Analog bliss!

@chipito,

Great!  When the funds present themselves, seriously consider a US cleaner. Glad you're back.

I have a system where I found myself listening almost exclusively to CDs.  They just sounded better.  After some investigating I purchased a VPI Prime TT with a quality tone arm, cart, and phone preamp.  My previous TT had a built in phono pre-amp and a cart. that just wasn't cutting it.  Now my collection of Classic Vinyl, from the '60s through the '80s, all acquired by me within a year or so of the release,  has come back to life from a moribund state.  The analog sound has better imaging, more "Wack" where wack is needed and other good sounding things.  My CDs are smoother sounding and better when listening to quieter, instrumental background music.  I have even started to buy vinyl again.

 Most of my listening is LP's also for last 10 years.I record them to an Alesis to make a CD to keep the time off my stylus and records and even with the digital middleman a high quality LP like an RCA living stereo 1S is superior to any digital CD I have,analog remake or full digital.

@jnovak,

Halleluiah!

I am skeptical about the rod method used for azimuth however, at least on it’s own merit. What’s critical about this method is:

(1) Your platter/lp are flat/level
(2) Your eyesight is in a special place that it aligns with what you are actually hearing.

( of coarse, these issues may not be as critical if you are using a uni-pivot arm?)

On it’s own, it seems like a logical method.

Glad you’re back!

 And then you have self-proclaimed expert's like Raul saying that tubes and vinyl are substandard. 
 The only thing I can ascertain from that is he must be deaf. 

From 1987 to 2007 I’d listened to digital exclusively. Over time I felt that advancing age had taken away my ability to enjoy music. To sort it out, in 2007 I took some high quality CDs and LPs to my local high end store to play them back-to-back. It became immediately apparent that it was the CD playback that was bleaching the nuance and life out of the music.

Within the week I bought a turntable; my preamp had a good phono stage already. I started picking up albums for $1 each at thrift shops, and it was the prospect of spinning vinyl that got me out of bed and got me engaged with embracing life. I didn’t listen to a single digital recording for the next 6-7 months.

11 years later my turntable is my #1 source for music. I have somewhere around 1500 LPs, many from used record store bargain bins and from thrift shops. They sound wonderful and lift my spirits emotionally in a way CDs never did. It turns out I hadn’t gotten too old to enjoy music; I was listening to the wrong format, and I love spinning music as much or more than I ever had in my life.

Just looking at my all-tube phono stage and line stage lifts my spirits, but playing 3-4 LPs puts a spring in my step that lasts for days.

Welcome back to the GLORIOUS sound of LP's! Analog playback has the MAGIC!