2. analog
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More convinced of analog than ever

Wednesday night I went to my local high end shop's "Music Matters" open house, which featured six meticulously set up listening rooms highlighting the best and brightest offerings from Wilson, Transparent, Audio Research, Ayre, Magnepan, Peachtree, B&W, Classe, Rotel, etc., with factory reps to introduce their products and innovations.

There were unmistakable improvements in reproduction of redbook CD, with jitter reduced to near zero, and holographic reproduction of images, soundstages, and the minute signals that indicate instrument resonance and hall ambience.

And yet... and yet... when the demos shifted from redbook to the new downloadable hi-rez digital formats in 24/88.2 and 24/96, there was an unmistakable jump in resolution around the edges of the notes, of sounds swelling, resonating, and decaying, of greater verisimilitude.

But compared to the turntable demos, I'd say the 24-bit digital got me about 80% there, whereas LP playback closed the gap completely. Once the LPs started spinning, there was a collective relaxed "aaaahhh" that went through the audience. It wasn't because of dynamic compression. Far from it, the Ayre prototype turntable was strikingly dynamic with a subterranean noise floor.

The sense of ease and relaxation I attribute to a sudden drop in listener fatigue. The LP-source music had so much more of what makes music musical. We didn't have to work nearly as hard to rectify the ear-brain connection as with even the best of 24-bit digital, which was still significantly better than redbook. The redbook playback always reminded me that I was listening to "hi-fi," even when played through multi-thousand dollar players from ARC and Ayre.

Even my local Brit-oriented Rega/Naim dealer asserts that the latest CD players rival or exceed LP playback.

I say nay.

What say you?
johnnyb53

Showing 1 response by dgad

dgad
782 posts
 
I have what I consider IMO both top flight digital and top flight analogue. Johnnyb's excitement about the maturing of digital is extremely valid. And there might be a time that such maturity will make the analogue renaissance truly come to a trickle. A native DSD recorded SACd can sound incredible. The problem is these are few and far between. Digital recordings have improved and quite a few CDs can sound good, very good. On the whole analogue playback has better source material than digital. But digital is coming of age and hard drive based playback with fast downloads, cheap storage and phenomenal dacs for a lot less money than just a few years ago are heare with more on the horizon. Now to get the true Hi Rez digital music downloads is the final key. I wonder if anyone will convert old master tapes via a hi resolution media that can be played off of a hard drive?

Yet... great vinyl warms my heart and I listen to it more than digital, even though digital is more convenient. The worst thing for me about vinyl is cleaning LPs. Mind you I hate biasing my tube amps as well.
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