is the sound of vinyl due to the physical process of the turntable?

guyboisvert
@theo @mrubey It all starts with recording the actual instruments in studio. Everything is recorded digitally theses days.

Technically, the best medium is digital and by far: Much Higher Dynanics, much better separation, much lower noise, no wear out, no angle error, no medium saturation, no compression, etc etc etc. The Vinyl is highly processed to fit in the physical medium. There is the RIAA EQ Curve applied so it can sound decent on this very poor medium.
And contrary to what you said, there is no "lost information" with digital, it’s simple math theory at work.

All that being said, you are perfectly right to prefer the sound of one or another, digital or analog. Each component has its transfer function, at the end, whatever it is, you are the one who listen and choose.

>>>That may all be true, I don’t know, but I suspect most audiophiles are focused on 👀 and committed to music from an earlier age, back when the recordings were made on tape. Then, staying in the same medium - tape - starts to look very attractive. No chop, chop, chop. Tape is a natural medium. It breathes. That why cassettes and vinyl just sound right. Forget about all the technical arguments. Almost all technical arguments can be disputed anyway. The playback medium is cut from the same cloth ✂️ as the recording.

Try not to listen to systems that are better than yours. That will only depress you. Only listen to systems that are worse than yours. That way you can avoid the upgrade urge and the tweak rabbit hole simultaneously. Keep telling yourself, my system sounds fabulous! 🤗

“Even my wife picks it up.”

>>>>>You sold me. 😬

The CD laser has a nano scale beam width and the spiral of physical data on the CD is also nano scale in diameter. In order to keep the laser focused on the data spiral whilst the disc is fluttering there is laser servo feedback system 🔄 and a tiny spring system for the laser that allows the laser to move very easily back and forth as required to stay on the spiral track.

The trouble is there is so much fluttering of the disc and movement caused by external forces (vibration) along with the out-of-round condition of the CD disc the laser servo system can’t keep up with all of the motion. Furthermore, unless you’ve obtained precise level of the CD while spinning the disc will wobble even more. Further exacerbating the situation, very low frequency seismic forces act 🔜 on the tiny spring suspension of the laser, the Fr of which is about 8 Hz, making the laser move unnecessarily. The CD edge beveler from Germany 🇩🇪 was designed to make the CD perfectly round which helped eliminate the flutter problem, but did not go far enough. I stiffen the CD disc and obtain absolute level whilst playing.

The laser light is scattered inside the transport box while the laser reads the data. The entire inside of the transport is lit up like a Christmas tree 🎄 but you would need infrared goggles to see it since it’s invisible light. The scattered laser light gets into the photodetector, which can’t tell the “good light“ from the scattered light. My NEW DARK MATTER scattered light absorber is the only audiophile device specifically designed to prevent invisible AND invisible scattered laser light from entering the photodetector and damaging the sound.

No, I don’t think aliasing is the culprit. Because if you listen to a digitally remastered cassette the so called digititis is absent. No more harsh weird sounding high frequencies and overall hardness to the sound, which are the calling cards of CD playback. No, the answer lies elsewhere. It lies in the inherent problems of CD players, their inability to extract the data correctly from the CD - as I’ve been saying for some time. The “digital artifacts” are produced by the act of playing the CD. Insidious isn’t it? 

Once you mechanically isolate the player, eliminate the scattered light problem and stiffen the CD itself the sound you hear is the pure analog sound that was encoded on the CD in the first place in all its glory. Old or new CDs, doesn’t matter. Hel-loo! Anybody out there?! Car 54 where are you? 😟 Wake up and smell the roses!! 🌹🌹🌹

mrubey
This explanation occurred to me back in the 80s when I first heard digital. It mimics Theo’s explanation.

Sound is a physical vibratory phenomena.
Analog technology captures and replays vibration as vibration all within the vibratory realm. It is not changed from its fundamental nature and has a sense of reality.
Digital on the other hand, like a teletransporter, disassembles then reassembles sound. Something is lost.

>>>>No. No. No. A thousand times no! Sound is only vibratory in the air. In wires and cables it’s not vibratory. Sound only becomes vibratory when the speaker transducers make them so. We re not even sure at this point as a group what the audio signal in wire even is. How’s that for reality? The CD itself contains all the intricate information of the music. You just can’t extract that information correctly. That’s all.