When is digital going to get the soul of music?

Dear Alex,

You should worry less about the ramblings of one man, (me), and more about folks like FX-Jitter and Ta-Chen Wu, whose e-mails still remain unanswered (over 18 months for Ta-Chen Wu). (Phone calls, too.)

Another issue: Why is it that the course of discussion always has to be centered around you and your APL products? If anyone posts about your competitors, (especially TRL), you and a handful of your supporters are quick to post derogatory comments and in extreme cases, sending unsolicited e-mails to us making rude comments about our choice.

If there is one thing that I've learned in my 30 plus years in the hobby it is that we all hear differently and all have different tastes. This is easily seen in the Inmate systems portion of AA or by viewing the gear of various members of Audiogon. SET versus transistor ... single driver horns versus electrostats .. we all have different tatses and likes/dislikes.

This said, why are you so defensive whenever the praise does not center around you? If you have the press from CES that you believe that you do, and the customer support and plenty of work, then why are you concerned about what a JES45 or a Clio09, or an Lkdog has to say? Why?

And, why can't you allow us the opportunity to share and discuss OUR opinion and likes/dislikes/tastes?

Best wishes,

Jack Seaton

What is a digital Lp? Lps mastered from digital tapes. From about '78 to '82(?) digital tape was available, but not the CD. One could only buy digital records, with the word DIGITAL splashed proudly across the front with all sorts of technical info on back. CD's came out later, but Classical records continued to be pressed simultaneously by the majors, (Decca/DG/Nonesuch/Philips, etc) until about '89. They're not bad at all. I particularly recommend Ashkenazy's Rachmaninov cycle and Mackerrass' Janacek.

i once read an interview with Tom Shultz (guitar gear designer, lead player for Boston) and he felt that the elimination of Phase distortion in the digital relm got rid of a lot of the environmental cues (i.e. sence of space) that are present in analog. maybe he's on to something. My digital set up is pretty darn nice but i can easily get drawn into extended album spinning that is much more rewarding and my analog is low end Linn arm on a CJ walker table using a B&O reciever for a phono pre...not much to speak of. Maybe Tom is onto something.

I can't find the comment, but he said something like I last listened to digital in 1988, enough said. His comment has a ring of truth, but I want to address the importance of history here. For instance, I 100% deoxited and 100% progolded my Oritek X-2 interconnects recently. At first they sounded harder, later that changed. To see if they benefited from this, I went back to my old Hi-Fi Answers information. It said that if something got louder after a change, it was better(this is in the analog days). Another thing they said, if it made more albums listenable it was better. I would have to agree, but I put the final decision on the Ori, of Oritek Audio.

I want to address something else about history here. I am 54 years old and I count on something I did over 25 years ago as important, or more so, than anything I have done since. I tried to set up an Ariston RD11E with a Grace arm, and Osawa-22 mat. The belt kept coming off. It was almost impossible, yet I learned a lot. I learned that one spring corresponded to what comes out of one speaker. Another spring corresponded to what comes out of the other speaker. The third spring had to do with the middle. I also learned that its three feet were also audible. One side of the cartridge screws(its alignment) corresponded to what one heard from one speaker. The other side of the cartridge corresponded to what comes out of the other speaker. Anti-skate is also audible. Just understand the theory and use the whole record on anti-skate.