Why do records sound so much better than digital?

[IPunchCholla]

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

No more or less snake oil than anything else in audio. It does not matter what you pick - DACs, preamps, amps, cables, turntables, speakers, etc. Each category has questionable products with claims of "improving" your sound. Turntables and speakers are two examples of transducers. Mechanical to electrical - turntable, arm, cartridge then electrical to mechanical - cabinet, stuffing, speaker drivers, crossover. The electronics in between has less audible effect on playback - assuming proper matching on inputs and outputs. Turntables give an audio enthusiast a lot of opportunities to make changes that have impact on the sound quality.

I think Bob, it is the amount of things you can do with vinyl playing, which introduces far more snake oil potential. I mean an amplifier is an amplifier, done and dusted!

 

[Doctor Big]

I think Bob, it is the amount of things you can do with vinyl playing, which introduces far more snake oil potential. I mean an amplifier is an amplifier, done and dusted!

A stylus interacts at the micron level with that tiny groove. And the signal that comes out of the cartridge is around .5mV which is shockingly low. There's a metric shit-ton of ways for the playback of an LP to go sideways. So there's just as many differing ways to try to optimize it.

And that's a feature, not a bug.

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

A stylus interacts at the micron level with that tiny groove. And the signal that comes out of the cartridge is around .5mV which is shockingly low. There's a metric shit-ton of ways for the playback of an LP to go sideways. So there's just as many differing ways to try to optimize it.

And that's a feature, not a bug.

So, you are with me, Dr Big?

 

[Doctor Big]

The slightly more extended version

 

[Sal1950]

You totally get it, but then lose the thread. The goal of a high-fidelity system is to give pleasure to its owner. If I don't enjoy listening to it, the system is an abject failure. It may be a success as a device for accurately reproducing the input signal, but that's more of a too/measurement feedback device.

Nope, you blew it.
The goal of a high fidelity system is to create a high fidelity recreation of the source.
The goal of a toy system is to give pleasure to its owner.

 

[Doctor Big]

So, you are with me, Dr Big?

Sort of. But if the "tweak" or whatever actually does change the sound, is it still snake oil? Admittedly there's a whole bunch of bullshit out there, but I don't think there's any question that LP playback is ACTUALLY susceptible to environmental factors that can be controlled, whereas there's not much you can do to effectively "tweak" a DAC or some such component.

Edit to add: I have several phono cables that I use between the turntable and phono stage. One of them picks up faint radio station signals in a foreign language. I can actually hear the words when I turn up the volume a bit louder than listening level with no music playing. That's a verifiable difference between cables. Using those same cables between a DAC and preamp the gain would be so much lower that the difference would be totally inaudible.

 

[IPunchCholla]

Nope, you blew it.
The goal of a high fidelity system is to create a high fidelity recreation of the source.
The goal of a toy system is to give pleasure to its owner.

So. You don’t enjoy listening to music? Then what is the point of fidelity?

 

[Sal1950]

You don’t enjoy listening to music?

I love music,
Detest listening to noise and distortion

 

[IPunchCholla]

I love music,
Detest listening to noise and distortion

So you have hi-fidelity toys.
Other people have toys where fidelity matters less. Why do you care?

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

Sort of. But if the "tweak" or whatever actually does change the sound, is it still snake oil? Admittedly there's a whole bunch of bullshit out there, but I don't think there's any question that LP playback is ACTUALLY susceptible to environmental factors that can be controlled, whereas there's not much you can do to effectively "tweak" a DAC or some such component.

Edit to add: I have several phono cables that I use between the turntable and phono stage. One of them picks up faint radio station signals in a foreign language. I can actually hear the words when I turn up the volume a bit louder than listening level with no music playing. That's a verifiable difference between cables. Using those same cables between a DAC and preamp the gain would be so much lower that the difference would be totally inaudible.

Fair comments Dr . However, doesn't the fact that you can introduce tweaks to vinyl, open the door to snake oil enough to drown in?

 

[MattHooper]

Fair comments Dr . However, doesn't the fact that you can introduce tweaks to vinyl, open the door to snake oil enough to drown in?

Have you ever visited Computer Audiophile? Or any of the sites in which audiophiles have found all sorts of mad tweaks for digital? Soundboards that sound different, power supplies that sound different, re-clocking devices, high end digital cables..it goes on and on. It's the audiophile impulse to tweak.
It didn't stop once digital supplanted vinyl.

 

[Doctor Big]

So you have hi-fidelity toys.
Other people have toys where fidelity matters less. Why do you care?

It's a complex mix. Selective first-world outrage combined with the ease of dissemination via social media, fuelled by conviction of absolute Dunning-Kruger certainty.

 

[Doodski]

2 Wheels (the inverted peace sign) is the salute we give each other as we pass on the road,
no matter the type or style of bike.

When I rode in British Columbia I would receive the middle finger from Harley riders seeing me on my Suzy or Kawi. I would see them coming, recognize it as a possible Harley and sure enough I wave with my left hand and give the peace sign and I would get a middle finger in return. It was wide spread and other Japanese machine riders told me they got the same treatment...lol. After I was harassed by 2 Harley riders at a roadside mountain pass toilet I swore to never pull over and help a Harley rider because of the abuse. Then one night I bought a Kawi GPZ550 from a woman in Victoria BC and I was riding it home to Vancouver and some car almost rear ended me. I mean like I am lucky to be alive sort of close call. So anyway this car is accelerating away from me and I go back to cruising and minding my own matters and some guy on a Harley comes up beside me, is shouting, waving and signaling to me to pull over. So I figured something must be up so I slowed down to maybe 15mph and he is shouting at me that I was nearly killed because my brake light was not working. So I pulled over and this guy digs into his saddlebags and whips out a tool kit and a can of switch cleaner and does a roadside repair job on my brake switch and sends me off on my way. Then I was hitch hiking late at night and it was getting chilly and no cars seemed to be out that night and voila I hear it coming. A smooth sounding thump thump of a Harley and sure enough this guy pulls over, gets off his ride and opens his saddle bags and pulls out a helmet, huge elbow length gloves and suits me up and then gives me a ride to my door. I have no idea what is the issue with those fingering riders but there are good ones out there countering the fingering types.

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

Have you ever visited Computer Audiophile? Or any of the sites in which audiophiles have found all sorts of mad tweaks for digital? Soundboards that sound different, power supplies that sound different, re-clocking devices, high end digital cables..it goes on and on. It's the audiophile impulse to tweak.
It didn't stop once digital supplanted vinyl.

I haven't Matt. "Mad tweaks", about sums it up for digital, don't you think?

 

[Doctor Big]

Fair comments Dr . However, doesn't the fact that you can introduce tweaks to vinyl, open the door to snake oil enough to drown in?

One needs to have a clear, rational head on one's shoulders. As many people here are trapped in their measurements-only dogma as are swirling around in the sewers of subjective tweakery.

The truth lies somewhere in between. Much closer to the measurements end of things certainly, but it's important to keep one's perspective.

 

[MattHooper]

OP aside, we all agree here that vinyl isn't SOTA audio technology. That's long been acknowledged and beaten to death.
And none of us care for some of the analog/vinyl myths out there.

And yet...some folks just still seemed irked by the very continuing existence of, or preference for playing vinyl, and keep wielding the "It's Not Hi Fidelity" club. Like there is some audiophile Purity Test you have violated.

I find this anti-vinyl stance tends to be a result of unexamined assumptions about goals and value.

As many of us have pointed out: what is the point of reproducing the signal, accurately or not, in the first place? The enjoyment of the music, right?
Otherwise you are just performing some cold science experiment, confirming every Spock-like stereotype "subjectivist" audiophiles lob at a site like this.
Hi-Fidelity in this respect is not an end in of itself; it is a tool towards and end. That doesn't rule out the use of other tools towards that end - e.g. some less accurate components - especially if it is to enjoy the music through our stereo systems!

Like I said: the artists and engineers producing music know there are a gazillion different music systems out there among the public. They produce the music as they desire in their studio, often ensuring that the essential properties of the recording will translate on various systems, and let it out in to the wild. It's up to the consumer how to consume the product, and the producers are glad if music lovers enjoy the results...whatever system they happen to use.

And if we even get in to the intent aspect, what the artists/engineers are producing: virtually EVERY TIME I play a record, I am doing so on the intended playback system for that recording!!!!

All the records I own that pre-date digital? They were produced of course as records! With the expectation they would be listened to on turntables!

If you are listening to digital versions of those records...you have departed from the expectations of the engineers who made those original recordings! Now you may be using a medium that the newer engineers (involved in the digital transfer) expect you might use. But you are on no Holier Ground in terms of playing back the intent of those engineers than I am when I spin a record, in terms of the medium they mastered for, and their expectations on how it would be played by consumers!

That goes for new vinyl too! I buy tons of newly produced vinyl. It's virtually a tautology to point out that the music contained on that record was meant to be listened to on a turntable! It was specifically mastered and vinyl produced for that purpose! There may be digital versions available too...and of course it's just as valid to listen to that. But, again, there is no Holier-Than-Thou ground on which to stand on, to say "I'm listening to the music as intended and you aren't!"

Then we just circle back to the point of what we are doing. High Fidelity for what purpose? To hear the music as the artist intended? I've got that covered when I play a record, to the degree that is at all practical. To enjoy music on our audio system? Got that covered.

There can be different paths to the same end. (Especially in a world were we all juggle compromises).

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

One needs to have a clear, rational head on one's shoulders. As many people here are trapped in their measurements-only dogma as are swirling around in the sewers of subjective tweakery.

The truth lies somewhere in between. Much closer to the measurements end of things certainly, but it's important to keep one's perspective.

Look Dr, if ASR is an uncomfortable place for your perspective, I came here via Stereophile, to name one alternative!

 

[Mart68]

If you are listening to digital versions of those records...you have departed from the expectations of the engineers who made those original recordings!

The recordings of the pre-digital era were made using tape, though, they were not recorded directly onto vinyl.

Musicians I knew in the late 1980s all thought CD was wonderful because there was finally a mass-market medium that could put what they made in the studio into people's homes without the bastardization of the recording that's required to put it onto vinyl. They really did not like how vinyl degraded their work.

With digital you have an exact copy of that tape. It's no different from listening to it on the Otari, Studer, or whatever in the studio.

 

[IPunchCholla]

Look Dr, if ASR is an uncomfortable place for your perspective, I came here via Stereophile, to name one alternative!

Are you the entirety of ASR? You don’t speak for me. Being science based in no way precludes anything Doctor Big has said. Science is the creation of generalizable knowledge. As far as I’m can tell, there is a ton of knowledge left to be generalized in even vinyl based playback, not the least of which (psychoacoustics) can not be understood by measuring the equipment of reproduction.