CD's vs Vinyl - Finally hear the difference

"(RBCD) does not do the various things as well as good vinyl, but it does them competently.....and you don't feel 'soiled' when listening to redbook"

I've arrived psychologically at a similar place as Mike L. on this point. The things that used to be bothersome about RBCD have been banished, and what's left is a small and forgiveable loss of detail. In addition, at a sufficiently high level of performance the few things that RBCD does better than vinyl-- silent background and channel separation-- stand out and complicate debate on the superiority of the two formats at current SOTA. These days RBCD is definitely better than "background music."

lack of... ? Perhaps an inability to complete one's thought, or an incuriousity about SOTA digital?

Dev, the OP's statements about the unconditional superiority of vinyl invited controversy. Digital technology has marched foward with increasing over-lap in quality with analog front ends, particularly as experienced in the broad middle of the hobby. It's unfortunate that so many superlatives have historically been heaped on what was in reality slow, incremental progress in RBCD playback. This legacy obscures the point that in some implementations at least, the technology has recently been moving faster: reduced jitter affects, much less synthetic sounding, closer to the realism of vinyl, and above all, astonishingly far from presumed limitations.

One thing that gets tiresome is attempts by vinyl esthetes to defend the format with anecdotes about deficits in set-up skills that they identify everywhere but in their own systems. Such anecdotes actually prove the opposite point: that vinyl as experienced by all but the self-elected expert is compromised. Operating under such biases, the "expert" may comfortably discount the experience of everyone but himself as subjective.

Has2be, I don't dispute the criticality of proper set-up or knowledge generously disseminated by some experts on the forums. My problem is with those who maintain that correct set-up is less commonly sighted than a unicorn. Vinyl can tend toward being one of those cabalistic corners of the hobby that for some becomes a shelter for elitist attitudes.

Okay, I over-reacted to Dev's post. But what got me going is also evident in Dev's last post-- that to surpass your reference digital system required a "new journey" into analog with esoteric equipment or set-up skills. (You are still a bit mysterious on how those "few individuals" you met along your new journey "changed all that." Can you share specifics?)

Your experience suggests that the "debate" between digital and analog formats is only definitive at the extreme margin. This is a reasonable conclusion that makes hay of blanket assertions often found in LP vs. CD discussions.

I happen to agree with you, but from the different perspective of customizing components. During a long process there has been hopscotch between RBCD and vinyl, up to the point that, yes, vinyl is more revealing(which is not to suggest that RBCD at this level is objectionable or background music.) However in view of the mutability of things I hesitate to post a Q.E.D. to the journey.

Mapman is certainly onto something when he suggests that the points of convergence between analog and digital in a system are remarkable. I've passed through a few such points, and when there is further divergence, the divergence is smaller than before but more meaningful, since more of what was wrong on both paths has been purged through the evolutionary process.

The remaining differences between formats on my system are fairly small but meaningful. TT has more subtle texture and truth of timbre, and(with a superb linear tonearm) tracks uniformly across LP. CD delivers on its original promise: dead quiet blackground, wide channel separation, LF heft that surpasses TT on some recordings, neutral across FR without a trace of the anomalies and tracking issues that dog all but the best cartridges. The spatial ECM LP and CD jazz catalog offers interesting comparisons on these points. Denser more dynamic R&R and classical material sounds more delineated and less confused on LP. Yes, for the most "serious listening"(whatever that means) one turns to LP. BTW, experimentation in CDP with the ESS 9018 32-bit Sabre DAC chip suggests that in digital, if not in analog, the latest is the greatest.

I'm not alone in this-- the experience is shared by several acquaintences with top digital front ends. Give it a try overnight, you may like it.

Dev, I want to be democratic and give/take as much as possible, knowing that vinyl involves more of a learning curve than most aspects of audio and everyone is moving along on that continuum. Thus generalizations about vinyl are really only interesting to the extent that one reveals something about oneself in context(as did the OP.) However there are a few on the forum who one way or another have formed an opinion that they are at the end not just of their own road but of all roads. One such *expert* elsewhere posted to the effect that of the many hundreds of set-ups he has encountered over the years, only a handful were not badly set up. If this is so IOW then w/r to LP uber alles, one may conclude either that vinyl as commonly experienced is a flawed medium indeed, or that it is so good as to forgive the worst mishandling.

A CDP has the disadvantage of requiring 4-6 hrs or more warm-up to sound its subtle best. A TT drive system reaches most of its potential in a half hour or so. So practically speaking, for a fair comparison between the formats the CDP should be left constantly powered up.

Really! I'd be interested to hear others' experiences on this.