Turntable got absolutely crushed by CD

There was a very interesting study done many years ago. It was a professional study done by psychologists and following established procedures to minimize anything that might influence the outcome. There were for example no questions about which is better or why. People sat and listened to some music. Different kinds of music. The questions that were asked were directed at the music. Its been so long now I forget but they were asked questions along the lines of have you heard this before, would you be interested in buying it, do you feel more or less inclined to listen to more of this music in the future, that kind of thing. 

They had an assistant bringing the questionnaire hand it to them from behind, eliminating any chance the subjects might see an expression or mannerism and be influenced in their answers. Not that they could have done much, even the assistants had no idea what was going on. All they knew was light goes off you go in hand this over take it back, wash, rinse repeat. Easily the most comprehensively objective, scientifically and statistically sound study I have ever seen or heard about.

The music they heard was played three different ways, all carefully matched to volume, frequency response, everything possible to eliminate all but the two parameters being studied. In the first method it was turntable and tube amp. In the second it was CD and tube amp. In the third it was CD and SS amp. 

While I said 1st, 2nd and 3rd they weren't always in that order. People might get tired after a while. That might influence results. So the order was randomized.

Now even though this is to the best of my knowledge clearly the definitive study on the subject, since nobody was asked which one sounds better we can't come to that conclusion. What they did show however and by a statistically large margin is people enjoy and want to buy music more when it is played on turntables with tubes. There was a clear ranking with turntable/tube first, CD tube second, CD SS dead last.

At the conclusion of the study the poor assistant who had been hearing all this for weeks asked what in the world was going on? Why? Because she couldn't figure it out. But over time she had come to dread the time when it would be the one awful sounding one.

That would be, just so you know, the CD and solid state.

Right you are, simao. Except I would add, its not just the pressing. The MoFi Dire Straits 45 is an awful pressing. Mine skips on Walk of Life, there are pops and crackles everywhere, and the whole pressing is just depressingly noisy across all sides. Its so bad I called Acoustic Sounds and said this is the worst MoFi ever! They agreed! Set a record for returns! And yet, even so, the sound that is there is so glorious that when they said they can refund but not exchange as there are none to exchange it for I said, well then I'll keep it!

So its not just the pressing. Another example. I have a really nice reissue of Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon. Pulled it out recently. Looks and plays like new. Quiet as can be. Perfectly fine pressing. Could hardly stand it. Awful detail, congested, harsh, glaring, pretty much crap. Pulled out one of my old MoFi's from back in the 70's, probably played 40 times by now. Ahhh, sweet, pure, natural, clear, that's the ticket! 

The MoFi is of course famously made from an Original Master Recording, and comes with a two page insert documenting all the obsessive steps taken to preserve fidelity in the process. My hunch is the reissue was made from gawd knows what source tape, knocked off on whatever gear was cheap, by whoever was available, so that by the time it got to the final step in the process it really doesn't matter what vinyl they use or how its pressed. The recording was an abortion from the get-go.

I think something like that happened on the LP of The New Basement Tapes. They messed that one up so much it sounds better on YouTube.

Comparing apples to apples recording quality wise its no contest. Even the crappiest MoFi ever crushes any digital version.

 So, yes a cheap LP set up can conquer a cheap CD player with low end ancillary equipment.

lol! The CDP my Technics first trounced was a $1200 California Audio Labs that I had selected only after home auditioning a dozen contenders. I really liked it. Wife really liked it. Except compared to vinyl.

That first system was anything but low end. Nor was the next one it trounced. Budget, yes. Low end, no. This was a CDP based system I put together as a gift, that sounded so good I had friends over just to prove to them you do not have to spend a lot to have truly good sound. I'd say about a dozen people, none of them audiophiles, just normal people. Every single one was stunned- at first, how good a budget system can sound and second, that the records killed the CD. Not even close.

By the third time it became painfully unfair because the Kenwood was gone so I had to use the ARC PH-3 SE. Only did this once because of the hassle and the ARC being like using a microscope to look at a flower.

Later on it was a Basis 2001/Graham 2.0/Glider when a friend challenged me for playing records when he could be listening to "better sound" from CD. (I forget what CD it was, CDPs being eminently forgettable.)  Now its true, if you compare a crap recording on vinyl to a good recording on CD the good recording will, uh, may sound better. Duh. Which I told him. Which he asked well do you have the same thing in both formats? Yeah sure, MFSL Original Master Recording. Ten minutes later my friend is telling me, "I kept thinking you were playing one louder, or that you did something, but actually no everything was identical. The record just sounds better." And his wife, equally amazed, nods in agreement.

Main thing I always make a point of saying, these are all normal people. Normal people who just love music. Normal people, in my experience, always hear the better power cord, interconnect, Cone, whatever. Always. I've had parties, room full of people, swap a power cord, everyone hears it. I've had wives shout from the kitchen which one sounds better. Even one old guy who thought it would be a waste of time because he wore two hearing aids.

Ancillary equipment doesn't seem to matter. Cost doesn't seem to matter. Only one thing seems to matter: Is it a person? Or an audiophile?

We report.

You decide.

ALSO: I don't really think it takes super expensive turntable/phono stages/cartridges for vinyl to compete with digital.

 
I'll say! Back in 1998 when I "thought" I was done auditioning and assembling the best system I could afford, I made the mistake of digging out my old Technics SL-1700. Bought new in 1976, it had after college sat in a box for years. It had the Stanton 681-EEE. It had patch cords (remember those??). It had... a bent cantilever?!?!? How'd that happen???! Dang! Oh well: pliers!

Thankfully I was able to straighten it out without breaking the cantilever off. Plugged the patch cords into the only phono stage I had, the one built into an even older (1974?) Kenwood integrated. Pulled out one of the few records I for whatever reason hadn't been able to part with when the rest were dumped for next to nothing at a record store. (Stupid, stupid, STUPID!!!)

Eventually the stylus drops onto the vinyl and..... WTF?!?! I mean WHAT the @$#@^#!?!?! All I could do was sit there slack jawed as this beat up old relic was positively blowing away my CDP! The CDP I had just spent months auditioning contenders to find. The CDP with a power cord, and Cones, and Shelf, and green stuff around the edges of the CD, which had been treated, and.... revealed to have no there there.

So the turntable trounced the CDP. Impossible! Jedi mind trick?

Hours later, wife comes home, "What's that you're playing?"
"Tom Petty." (She knew that.) "Why?"
"It sounds really good."
My wife by the way, it takes major improvements for her to notice.
Without tipping her off I lured her into the room. No way she could see the turntable sitting on the floor. To her eyes it had to be the CDP.

"How does it sound?"

"It sounds really good!"

Me, "Its a record."

She, "Well, it sounds really good!"

Yeah. Let that one sink in. Woman with no skin in the game. Loves music, couldn't care less for the equipment, the technology, any of that. And she prefers the record. I mean really, let it sink in.

I could share a dozen other similar stories. That is why, anyone tries to tell me a turntable got absolutely crushed by a CDP, all I can do is ask, from how high was it dropped?

Based simply on countless auditions, not just myself but scores of people (please note: not audiophiles, PEOPLE) over many years with everything from budget to mega there simply is no way any VPI doesn't trounce any CD.

So let's set that aside and maybe focus on what you really need to develop, which is listening skills.

No offense, but if you had them we wouldn't be here. You would have heard- not seen, heard- that VTA was off, and kept adjusting until it was right on. 

Lesson One: turntables CANNOT be set up and adjusted by eyeballs, rulers, stylus force gauges, or any of that. These merely get you in the ballpark. Perfect LP playback can only be achieved by careful listening, judicious adjustment, and more listening.

Lesson Two: most everything you adjust will affect everything else. Changing tracking force alters SRA, which affects VTA. Tracking force also affects subjective frequency response, which might make you change your opinion on the optimum VTA. Round and round.

Fremer no doubt has superb setup tutorials online. Seek them out and study.

My tip for setting VTA: If the arm is a bit too high (arm tilts down towards the stylus) you will hear note attack emphasized relative to note body. The saxophone reed a bit more prominent than the body. Cymbal tsss more than tinggggg. With VTA too low the body or fundamental of the note will be a bit more pronounced relative to the attack, or plucking, whatever you want to call it.

If that seems hard, wait, it gets better. The difference, when you get really good at it, between high, low and perfect is way, way, WAAAAY too small to see. Its like thousandths of an inch. When I get it right I write it down, right on the record. Its not like you have to do this. Hardly anyone does. It seems like a lot of work. Impossible, if you can't hear the difference. With practice though its easy. Once you understand what it sounds like when VTA is locked in its hard to accept less than perfect. Especially when by then you also know you can tweak it perfect in literally a matter of minutes.

Once you understand. There's your homework.