Does vinyl sounds better than cd or not?

[thx911]

Interesting Radio talk show on npr

Audio link: NPR Media Player

Transcript: Why Vinyl Sounds Better Than CD, Or Not : NPR

hope its informative.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

It's the same-old same-old question.

Same old answers? Not quite. I only read about half way, but there is a lot of sense there about why any particular LP might sound better than the CD --- or another particular CD might sound better than the LP.

The engineers, who listen to the stuff in the studio, say that the CD sounds more like what they hear from the musicians. Not a popular point of view with some of today's audiophiles! Must analogue sound be the absolute truth?

I found the put down of "Laura" at the start rather a shame. It's almost as if the fact that she is professionally involved with vinyl invalidates her viewpoint, which, of course, it does not at all. She likes the vinyl experience, the totality of the experience, from the full-size record covers to lifting the stylus at the end of each side. There is nothing at all invalid in that point of view. A lot of the vinyl experience has nothing to do with the actual sound. There is no way that CDs evoke the same emotion in me that LPs connected with life changing events can do --- even if the actual sound quality is better.

More from Sean Olive: Audio Musings. It's well worth following.

 

[thx911]

i heard Sean Olive allude to how perceptions can shape what you hear. the bottom line for me however was that if you remove what Sean calls ''bias or nuisance variables" today's CDs/digital music has much better fidelity compared to vinly

 

[tanaka]

Everything else being equal, I feel that vinyl sounds like it has more presence. Also being analogue, the audio signal is continuous whereas digital signal is read in bits.

 

[ranjeetrain]

* In past, when digital was new, storage was expensive, conversion / recording / mastering techniques were not mature, a lot of horrible sounding CDs were produced. That turned a lot of people into CD haters (as is always the case with a typical self-proclaimed audiophile, who refuse to embrace a change without giving it the time to mature).

* Besides, which audiophile would like to admit his collection of 5000+ vinyls is outdated now, and he should go acquire High-resolution digital instead?

* I have heard the same tracks on LP as well as CD on fairly resolving systems. Call me and the people who owned dual (digital cum analogue) rigs tin-eared, but we failed to pick the difference on many recordings. So conclusion obviously was this is not LP vs CD, it's This company vs that company, this equipment vs that equipment, this mastering engineer vs that mastering engineer.

* The recent push on releasing vinyls by audio companies is just a way to curb piracy. Pirating vinyls is much harder than pirating digitally stored music. It's a great way to improve their revenues.

* To anyone asking the "Digital vs Analogue" question, I have a simple thing to say. Stop reading, start experimenting.

Here is something to start with.

Buy some recently released LPs and CDs. And to make it truly Digital vs Analogue, also acquire 24x96 or 32x192 recordings of the same if available. Let this selection be random rather than planned, to make it a fair assessment. Now play them back to back on a decent system and hudge.

The keyword here is recently issued. If you compare CDs issued 30 years ago with LPs issued at that time LPs will sound better in almost every case. Comparing goods produced 30 years ago has no meaning today, considering that Digital has been evolving second-by-second Analogue has not.

 

[ranjeetrain]

Everything else being equal, I feel that vinyl sounds like it has more presence. Also being analogue, the audio signal is continuous whereas digital signal is read in bits.

The earth is FLAT, not round as silly scientists want us to believe. When I look around I just see vast expanses of flat land, till wherever my eyes can see. Whoever said the earth is round?

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

* The recent push on releasing vinyls by audio companies is just a way to curb piracy. Pirating vinyls is much harder than pirating digitally stored music. It's a great way to improve their revenues.

They sold us LPs, then they sold us CDs, then they sold us downloads --- now they are trying to sell LPs again to those who didn't buy them in the first place. Pure revenue.

* To anyone asking the "Digital vs Analogue" question, I have a simple thing to say. Stop reading, start experimenting.

Here is something to start with.

Buy some recently released LPs and CDs. And to make it truly Digital vs Analogue, also acquire 24x96 or 32x192 recordings of the same if available. Let this selection be random rather than planned, to make it a fair assessment. Now play them back to back on a decent system and hudge.

The real experiment is to get an audio interface, make your own digital copy of your own LP, at whatever bit-rate you choose (that your interface supports. Then compare.

The keyword here is recently issued. If you compare CDs issued 30 years ago with LPs issued at that time LPs will sound better in almost every case. Comparing goods produced 30 years ago has no meaning today, considering that Digital has been evolving second-by-second Analogue has not.

My older CDs are pretty good. Maybe that is because I didn't get in on the first wave. They are almost always better than my LPs. Comparing them with a new, or really well kept, LP might be different --- but it is not just the surface noise and imperfections: they have more detail and finesse.

being analogue, the audio signal is continuous whereas digital signal is read in bits.

Do try to understand the technology a little [bit? ] better before using it as a reason to criticise. There are no gaps in digital music, and (something I only recently learnt) it does not produce the stepped waveform that we always used to think it did.

After all which, I have to say... Long live vinyl! Long live turntables, and all the fuss that goes into getting the best out of them. Long live the people who go to the trouble to do all that. it is an experience in itself hyeah:

 

[thx911]

* The recent push on releasing vinyls by audio companies is just a way to curb piracy. Pirating vinyls is much harder than pirating digitally stored music. It's a great way to improve their revenues.

great point, couldn't agree more - gazing the crystal ball i cant help see how one can prevent piracy of vinyls especially with 3D printing just around the corner

am i predicting the future? nope - i might actually try it out just for kicks

so you will have digitally replicated original analog LPs just like CD-R/DVD-R! and we the netizens of the world can slugit out as to which one sounds better

 

[Shivam]

I like my LPs and CDs and for that matter, my downloads equally well.

After hearing and comparing multiple albums and mediums, I have come to a conclusion that what matters more is the recording and transfer rather than the medium in itself. I no longer worry about the medium but rather seek out the best possible recording available of the music that I want.

 

[ranjeetrain]

great point, couldn't agree more - gazing the crystal ball i cant help see how one can prevent piracy of vinyls especially with 3D printing just around the corner

am i predicting the future? nope - i might actually try it out just for kicks

so you will have digitally replicated original analog LPs just like CD-R/DVD-R! and we the netizens of the world can slugit out as to which one sounds better

In this age when they are cloning pigs, calfs and humans, cloning vinyls is not going to remain rocket science. Yet, it will be much harder and expensive than copying a digital music file. For anyone with a computer, COPY / cp / Ctrl c+v / Cmd x+v costs nothing more than a few seconds of time. For all practical purposes, pirating digital is almost free and non time consuming.

Pirating Vinyls is somewhat harder. Pirated vinyls are available off the shelf too, at a fraction of cost in many parts of the world. But they still do cost more than pirated digital, where one can just share with anyone dozens of albums in studio resolution for the sake of brotherhood.

 

[ranjeetrain]

* To anyone asking the "Digital vs Analogue" question, I have a simple thing to say. Stop reading, start experimenting.

Here is something to start with.

Buy some recently released LPs and CDs. And to make it truly Digital vs Analogue, also acquire 24x96 or 32x192 recordings of the same if available. Let this selection be random rather than planned, to make it a fair assessment. Now play them back to back on a decent system and hudge.

The real experiment is to get an audio interface, make your own digital copy of your own LP, at whatever bit-rate you choose (that your interface supports. Then compare.

No, that won't do it.

Each time a conversion takes place there is some loss (however small). Transferring from a Vinyl using an audio interface will get pretty close yet not exactly (owning to degradation that is bound to happen to a physical medium, and Vinyl is a degradable physical medium).

If perfection is sought, both the Vinyl and CD (or high resolution digital) should be produced from the same source (studio masters) before comparison.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

both the Vinyl and CD (or high resolution digital) should be produced from the same source (studio masters)

In an ideal world, perhaps, but in a real, practical world, using what is available to us, the comparison of LP with our own digitisations is a very good test. An experiment does not have to be ultimate to be interesting and even revealing. Home science is a good start.

You and I are never going to get hold of those tapes and never going to have the equipment to do the master-tape experiment. When music is commercially re-issued in digital form, it may not be the aim to reproduce, exactly, the earlier LP. It should not be the aim: technology today should be able to give us a better reproduction, whatever medium it is sold on.

 

[ranjeetrain]

In an ideal world, perhaps, but in a real, practical world, using what is available to us, the comparison of LP with our own digitisations is a very good test. An experiment does not have to be ultimate to be interesting and even revealing. Home science is a good start.

You and I are never going to get hold of those tapes and never going to have the equipment to do the master-tape experiment. When music is commercially re-issued in digital form, it may not be the aim to reproduce, exactly, the earlier LP. It should not be the aim: technology today should be able to give us a better reproduction, whatever medium it is sold on.

That's where I started when I said "Buy some recently released LPs and CDs. And to make it truly Digital vs Analogue, also acquire 24x96 or 32x192 recordings of the same if available.".

High resolution digital being sold by most of the reputed online companies is going to be better than any rip an average consumer can produce at home with his average gear. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. High resolution digital is available off the shelf for any such test.

 

[reubensm]

I enjoy listening to my cds although I've been into vinyl since my childhood. My entire personal choice of music is on cd. I collect vinyl to diversify my music listening taste. Not really bothered whether vinyl sounds better than cd or vise versa. For me, the music should be listenable, and enjoyable.

I would be bold enough to say that the overall dynamic range, accuracy and convenience of digital mastering on cds, is definitely superior, while the originality, nostalgia, warmth, experience (both operating and listening) and equipment tweak-ability keeps enthusiasts like me, interested in vinyl.

 

[thx911]

while the originality, nostalgia, warmth, experience (both operating and listening) and equipment tweak-ability keeps enthusiasts like me, interested in vinyl.

perception & bias set aside - not sure how one can expect originality from a vinyl - because every time you play a vinyl its not the same medium anymore that it was the last time you played it. the medium has limitations capturing DR in the first place (unless you are listening just singles). its hard to believe that its going to be original and true to its source!

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originality as in part of the psychological experience, rather than in any absolute truth of the music?

When I handle an LP that was originally recorded in, say, 1968, I get a feeling of the time. This is true (so long as the original designs remain unchanged) even if the thing in my hand was actually manufactured twenty years later. This is part of the magic of LPs that is missing with digital media. Having an fine-condition LP of beautiful music recorded and made in 1951, recently, was amazing.

I am not attempting to be logical here: I don't think that the experience is entirely logical!

 

[captrajesh]

Stop reading, start experimenting.

Super quote.:clapping: Kindly permit me to add it to my signature albeit with some modifications.

 

[ranjeetrain]

Super quote.:clapping: Kindly permit me to add it to my signature albeit with some modifications.

No problem. It's a copyleft material, feel free to modify and use hyeah:

 

[Santy]

Does vinyl sounds better than cd or not?
One of the biggest debate on the internet that is pointless.
All are different members of the same family (music lovers).

 

[reubensm]

perception & bias set aside - not sure how one can expect originality from a vinyl - because every time you play a vinyl its not the same medium anymore that it was the last time you played it. the medium has limitations capturing DR in the first place (unless you are listening just singles). its hard to believe that its going to be original and true to its source!

Good point, by originality, what I actually meant was, vinyl was the very first mass market recording medium. While listening to older albums on vinyl, I would like to believe that I am listening to it on the same medium, it was first released on (Imagine listening to Edison's voice on a wax cylinder )