Clipping occurs anywhere, as another poster or two commented. Even if it's all digital and all the processor 'boxes' are dsps, you can clip. If you turn things down one at a time and (besides making things quieter) you notice a huge improvement in sound quality, you were clipping someplace. One reason I use computers. Plenty of peak meter dsps to insert in the signal chain (rms meters are near useless for this).
If it's the old classic power amp type clipping, a tube amp will go into clipping before you know it's there perhaps, since tubes soft-clip. They're not 'fast enough' to saw off a waveform like it had been cut with scissors. The edges round off. It may not be offensive enough to notice until you really overdrive it. Solid state amps clip very sharply, leaving you with a lot of odd harmonics like a square wave. It's very hard to listen to, which is why guitarists who want that pleasant fuzzy tone use tubes. Solid state sounds like a buzz saw. You'll know if your SS amp is clipping.
And then there are speakers. Many of them have sensitive spots at different frequency bands where they simply buzz. It's a common defect, one you'll never pin down without a signal generator (which these days your laptop can become pretty easily).
And then there are the 1000 other reasons besides 'clipping' that something sounds bad, especially if it's not on loud passages. A vinyl environment has quite the number of mechanical culprits to suspect, not of 'clipping' but of noises and distortion.
