The Truth About Vinyl Records

[levimax]

Graphic equaliser or DSP (of whatever quality you wish) gives you the options of thousands of new carts and all their “different, hopefully better” sounds. Plus the vastly-more-sensible (compared to changing carts and hoping for magic) option of tuning the sound to suit the recording.

Recently I have been using a test record and the @JP script to measure different carts and have been making FIR filters to EQ them. Seems to work great.

 

[Robert C]

Disclaimer: I have an analogue record collection (dating back to the acoustic era) and an archival disc playback setup (it's my job), but I do the vast majority of my listening for pleasure using digital audio, either compact disc or streaming. A digital copy of the master recording is of course going to provide a 1:1 playback experience that is objectively superior to any analogue copy.

That said, there seems to be a level of vitriol, almost verging on fundamentalism, from users here targeted at people who choose to listen to vinyl records as their primary playback format. A vinyl record is absolutely a high fidelity format. It is a facsimile of a very accurate drawing of sound. No, it will never be as accurate as 16/44 digital, but it is practically identical to the lacquer master. Digitise a vinyl record and compare it back to the digital master and they sound very similar indeed.

It is wrong of vinyl audiophiles to proclaim that their way of listening to music is the purest, because it quite demonstrably isn't. However, it is also wrong of digital audiophiles to claim that vinyl isn't capable of providing a high fidelity listening experience. It's more difficult and takes quite a bit of fiddling, but a vinyl record is perfectly capable of sounding just like the master.

 

[Galliardist]

Disclaimer: I have an analogue record collection (dating back to the acoustic era) and an archival disc playback setup (it's my job), but I do the vast majority of my listening for pleasure using digital audio, either compact disc or streaming. A digital copy of the master recording is of course going to provide a 1:1 playback experience that is objectively superior to any analogue copy.

That said, there seems to be a level of vitriol, almost verging on fundamentalism, from users here targeted at people who choose to listen to vinyl records as their primary playback format. A vinyl record is absolutely a high fidelity format. It is a facsimile of a very accurate drawing of sound. No, it will never be as accurate as 16/44 digital, but it is practically identical to the lacquer master. Digitise a vinyl record and compare it back to the digital master and they sound very similar indeed.

It is wrong of vinyl audiophiles to proclaim that their way of listening to music is the purest, because it quite demonstrably isn't. However, it is also wrong of digital audiophiles to claim that vinyl isn't capable of providing a high fidelity listening experience. It's more difficult and takes quite a bit of fiddling, but a vinyl record is perfectly capable of sounding just like the master.

The fundamentalism (at least on my part, I hope) is against those who "proclaim that their way of listening to music is the purest" as you put it. Even though I don't have a vinyl setup and haven't for years, I don't resent people who listen primarily to vinyl. I have problems with the evangelists who either don't understand, or lie - those who say that vinyl not only is purer, but is the only way to have any kind of relationship to the music.

The point where I get angry is when someone walks into a hi fi store or seeks advice about their first system and is immediately told they have to have vinyl to appreciate music, because these days it is unnecessarily expensive, it is unreasonably awkward ("quite a bit of fiddling") and as you say, it is objectively inferior. I want people to listen to music at decent fidelity. If for them vinyl is part of the answer, and that can be for any of several reasons, they can discover it after they start by owning something great - a reasonably priced system that is easier to use, objectively better, and makes much of the world's music easily available to them at best quality.

Back in the 1980s. the goal of the hifi industry was to have higher fidelity than vinyl - we used to dream of having access to a copy at the standard of the master recording. So, now we can, easily, and guess what? The supposed experts (and often the very same pundits as back then!) are queuing up to tell us that that is wrong, and we should not only use vinyl, but indeed pulling away from high fidelity with recommendations and awards for equipment that would not have passed QA at the Leak factory in the 1950s.

Much of your post I can happily agree with. I had high fidelity from my turntables and vinyl and had it for the best part of 40 years. I disagree with your last four words, and that is based on both the objective numbers and my personal experience. I listen a lot to supposedly simple music - classical guitar, lute, solo harpsichord and piano - and my experience is that detail in such recordings is obscured when listened to intently on LP. The first three of those need very little processing to put onto LP and should be the easiest to reproduce that way. Maybe that's nitpicking, but that's my viewpoint.

There's one more thing. As the loudness wars have receded, there's a different attitude in the industry. Still, though, they continue to serve up digital recordings aimed at the lowest common denominator playback, and excuse themselves from any responsibility by saying that audiophiles only want vinyl. That works against not only self proclaimed "audiophiles" but anyone else who may have bought equipment - maybe modest but better headphones, for example - to get improved digital sound.

It's not high fidelity LP playback that is the problem - it's that big expensive lie that hurts us all, and it's the big expensive lie that brings out the vitriol.

 

[notsodeadlizard]

The most important thing in this sacred struggle with vinyl is not to reach the level of furious evidence for small children that Santa Claus does not exist.
Many are already close...

 

[Galliardist]

The most important thing in this sacred struggle with vinyl is not to reach the level of furious evidence for small children that Santa Claus does not exist.
Many are already close...

He doesn't. But he still made lots of money for Coca-Cola.

Anyway, that doesn't stop LP from sounding fine when done properly. Any sacred struggle is with something else.

 

[MattHooper]

89% of audio sales are streams.

Is that about 'feels'?

Of course. It fulfills an emotional need or desire. Do you think all those people are doing science?

 

[MattHooper]

That said, there seems to be a level of vitriol, almost verging on fundamentalism, from users here targeted at people who choose to listen to vinyl records as their primary playback format.

On one hand there is the downplaying of the sales and influence of vinyl "utterly swamped by the fact people are using streaming instead."

On the other hand, the fervor is like a generation is being corrupted "We came all this way with digital, and now the kids want to listen to vinyl! What's become of this generation?"

It's a bit like the fundamentalist worry "The Kids Are Being Corrupted. They Must Be Saved." ;-)

 

[krabapple]

Of course. It fulfills an emotional need or desire. Do you think all those people are doing science?

You think choosing streams versus vinyl is an 'emotional' decision? You think that's how its users would describe it?

Here on Earth, I beg to differ. Your employment of 'filling an emotional need or desire' as a motivation is banal.

 

[MattHooper]

You think choosing streams versus vinyl is an 'emotional' decision? You think that's how its users would describe it?

Here on Earth, I beg to differ. Your employment of 'filling an emotional need or desire' as a motivation is banal.

Please, do explain why people make choices about how they will listen to music, that does not fulfill an emotional desire. This should be interesting.

Your attempt to divide vinyl listeners from other music listeners in terms of emotion, I suggest, will be a hard sell.

 

[krabapple]

Your implicit proposition that streaming listeners are as emotionally invested in their format choice as vinylphiles are, is laughable.

Tell me, is 'conveniencephilia' a thing on your world?

 

[MattHooper]

Your implicit proposition that streaming listeners are as emotionally invested in their format choice as vinylphiles are, is laughable.

Tell me, is 'conveniencephilia' a thing on your world?

I'd said: "And in any case, in a sense, all purchases are motivated by "feels"

It's not like "people choosing vinyl have emotional reasons for their choices and everyone else does not." Your justification for why you stream will inevitably appeal to how it satisfies your emotional desires just as anyone listening to vinyl. I presume you are not Spock?

Look at the justifications one sees here (and elsewhere) all the time for choosing streaming over, say, vinyl. "It's much more convenient and doesn't have all the hassles" is just another way of saying "I'd be distracted by vinyl, streaming doesn't have those impediments to my just connecting to the music." Also "it's the way I want to be able to explore music." It's all a way of saying "I choose THIS format because the user experience will facilitate my ENJOYMENT of listening to and exploring music." Literally the same underlying motivation someone may have for choosing vinyl. "I like listening to music THIS way, YOU like listening to music THAT way."

What other possible motivation would there be? Like I said, people choosing streaming are not doing science. When CDs came on the scene it wasn't a choice between "reason and emotion." One could have their desires fulfilled by either format, depending on what they liked.

There literally isn't ANY justification you will have for choosing streaming which does not boil down to essentially that basis, which is the basis we make our deliberate choices on what format to use for listening to music.

Your posts suggest you want some way to separate out vinyl listeners in an "us and them" manner, to subtly disparage their choice - as if for the other guy (vinyl listener) it's all about psychology, where the choice for streaming is about "reason."

Sorry, that particular dog don't hunt ;-)

 

[VQR]

That said, there seems to be a level of vitriol, almost verging on fundamentalism, from users here targeted at people who choose to listen to vinyl records as their primary playback format. A vinyl record is absolutely a high fidelity format. It is a facsimile of a very accurate drawing of sound. No, it will never be as accurate as 16/44 digital, but it is practically identical to the lacquer master. Digitise a vinyl record and compare it back to the digital master and they sound very similar indeed.

Most of the vitrol comes from people tired of hearing from a loud minority who think digital is impure. I don't disagree vinyl can give a high fidelity sound for what it is, but it's not the highest fidelity possible in the modern day. I wouldn't call someone a 'digiphile' for wanting the highest fidelity copies possible, i.e. digital audio starting from CD quality and higher.

No phono cartridge can match the flat frequency response of a DAC, nor do you have to worry about wow and flutter from mediocre turntables or off-center pressings. I like and buy new and old vinyl, but I won't claim records are more accurate than a CD or file.

A lot of analogphiles do harm for people getting into the hobby by saying digital can't ever sound as good as vinyl, even going so far as to say they've never heard digital sound good. I feel bad for those people, since even my relatively modest digital setup gives superlative sound. Still, that doesn't stop me from spinning my favorite vinyl pressings with my preferred masterings.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

the theoretical dynamic range of a cd is 96.33dB, in reality it's more about 92dB due to quantization and dithering. Vinyl is between 60 and 70dB mostly depending on the pressing. 24Bit is 144.45dB in theory but in reality hardware limits set it lower. The formula is out there for if you want to calculate it yourself: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_bit_depth

I've heard 62 db which is around 10-11 bits. And to get all of that requires incredibly heroic measures. Wheras any $100 dac will give you at least 90 and probably more like 110 db which is around 18 bits.

It's just a no-brainer and has been for decades.

 

[krabapple]

I'd said: "And in any case, in a sense, all purchases are motivated by "feels"

It's not like "people choosing vinyl have emotional reasons for their choices and everyone else does not." Your justification for why you stream will inevitably appeal to how it satisfies your emotional desires just as anyone listening to vinyl. I presume you are not Spock?

Clearly not, since I'm chuckling at these rhetorical contortions of yours.

 

[IPunchCholla]

I've heard 62 db which is around 10-11 bits. And to get all of that requires incredibly heroic measures. Wheras any $100 dac will give you at least 90 and probably more like 110 db which is around 18 bits.

It's just a no-brainer and has been for decades.

But this all happens in meat-space. I mean with 64-bit audio we have almost 400 dB of dynamic range! That is way better than 24 bit, or 16 bit or LPs! Except we are listening with our bodies. Most people don’t listen to music at an average DB of 90 dB. Loudest show I’ve been to recently was averaging around 117 dB where I was standing (behind the audio guy who had calibration mikes on his board) and that was LOUD!

And then on the other side we have the noise floor, masking effects, etc.

My listening room is around 30 dB for the noise floor, and while I know we can hear tones below the noise floor, but I don’t think we can hear noise below the noise floor. So if I am listening at pretty loud levels, 90 dB average say, then I really only need about 60 dB of range. Masking Also makes the numbers weird. I was listening to LPs on ANC IEMs, so a much lower noise floor. The groove noise on the record sounded so load! Until music was playing, then it simply disappeared. Even when I was listening for the noise and not the music I couldn’t hear it, except during very quiet bits, and even then I had to try and listen to the noise.

Anyway, digital is orders of magnitude better than vinyl, but most of those orders do not apply to actual listening.

 

[levimax]

I've heard 62 db which is around 10-11 bits. And to get all of that requires incredibly heroic measures. Wheras any $100 dac will give you at least 90 and probably more like 110 db which is around 18 bits.

It's just a no-brainer and has been for decades.

I would contend digital has been a disappointment in many ways. When people throw around figures like 60dB vs 110db which is 10,000,000% better they expect to hear a big difference but because of recording quality and human hearing limitations the reality is 60dB vs 110dB is subtle at best. When you combine the other unintended consequences of digital such as CD's padded with "filler songs" in order to fill up 72 minutes and the loudness wars and the resulting terrible sound quality it has not really been as much of a sound quality improvement as I had hoped for. The one area that digital shines is that it is cheap to produce, store, and playback so that has been a win especially for music producers and distributors.... for the average recorded music enthusiast after sound quality no so much.

 

[JRS]

The fundamentalism (at least on my part, I hope) is against those who "proclaim that their way of listening to music is the purest" as you put it. Even though I don't have a vinyl setup and haven't for years, I don't resent people who listen primarily to vinyl. I have problems with the evangelists who either don't understand, or lie - those who say that vinyl not only is purer, but is the only way to have any kind of relationship to the music.

The point where I get angry is when someone walks into a hi fi store or seeks advice about their first system and is immediately told they have to have vinyl to appreciate music, because these days it is unnecessarily expensive, it is unreasonably awkward ("quite a bit of fiddling") and as you say, it is objectively inferior. I want people to listen to music at decent fidelity. If for them vinyl is part of the answer, and that can be for any of several reasons, they can discover it after they start by owning something great - a reasonably priced system that is easier to use, objectively better, and makes much of the world's music easily available to them at best quality.

Back in the 1980s. the goal of the hifi industry was to have higher fidelity than vinyl - we used to dream of having access to a copy at the standard of the master recording. So, now we can, easily, and guess what? The supposed experts (and often the very same pundits as back then!) are queuing up to tell us that that is wrong, and we should not only use vinyl, but indeed pulling away from high fidelity with recommendations and awards for equipment that would not have passed QA at the Leak factory in the 1950s.

Much of your post I can happily agree with. I had high fidelity from my turntables and vinyl and had it for the best part of 40 years. I disagree with your last four words, and that is based on both the objective numbers and my personal experience. I listen a lot to supposedly simple music - classical guitar, lute, solo harpsichord and piano - and my experience is that detail in such recordings is obscured when listened to intently on LP. The first three of those need very little processing to put onto LP and should be the easiest to reproduce that way. Maybe that's nitpicking, but that's my viewpoint.

There's one more thing. As the loudness wars have receded, there's a different attitude in the industry. Still, though, they continue to serve up digital recordings aimed at the lowest common denominator playback, and excuse themselves from any responsibility by saying that audiophiles only want vinyl. That works against not only self proclaimed "audiophiles" but anyone else who may have bought equipment - maybe modest but better headphones, for example - to get improved digital sound.

It's not high fidelity LP playback that is the problem - it's that big expensive lie that hurts us all, and it's the big expensive lie that brings out the vitriol.

I very much like your comment about not using vinyl in a first home stereo system. This has come up here multiple times when a newcomer to the hobby solicits advice on putting together a vinyl based system.

Because he has heard that vinyl is best, he or she enters ASR seeking advice based on the assumption that 30 of 40% of the budget needs to be spent on a TT. And in many but not all cases depending on whether there's a phono preamp built into the TT he's looking at another box and another 100+ dollars.

Its easy to recommend a system that while BT based easily exceeds most kf what we older readers started with in SQ and price.

My first real system cost be about 1000 after serious discounts on Marantz 100w/side integrated/AR speakers/technics/Stanton . That same thousand dollars would have made a significant down payment on a new Dodge Charger costing 3500 vs one today selling for 35000.

I'm sure we could all come up with a capable system in the 1000 range. I'd likely recommend a solid pair of active speakers and stands. Many to choose from. Wire it up_ plug it in and done. Use BT from phone--many actives will accept feeds ftom s variety of sources including in some cases TTs.

Step 2 would be to acquire a TT and phono stage for a few hundred if they still wanted to pursue vinyl. At that point in the process a fair eval of vinyl vs streaming can be made and the mistake avoided of cutting speaker quality to accommodate vinyl. And without vinyl one can buy s nice sub or maybe a 55" OLED.

I think that's far better than finicky phono, expensive records, cartridge upgrade, etc if you're trying to keep someone in the hobby.

But I digress--just wanted to flesh out your point using recent example. Its a good one.

 

[MattHooper]

Clearly not, since I'm chuckling at these rhetorical contortions of yours.

Chuckling is easier than answering an argument. It's conspicuous that you ignored my challenge - to justify a choice for streaming over other options that is not about satisfying one's preferences. As I described ;-)

Have you missed how many times people here (and elsewhere in the music/audiophile scene) have extolled the new age of streaming? They aren't just doing so dispassionately...with "no feels." Listeners clearly REALLY CARE about it. It really fulfills their desires in terms of music listening. If fulfills their "feels" in regards to music just like a vinyl listener may feel vinyl fulfills their "feels."

Example from Vinyl Listener: "I choose to listen to vinyl because I find it facilitates the way I want to listen - deliberately and to albums rather than playlists. Getting in to vinyl has also facilitated my musical exploration: perusing record stores, record shows, exchanging notes with other vinyl listeners etc, has led me to discovering all sorts of music and artists I hadn't been aware of...."

Example from Streaming Listener: "I choose to listen to music via streaming because I find it facilitates the way I want to listen to music - anywhere, any time, as I jog, in my car etc. I love having millions of tracks at my fingertips as it has led me to discovering all sorts of music and artists I hadn't been aware of."

Both are expressions of satisfying one's preferences - a preference for how one listens to music.

And these are fundamentally different....how, exactly?

 

[Newman]

If you weren't the school debating team captain …then your school missed an opportunity for a national title.

Never mind, right or wrong, it's all about the debate!

 

[Newman]

Your implicit proposition that streaming listeners are as emotionally invested in their format choice as vinylphiles are, is laughable.

Agreed. After all, today’s streaming listeners include many who once were vinyl, then moved to CD without a teary goodbye, and similarly from CD to downloads, from downloads to streaming. That’s not what emotional investment looks like.

But the Vinyl Defenders are stuck. And they are stuck because they are attached. Now, that’s what emotional investment looks like.