about.
No offence taken - I don't really have a view, having never compared vinyl and digital under test conditions. What does interest me is the number of people (including friends whose views I'm reluctant to dismiss) who prefer vinyl to digital despite evidence to the contrary which I find quite persuasive. Paul McGowan is a hifi designer and enthusiast whose views should not be easily discounted. So tell me, why does a legacy device with an inferior dynamic range which with every play corrupts the vinyl on which it depends still command the loyalty of so many?
marou said:
I suspect it may depend on the quality of the mastering on the CDs that they've listened to, as well as the source they have used for the comparison.
I have been lucky enough to have gone from decent TTs, to a great CDP to a very good streamer,......which has given me reasonable insight into how they all compare.
McGowan says that a cd recording of a vinyl record is indistinguishable thus confirming there is no inherent superiority in analogue - interesting if true.
CnoEvil said:
Very much to the point Cno.
The truly crazy thing is that most of the people I see and hear extolling the virtues of vinyl have pretty poor players, often third rate or worse.
My own experience was simply that the better the CD player and the better the record player the closer together they sounded in terms of sound quality.
For a brief period I was able to compare my own player, an SME20A/Red signature with the comparibly priced Wadia 860 and on some recordings the differences were actually difficult to hear, some modern, for the time, Deutsche Grammaphon DDD and DDA releases for example.
Edit for spelling.
Overdose
Well-known member
marou said:
Define 'so many'.
Only a very small percentage of music consumed is vinyl.
Nostalgia is your answer.
Electro
Well-known member
marou said:
Yes it is true, I have done it many times myself and the CDR recording of an LP sounds identical to the original LP.
I have done several blind tests so that I did not know which one I was listening to and I found it impossible to hear any difference .
See I was reading only last night that MP3s sound better than vinyl, and that really all one needs these days is an iPod and speakerettes. I guess all those turntable designers are wasting their time, then. :rofl:
surely a cd 'rip' of a vinyl recording is only sampling the waveform with digital steps, then converted with a dac. is some information lost? should it sound slightly less warm for example
I have another theory. Often, the noise floor of records is much higher than that of a good digital recording.
This 'fills' the gaps between notes, making for a more cohesive 'whole'. The brain has to work less hard to decipher and piece together the information.
Look at equipment like Cambridge Audio's 840's and other, very good measuring stuff. All the detail you could want but somehow it doesn't come together into a musical whole (for some people). Other equipment, perhaps not so acurate measuring, sounds more cohesive.
I am broadly generalising and I myself err on the side of accuracy for preference but could it be that there can be to much detail, to much stereo separation etc?
A point in case was a recent swap of cartridges on one of my TT's. I replaced a Ortofon with a shibata tipped AT. More separation, better highs ... more musical? No.
regards
This 'fills' the gaps between notes, making for a more cohesive 'whole'. The brain has to work less hard to decipher and piece together the information.
Look at equipment like Cambridge Audio's 840's and other, very good measuring stuff. All the detail you could want but somehow it doesn't come together into a musical whole (for some people). Other equipment, perhaps not so acurate measuring, sounds more cohesive.
I am broadly generalising and I myself err on the side of accuracy for preference but could it be that there can be to much detail, to much stereo separation etc?
A point in case was a recent swap of cartridges on one of my TT's. I replaced a Ortofon with a shibata tipped AT. More separation, better highs ... more musical? No.
regards
oldric_naubhoff said:
Agreed, the 1st two paragraphs here explain in good detail. http://sound.westhost.com/dynamic-range.htm
BigH
Well-known member
Overdose said:
I agree LP sales are very low. It also trendy, fashionable among the young because they never had turntables before, makes me laugh that that they even put vinyl sound effects on some recordings. The problem with recent cd issues is the dynamic range is not used, its produced for the mp3 player and is compressed to sound louder which some say sells more, so yes it maybe OK for headphones ina noisy enviroment or in the car but its not so good on a hifi system. As for sounding more live thats complete rubbish, they say that Americans rarely listen to live music maybe this is why you get these comments.
matt49
Well-known member
Am I right in thinking that people who listen predominantly to classical music tend to express a preference for vinyl over CD much less often? It's just an impression I've formed, and it may be quite wrong.
If it's right, I can think of two possible explanations. 1. compression on classical CDs isn't really an issue; sure it's used, but much more sensitively, presumably because there's a tradition of selling classical CDs to an "audiophile" (dread word!) market and not for listening via iPods/earbuds. 2. vinyl is by its nature less bright (because it's less transparent), and the softer sound of vinyl is appealing with pop/rock, which with its prominent percussion and electronic instruments can tend towards harshness.
If it's right, I can think of two possible explanations. 1. compression on classical CDs isn't really an issue; sure it's used, but much more sensitively, presumably because there's a tradition of selling classical CDs to an "audiophile" (dread word!) market and not for listening via iPods/earbuds. 2. vinyl is by its nature less bright (because it's less transparent), and the softer sound of vinyl is appealing with pop/rock, which with its prominent percussion and electronic instruments can tend towards harshness.
Electro
Well-known member
Johnno2 said:
Not in my experience , I have transfered many rare LP's to CDR in a very simple way by using a Phillips CDR 760 Cd recorder Direcly from my LP12 via the equipment in my signature in real time and adding track numbers manually as the recording progresses because the auto track numbering from analogue is unreliable due to the high noise floor of vinyl .
The CDR recording captures all the warmth , character , and pleasing colorations of vinyl played on an LP12 perfectly and sounds exactly the same as the original IMO !
Just to add the CDR760 player /recorder used to convert the analogue signal to digital has a very good ADC inside but the CDR copies were played back on my Electrocompaniet EMC1UP cd player .
matt49 said:
Possibly.
IMO. The Classical music lover may be older (like a lot of people who are into hifi), so may have a TT already, and being older, probably likes the classic stuff that was recorded pre-digital, and probably sounds better than the CDs made from those same recordings.
FWIW. The Linn 24 bit Classical stuff sounds as good as anything I've heard, and better than most.
For Classical on CD, I like Telarc, DG, Linn Records and Harmonia Mundi, to name a few.
davedotco said:
Lol...... I think thats the reason for alot of the disagreement on this forum, some systems are just not up to the task.........
saying that is that just plain old snobbery though..... a cheap turntable can sound excellent by any standard if set -up just right.
and the noise floor (hiss) on a turntable no matter how good or dear it is is what stops vinyl from being a serious contender, but if you like that sort of thing then I can see the argument from the other side.
drummerman said:
This I agree with this totally - the last bit is about taste/preference though.
me, I love the silence and the seperation it adds so much more drama to music in my mind..... especially accoustic and vocal driven stuff.
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