When a single vinyl album costs more than your DAC ...

[Robin L]

Your CD has a resolution of 16 bits.
Those are 65,536 fixed voltage steps.

Now how many steps for vinyl?
All of them (unlimited).

Ah . . . no . . .

You keep using words.
I don't think you know what those words mean.

 

[Robin L]

How so? Why would my subjective experience be any different from your own in terms of "knowing" what someone else is experiencing?

Have to admit this leads us to Principle Poop's perplex:

"That's metaphysically absurd! How can I KNOW what you HEAR!?"

 

[A800]

Ah . . . no . . .

You keep using words.
I don't think you know what those words mean.

LOL.
Not bad.

 

[Robin L]

LOL.
Not bad.

A: Those "steps" you speak of do not exist.
B: The bandwidth and dynamic range of Redbook Digital exceeds the bandwidth and dynamic range of ANY LP.

 

[A800]

A: Those "steps" you speak of do not exist.
B: The bandwidth and dynamic range of Redbook Digital exceeds the bandwidth and dynamic range of ANY LP.

A: read up on digital technology.
B: I agree.

Also there are steps/limited resolution in the time domain compared to vinyl.

 

[levimax]

Same people arguing over same subject in a circle.... not sure why digital vs vinyl is even a controversy on these boards.... if someone enjoys driving his vintage Corvette even though he has a new BMW M5 I don't think that would be controversial.... it's just a different experience. I think having both vinyl and digital playback capabilities broadens the "listening to recorded music experience"... arguing which one is "superior" doesn't make any sense.

 

[MattHooper]

Your CD has a resolution of 16 bits.
Those are 65,536 fixed voltage steps.

Now how many steps for vinyl?
All of them (unlimited).

Oh, you were serious.

Oh dear. I'll leave it to others who want to handle that old myth...

(And you are ignoring all the ways in which CD is demonstrably lower in distortion, higher in accuracy, and is capable of higher dynamic range).

 

[A800]

Oh, you were serious.

Oh dear. I'll leave it to others who want to handle that old myth...

(And you are ignoring all the ways in which CD is demonstrably lower in distortion, higher in accuracy, and is capable of higher dynamic range).

I didn't ignore the obvious higher dynamic range^ I said "I agree".
Lower distortion and higher accuracy is the same.
But I am not so sure about that.

 

[Robin L]

Oh, you were serious.

Oh dear. I'll leave it to others who want to handle that old myth...

(And you are ignoring all the ways in which CD is demonstrably lower in distortion, higher in accuracy, and is capable of higher dynamic range).

And once one gets to modern day tech specs for digital record/replay, we are in exponentially different territory than good old Redbook. Prima facie absurd argument.

 

[MattHooper]

I didn't ignore the obvious higher dynamic range^ I said "I agree".

You'd written: How can a medium incorporating limited resolution be superior to a medium with unlimited resolution?

The answer is not only is the LP resolution not superior to redbook CD, but redbook CD is a "superior medium" to LP in various other ways
including lower distortion/higher dynamic range capability, and greater overall accuracy.

 

[Robin L]

not sure why digital vs vinyl is even a controversy on these boards....

Be kinda useless posting such arguments on most audio boards. I can tell you from experience that Mikey Don't Like That.

But there's that "Science" word up there defining one of the aspects of this particular forum. And that calls out for specifics as regards the actual measurable performance of audio gear. That appears to be the primary concern of our host. So dealing with the specifics of the very real limitations of a given audio format is grist for the mill 'round these parts.

 

[Robin L]

You'd written: How can a medium incorporating limited resolution be superior to a medium with unlimited resolution?

The answer is not only is the LP resolution not superior to redbook CD, but redbook CD is a "superior medium" to LP in various other ways
including lower distortion/higher dynamic range capability, and greater overall accuracy.

But raw Opium has that flavor . . .

 

[A800]

You'd written: How can a medium incorporating limited resolution be superior to a medium with unlimited resolution?

The answer is not only is the LP resolution not superior to redbook CD, but redbook CD is a "superior medium" to LP in various other ways
including lower distortion/higher dynamic range capability, and greater overall accuracy.

Digital can by design never achieve unlimited analog resolution.
At least that's my opinion.

 

[levimax]

Be kinda useless posting such arguments on most audio boards. I can tell you from experience that Mikey Don't Like That.

But there's that "Science" word up there defining one of the aspects of this particular forum. And that calls out for specifics as regards the actual measurable performance of audio gear. That appears to be the primary concern of our host. So dealing with the specifics of the very real limitations of a given audio format is grist for the mill 'round these parts.

I understand the science and digital measures 10X to 100,000X better than an LP.... however in the real world the difference between a well recorded song on an good condition LP and digital is vanishing small in a ABX listening test. Measurements need to be correlated to peoples experiences to be understood and to be scientifically useful. The lazy way to think about measurements is "more is better" i.e. SINAD of -120 db must sound better than SINAD -80 db after all it is 10,000 times "better" yet few if anyone can hear the difference. I think the fact that a 100 year old technology is still even being discussed is fascinating and scientifically challenging to explain. To dismiss everyone who listens to vinyl as foolish, vain, insincere, crowd following and ignorant is again the "lazy" way to think about it and is really not scientific at all.

 

[MattHooper]

Digital can by design never achieve unlimited analog resolution.
At least that's my opinion.

I think this is the wrong forum to promulgate such a view. People here are interested in objective evidence for technical claims, not mere opinion.

 

[A800]

I think this is the wrong forum to promulgate such a view. People here are interested in objective evidence for technical claims, not mere opinion.

I already mentioned the "technical objective evidence".
16 bits resolution are just 65535 fixed values out of a unlimited number of values.
Let me add to that 44,1kHz is just 44100 times per second out of an unlimited number in the time domain.
So the whole CD story is rather quite a bit coarse and dismembered.

 

[levimax]

I already mentioned the "technical objective evidence".
16 bits resolution are just 65535 fixed values out of a unlimited number of values.
Let me add to that 44,1kHz is just 44100 times per second out of an unlimited number in the time domain.
So the whole CD story is rather quite a bit coarse and dismembered.

See Nyquist theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist–Shannon_sampling_theorem

 

[scott wurcer]

I already mentioned the "technical objective evidence".

I enjoy being on both sides of these discussions, I listened to some of my old favorite LP's last night. I listen to the performances and the mastering of one of the greats, Bob Ludwig. OTOH the technical objective evidence is that if the sampling theorem is satisfied there is no missing information within the noise floor of 16 bits, that is digitizing an LP and saving it as 16/44.1 is to me indistinguishable from the original. I listen to LP's as entertainment I see no point in these discussions.

 

[Wes]

Same people arguing over same subject in a circle.... not sure why digital vs vinyl is even a controversy on these boards.... if someone enjoys driving his vintage Corvette even though he has a new BMW M5 I don't think that would be controversial.... it's just a different experience. I think having both vinyl and digital playback capabilities broadens the "listening to recorded music experience"... arguing which one is "superior" doesn't make any sense.

Exactly. I know that some people even ride motorcycles and collect them, even tho they would be far better off in a car.

 

[A800]

See Nyquist theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist–Shannon_sampling_theorem

Interesting.
Thank you.