Digital Source with Tube Amplification

One thing I can say for sure, the new tube amp makes one of my Claude Bolling CDs sound fantastic compared to my solid state receiver. It was one disk that I always wished was recorded better and it turns out that the tube amp was the key. Possibly something to do with being an originally analog recording. Very fun.

Sometimes I wonder if people on this forum have too much information to filter it down to a straight answer. While everything that has been said is true, it really says little to nothing.

I have limited experience with audio equipment, but I can easily make a recommendation based on what experience I have had and It seems that it would be just as valid as anyone else because the room, setup, and listener preference pretty much renders any commonality null. An identical system in a different room might be synergistic in one and competing with Bose in the other.

Is it not possible to state an opinion without 75% of the post being caveats?

Charles1dad - I'll try to clarify my question. I keep coming back to this forum because it's obvious that, in general, the knowledge and experience here is beyond other audio forums. Sometimes I tire of responses to questions always being conditional.

Now back to my original question.

My dad has always disliked the "digital" sound that he associated with CDs vs. vinyl. I was interested to know if it would be expected that a turntable to solid state integrated amplifier to speakers would result in a more or less appealing sound than a CDP to stereo tube integrated amplifier for someone that prefers the "analog" sound.

It seems that each combination would take the sound closer to the analog end of the spectrum.

Maybe nobody has really played around with these combinations with their own gear.

On a scale from the "analog" to "digital" sound what would you think the order of the following system combinations would be?

(1) All Analog - turntable to tube amp to speakers
(2) Hybrid A - turntable to solid state amp to speakers
(3) Hybrid B - CDP to tube amp to speakers
(4) All Digital - CDP to solid state amp to speakers

Assume the gear is all the same and the musical selectio is identical with both the vinyl and CD being excellent recordings and give me your gut feeling about whether Hybrid A or B would sound closer to the All analog sound 50.00001% of the time.

I have never had the opportunity to do anything close to this and my gut would be that source would result in the more analog sound.

Charles1dad - What's ironic is that if I listed every aspect of my system and listening room and somehow quantified my listening preferences in an objective way we'd be no closer to being able to discuss it because unless you personally experience what I experience the list of "conditions" is endless. So where does that leave us with an audio forum?

I just don't see where stating an opinion, however much it approaches being a wild guess, is so impossible.

Onhwy61 - I absolutely believe that there's some truth in almost every caveat that is mentioned, but my point is that these types of things should be assumed and unecessary to bring up in every post.

For example:
Jmcgrogan2's post could have simply said, "In my experience I'd rather listen to an AAD CD than a digitally mastered LP so assuming that the album being used is an analog recording with analog mixing, I would choose 1, 2, 3, 4 as my preferred order of system combinations generally speaking."

I would then take this to be his general opinion and not absolute fact in every case on every system combination. I'm guessing that some of the rest of the post was provided tongue in cheek, but you get my point.

Jmcgrogan2 does bring up an interesting point that a digitally mastered LP isn't superior to the CD. I have a coworker that strongly prefers vinyl, but says he can't really tell a difference between a digitally mastered LP and the same CD.

The interesting thing about the Claude Bolling CD is that it is fairly unique in my collection because it is one that I've always wished had a better recording when my system did wonders with the majority of my music. I'm not judging all tube or solid state gear based on my two pieces of equipment, but it's becoming very clear that the Yaqin integrated is far superior to the Integra receiver.

I'm sure it's a combination of the differences between tubes and solid state, integrated vs. receiver, and a host of other factors. What I can say is that this tube amp would make my next choice a lot more difficult because I'd have more options to consider.