Expectations vs. results

[LouB]

After 50 years of chasing sound (always on budget) built my 1st pair of speakers in 1973 at 15 years old. Pretty much have always had a "decent" sounding system over the years even in my vehicles I made sure they had good sound. About 35 years ago I went all digital content & sold/gave away all my albums & TT.
Fast forward to 2023 now retired & have been buying some new gea, researching amps, speakers, streamers, turntables, dacs, ect. I've read so much about how crappy vinyl is & why nobody in there right mind should invest in it, blah, blah, blah. So I was hesitant about getting back into vinyl I mean I can stream 80 million hi-res songs for about 12 bucks a month, blah, blah, blah. But as usual I didn't heed the advice. Took the plunge & bought a new RegaPlanar 2 went to the local record store spent 40 bucks & came home with 6 used albums listened to em last night and was totally blown away by how good they sounded ! I was surprised to say the least (that's comparing the sound to a Marantz CD6007 player & hi-res streaming).
My expectations were so low on how the vinyl would compare to digital due to all hate I've read on the internet, I hope my low expectations didn't screw up my 1st impressions of the sound. Maybe they did a bit but I really enjoyed listening to the albums just as much as anything digital, I hope the honeymoon lasts ! Anyway thanks to all the haters for lowering my expectations and making me happy I didn't waste a dime on buying a TT .

 

[solderdude]

No one said vinyl cannot sound good. It always did (on a decent setup) and still sounds good (so can the good ol' tape).

When one talks about signal fidelity (so preservation of the final mix) vinyl is poor compared to digital copy of the same recording.
There are lots of people even preferring vinyl.

 

[Joe Smith]

Enjoy all the formats, that's my motto... (The only real limiting factor is one's storage space. Digital solves a lot of problems in that regard.)

LPs still can sound great, even with a modest investment, and the aesthetics/physical nature of it are enjoyable...congrats on your new purchase!

 

[mhardy6647]

Enjoy all the formats, that's my motto... (The only real limiting factor is one's storage space. Digital solves a lot of problems in that regard.)

 

[Cote Dazur]

was totally blown away by how good they sounded !

Good for you.
For the record (pun intended) not every body hate LP and playing them on a TT here at ASR. While recognizing that digital medium is technically superior, many here still enjoy a steady diet listening of stereo recordings on a TT.
Some have developed a condition that make them allergic to listening to vinyl records, a sad state if you ask me and we should wish them well with a possible prompt recovery.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Some have developed a condition that make them allergic to listening to vinyl records, a sad state if you ask me and we should wish them well with a possible prompt recovery.

Thanks and we wish you the same.

 

[jjmanda]

My opinion is that a lot of vinyl vs. digital depends on the mastering job.

I have vinyl where the mastering is superior to any CD mastering I have found.
I also have CD's where the mastering is superior to any vinyl mastering I ever listened to.

The mastering can make all the difference I believe.

There are some music catalogues where the mastering jobs are all over the darn place.
Take Black Sabbath for example. There are good, bad and ugly mastering jobs on both CD and vinyl.

And of course there is that nostalgic love of vintage vinyl and packaging for our generation that grew up before there were any digital formats.

 

[serendipitydawg]

Out of curiosity : what were the 6 LPs you bought ?

 

[Sokel]

My opinion is that a lot of vinyl vs. digital depends on the mastering job.

I have vinyl where the mastering is superior to any CD mastering I have found.
I also have CD's where the mastering is superior to any vinyl mastering I ever listened to.

The mastering can make all the difference I believe.

There are some music catalogues where the mastering jobs are all over the darn place.
Take Black Sabbath for example. There are good, bad and ugly mastering jobs on both CD and vinyl.

And of course there is that nostalgic love of vintage vinyl and packaging for our generation that grew up before there were any digital formats.

I have two different copies of Paranoid (yes,we classical listeners grew up like the normal people ) ,one normal and the other one is picture disc .
I don't think I ever heard such a bad sound again in my life (the picture one)

 

[Gorgonzola]

Good for you.
For the record (pun intended) not every body hate LP and playing them on a TT here at ASR. While recognizing that digital medium is technically superior, many here still enjoy a steady diet listening of stereo recordings on a TT.
Some have developed a condition that make them allergic to listening to vinyl records, a sad state if you ask me and we should wish them well with a possible prompt recovery.

No recovery for me It isn't that I hate the vinyl sound. What I hate is setting up and maintaining turntables, tone arms, and cartridges; also, retrieving, dusting, and handling of the LPs themselves. I bought my last LP in the mid-90s and quit playing them altogether about 15 years -- just not worth the hassle. Today I don't even play CDs for similar reasons though I still buy quite a few because much Classical music is available only on CD/SACD; I immediately rip these to FLAC files.

Vinyl can sound great, though ultimately not as great as digital can sound, (but doesn't always). What has always been true is that the quality of the recording & mastering is more important to the sound than the medium. There are good & terrible sound LPs, and good & terrible sounding CDs.

 

[Cote Dazur]

No recovery for me

You do not need recovery,, you are not allergic to vinyl sound, you prefer something else for all kind of good reasons, but still recognize that within limitation a LP can be enjoyable, as at the end of the day "recording & mastering is more important to the sound than the medium".
You seem perfectly balanced to me.

 

[mike70]

mastering / recording is the key in the source.
after that, your speakers have much greater distortion than vinyl and your amplifier can have lesser dynamic range than vinyl ... and ... can we talk about room acoustics?

so ... in the REAL world ... the theoretical axioms can be totally silly. Enjoy music, in the way you like it more, and that's all.

theory is only equals to practice in theory.