Vinyl vs. top-notch digital

Jeff - Glad you started this thread...very thoughtful responses. In a sense, I'm mainly saying "me too." I worked hard for several years to get the best out of CD's, including picking up a demo Linn CD12 and having Great Northern Sound modify my Wadia 860, and I've had some extended experience with an EMM CDSA. All three are among the best you can do in digital, as far as I can tell. But something was lacking. I had an Linn LP12 that I hadn't used for 15+ years. I had it refurbished last fall, and put a new Koetsu Black in it, and bought an EAR 834P phono stage. I was amazed. Good vinyl is just wonderful. Digital can be fatiguing. Vinyl rarely is (although, as with CD's, there are vinyl dogs out there). And, yes, you end up in searches for 2nd hand vinyl, then you find yourself buying a record cleaning machine, etc.

But I'm fascinated by Violin's comments, and think he's onto something, also. I find that I like classical music more on vinyl...and my "reference" is my typical listening post, mid-hall in a good concert hall. Yet, I tend to prefer pop music on CD, perhaps because, like Violin, I spent a lot of time on the bandstand over the years, playing rock, later fusion, and country. Jazz (except fusion), works pretty well (for me) either on vinyl or CD, although I think vinyl tends to catch the sonic nuances better than CD.

You ought to be able to get a fine rig for around $5-6K. If you go this route, and want some thoughts on places to find good 2nd hand classical vinyl, send me an email.

The "digital vs. analog" controversy seems unresolvable, from a talking standpoint. As an semi-active musician, I've recorded in both formats and had good, and bad results in each. I've been disappointed with transfers of analog material to digital. I've read a fair bit about digital vs. analog, and talked to my engineer friends. Seems like there are a lot of theories floating around out there about why digital "must be" as good or better than analog, or why analog might "seem to be" more listener-friendly.

What I hear when I listen, using top notch digital playback vs. at least very good analog playback (all as reported above) is quite consistent with what many others (but not all) report: good Lps present a sound that is somewhat warmer, somewhat more detailed, and typically less fatiguing, than what I hear on CD's. I've heard theories that suggest that what I'm hearing is actually a result of deficiencies in the whole analog process. I suppose those theories could be right.

But at the end of the day, who cares? Enough of us hear differences in the formats that I think it's hard to argue that there are no differences (depending on the characteristics and quality of the playback systems, of course). Beyond that, it seems like what matters is what you like. (As noted, I tend to like classical vinyl, and pop CDs. Possibly that plays to the strengths of each, at least on my system.) And, if you're a really serious music and audio junkie, like most of us here, the two formats are at least worth experimenting with. Sure can be fun, and satisfying.