Vinyl or wait for the new stuff??

In my opinion, vinyl provides an unexplainable quality in reproducing music vis-à-vis digital. I feel that there is a noticeable “blending” of instrumentation and voices with vinyl – including much smoother transients. If your purpose, however, is instrument discrimination, digital might be your bread and butter… but, if you don’t mind a little extra attention to your “software” and simply enjoy music, then vinyl is the way to go. Additionally, I don’t really believe that one must spend excessively to reap the benefits of either vinyl or digital. I would contend that more emphasis be placed upon amplification means (I prefer vacuum tubes to solid state), speakers, quality of the LP or CD, and the inter-relationship of all your components, including cables.

I've been in analog since the intro of LPs. I don't have a vast collection---in early years, I simply couldn't afford to buy lots of records, and my taste in music is rather limited to classical, and even then, to more modern stuff (Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Ravel, etc.), but it's one I still enjoy. More recently, I've become partial to piano trios, quartets, quintets, and small chamber orchestras. In brief, there is now, and always has been, a limited amount of software available that I enjoy. For this reason, I've been reluctant to get into SACD---of the few SACDs available, I've found only about six, maybe eight, that I would want. I hope that will change soon, but only time will tell.

I recently upgraded speakers, pre- and pwr-amps, phono preamp,etc., and have ordered a better cartridge to replace the BPS on my Rega P3. So it's obvious that I'm seriously back into analog. My Wadia 830 is great, but I still hear the dreaded CD grit/grain on many disks. I think SACD might be the answer to many prayers.

As far as the monetary outlay is concerned, look at what you can buy in vinyl, compared to the cost of an average CD. I know of at least two stores in Atlanta where there is a great selection of used/new vinyl at a fraction of what a CD costs. I'm sure such a selection exists in most major cities. RR, Classic, Chesky LPs are all excellent, but their prices are comparable to CDs, or maybe even higher in some cases, although I feel sonics are superior to CDs.

So I plan to keep the CDs I have, add to them when the notion hits me, and do the same with vinyl. I recently dug out some of my LPs---ones I couldn't/didn't listen to before---and with the new equipment many are better than any CD I have.

I'm gonna wait and see what happens. Certainly one, or maybe both, of the new formats will make it. When that happens, prices of machines will drop, and the selection of SACDs or DVD-As will multiply, also with diminishing prices----best of both worlds.
Vinyl is here now,it's good, and it's affordable, even if you have to start from scratch!

You will never regret having the classic experience of vinyl. I still enjoy throwing an old "disk" on the turntable and relaxing with music from the 60's on up!

best mactching, best set up analogue still the best.

We have recently gotten back into vinyl. Yes the cd's are more convenient... but there is something very satisfying about cleaning the LP and placing the tonearm on that vinyl. Even my wife was amazed at the sound, she loves the MFSL recordings. The funny thing was, that after quite a long session of farely loud playing, we never felt like turning down the volume. That harsheness never materialized! And you know what the funny part of that was, I hadn't noticed the cd's harsheness, until we started playing our LP's again. My advice is... don't wait. You really don't know what you're missing!