Cd wees wees over vinyl ?

[Mikeandvan]

CD continues to excel, listening now to Depeche Mode, Black celebration, stunning.

[Enossification]

And of course there is vinyl's serious low frequency limitations too. As for me, I'll continue to use both because they are just so different.

[Ubi]

Hi, its mikeandvan, not much work these days, so just mike I guess. But been having loads of time to listen to music. So, I've been quite busy on the cart front lately, trying AT 95 en and the VM 540ML (inc. Rigsby version, Miss Jones, Miss Jones), was using the 540ml until it really started to grate, picks up loads of surface noise, quite sharp, became unlistenable, so got a new stylus for the 95 EN and that's easier on the ear. Then a few days ago I played the 70s reissue of Mingus' 'Black saint and dinner lady', on Impulse, and I was dissatisfied with the sound, especially towards the end of the record, I believe there's a name for this, 'end of side distortion'? I mean that in itself is enough to make you wanna ditch the vinyl! So I thought, get this LP on CD, on to Ebay, CD now here, in a nice GF cardboard sleeve, rather than one of the regular crappy CD cases, who's hinges so often break. And lo and behold its ****ing amazing!! So, kudos to Macca, CD does indeed beat vinyl hands down, no contest, wees wees all over it like a chav beating the crap out of someone and then displaying his dominance. But but, I can't get rid of all my vinyl, I'm so attached to it, the spinning of the record, the covers, the sheer build quality of those 1210s!!

Well, this is outstanding, listening now, and the depth of sound is outrageously good, I fear now listening to vinyl is just like why?

So off to Ebay I guess now, shall i track down absolutely every vinyl I own on CD? Do they all sound better on CD?

You have put a AT95 (various bodies) and a AT540 on a turntable and come to the conclusion that vinyl is inferior to CD?

May be a little premature to conclude this, especially in terms of vinyl replay being judged on rather lowly carts such as those. It may be more pertinent to maybe suggest that cd is better than your current vinyl replay system?

Your end of record distortion is due to alignment. All vinyl replay has inner or outer groove distortion. It cannot be avoided, but if it's audible, your setup is wrong. It may be worth also making sure your setup is correct before heading off to eBay for CDs.

[Macca]

All alignments are a compromise. I'm always amazed linear tracking tonearms are not more popular since they at least solve one problem. But then good ones are expensive and difficult to implement.

Still it does puzzle me that even decks costing £100K plus don't use them.

Also notice many vinyl enthusiasts tend to concentrate on more nebulous things like 'Musicality' and are not at all bothered by the noise, distortion and variable pitch. Which is fine, but some of us are bothered, and can't 'unhear' those issues.

Although I grant that on a good set up they're not bad enough to spoil the enjoyment of good music, the question still remains why do it when the alternative is better and a lot cheaper and easier?

[Lawrence001]

I've always assumed that all the mechanism required to make a linear tracking arm work makes it sound worse than a standard arm of the same cost. Like a mechanical auto return arm but much worse.

There is that very fancy one doing the rounds at high end shows but it is very expensive.

Sent from my PCT-L29 using Tapatalk

[Macca]

I've always assumed that all the mechanism required to make a linear tracking arm work makes it sound worse than a standard arm of the same cost. Like a mechanical auto return arm but much worse.

There is that very fancy one doing the rounds at high end shows but it is very expensive.

Sent from my PCT-L29 using Tapatalk

At the same cost that's probably true.

[AJSki2fly]

The improvement in sound I heard today of the cd over the vinyl version of 'black saint dinner lady' was gob smacking, and I'm thinking, life's short, why waste it listening to inferior versions of music you love.

This is a can-of-worms topic as stated in many other threads before.

CD can be better that Vinyl and Vinyl can be better than CD, Streaming can be better still and also worse that both, digital files on are local server down loaded using a good/clean SP/Internet connection can be better than all.

BUT!!!!

1. There are many, ,any, many variables? (the following assumes the same Pre-Amp, Power Amp cables and speaker combination used through out)

2. Is the CD replay systems as good as the vinyl(turntable.arm, cartridge and phono stage combo) and visa versa?

3. Assuming the 2 above is reasonable/good parity, then is the source, CD and Vinyl from the same original master recordings? If not forget the comparison.

4. If CD and Vinyl are from the same original master recordings, then has each media been mixed in the same way, ignoring final compression for CD or Vinyl in producing the media. If either has been change again forget making comparisons.

5. Taking a reasonably simplistic view then 1-4 are satisfied positively then it is fair to consider comparing the sound from CD to Vinyl. BUT they may intrinsically actually sound different after all that because that each medium uses different compression techniques and rendering to get back to the analogue output through amp and speaker.

The same issues apply when considering other media for comparison, streaming(file type and resolutions), Tapes,reel to reel, Cassette(playback speeds, SQ ie. Dolby dB filtering, tape band-width ), Downloaded files(files types and resolutions)


So the answer is not a straight forward one, I have learn that some CDs do sound as good or better the vinyl and visa-versa, but it can be a complete lottery, and near impossible to know if you have the definitive version in terms of SQ.

Oooh! I forgot another important part of the equation, Vinyl SQ can vary greatly between pressing runs (even where the same master has been used), get a record pressed near the start of a 10K run and if it is pressed properly there is a good chance it will be good, get one near the end then the edge of the SQ may be lost due to stamper wear. Another aspect is Vinyl manufacturers are known for changing Vinyl chemical composition of the years, as supplied from vinyl pellet manufacturers, so release 1 of a pressing may be excellent in terms of recording, and vinyl composition, but a later release may have still the same SQ in recording bu inferior vinyl composition affecting SQ, or maybe better giving a better overall SQ than release1. In my experience if you find a record you love to be noisy or sound compressed(assuming others played sound great in your system) or just plain odd then research a bit and find a recommended release that is NM and see if it is better, I have done this severel times and always been please. A good example of this was Genesis - 'and Then There Were Three", the first copy I had was just awful, noisy from the start, and the inner tracks were nearly unplayable to due to mid and upper distortion. This is record with about 55 minutes squeezed onto it. After some research I discovered in the UK and US that there were extensive release runs with many copy done in each, but in Canada only a couple of runs at a good pressing plant each with less than 10K records, I order one from CA and it proved to be excellent throughout.

[Macca]

Good post.

Excessive limiting is really the enemy of digital but it is an artistic choice.

Happily for my music tastes I rarely buy anything contemporary - still too much music from the 70s through to the 90s to get to know - and so I seek out the original release CDs from the 1980s (sometimes to replace the vinyl record I bought at the time. Sometimes because it's one I never got round to then).

It's rare these are not superior in terms of dynamic range to every other mastering or format as many are just a flat transfer from a master (with the warning in the booklet that you might hear the tape hiss!)

Most recently 'Back In Black' - no bother at all to get a decent example of the original CD - and it cost less than a fiver.

[Mikeandvan]

You have put a AT95 (various bodies) and a AT540 on a turntable and come to the conclusion that vinyl is inferior to CD?

May be a little premature to conclude this, especially in terms of vinyl replay being judged on rather lowly carts such as those. It may be more pertinent to maybe suggest that cd is better than your current vinyl replay system?

Your end of record distortion is due to alignment. All vinyl replay has inner or outer groove distortion. It cannot be avoided, but if it's audible, your setup is wrong. It may be worth also making sure your setup is correct before heading off to eBay for CDs.

The end of side distortion is only present with certain discs, some of my vinyl sounds fantastic, even with these so called budget carts (I wonder what makes a £1000 cart cost more to produce than a £100 cart?). My set up is a straight up 1210GR, so I don't see where along the signal path the set up can be wrong, though I'd be happy to know where if so. I use a Slee phono stage into the Suggie. In the end faffing about with a so called high end TT and a £1000 cart that could easily break (just like I did once in a hayfever induced accident on a £440 AT cart), is a luxury only a few can afford, seems rather pointless when you can bang an album in a high end CD player, which costs the same as a high end cart, yet isn't a 'consumable'. I still love playing vinyl, and have more of it than CD, and I like banging on a record, and not worrying about being too careful with the stylus (I don't mean reckless of course), but you know, can't be bothered with arm cueing and all that.

[Macca]

Cool deck. Although I see your point about not wanting to worry about an expensive needle I'd still want something better than an AT95 on that thing. They're okay, but I think they're a bit 'scratchy'.

What about a Nagaoka MP100? Or have you been down that road already?