Which is best - vinyl or CD ?

I'm not feeling "personally wounded" by your statements. But let's compare the two sides here:

You constantly bash and criticise digital audio and claim that it's no good at all and the worst that ever happened to music.

I say that both analog and numeric can sound awesome.


Now: which of these two statements could be perceived as "personally wounding"?

^ what scares me is that someone reading this might actually believe it ... 

^ the sub sonic frequencies don't affect the sound, I'm very sure about that. You're free to disagree of course, but frequencies that deep are simply vibrations ... it's conceivable that in a real instrument such as a piano or a guitar these vibrations affect the overall sound, but I doubt that just because some people can "sense" these frequencies they're the reason why some people prefer vinyl. And the last time I watched (and listened to) my washing machine spinning it didn't strike me as being particularly musical ... 

mystic fred wrote: having lost the speaker covers years ago, sometimes i watch how my bass drivers or "woofers" physically react to using vinyl and CD sources (i know i don't get out much ) -   when a vinyl record is playing the speaker cones physically react to low frequencies, sometimes so violently that i fear for their safety. on the other hand when playing CD's there is hardly any noticeable movement at all - my theory is a stylus is far more sensitive than a CD laser and picks up on the much lower frequencies.??

MikeEnRegalia wrote: Frequencies below 20 Hz are called "sub sonic" for a reason ... you can't hear them. And about the issues darqdean has with mastering: All valid points, but hardly against the medium which is used to store the mastered audio.

Frequencies below 20 Hz are called "sub sonic" for a reason ... you can't hear them.

And about the issues darqdean has with mastering: All valid points, but hardly against the medium which is used to store the mastered audio.

darqdean wrote:   For me Mastering is the biggest problem for CD's - most modern CD's are over mastered - the compression and equalisation applied to increase the loudness of the music kills the dynamic range and makes the music tiring to listen too for extended periods. Again a wave-editor program illustrates this clearly - over-mastered tracks have fewer peaks and troughs and in extreme cases the higher frequency peaks are crushed, resulting in a harsh sound. Again, there is no way that post-processing can negate thses effects.

Yeah, I prefer a vinyl when there's a chance. Especially some new cds sound too digital for my taste, not like played music anymore. I guess the roughness of the vinyl makes it sound a bit like it was played here and now, live.

Certif1ed wrote: MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ information is missing on vinyls too.   But it's more random - the arrangement of the molecules in the vinyl is not as precise as the 0's and 1's of digital music - and they're presumably round - or at least squishy-shaped (before they wear out ), with no sharp edges. Sharp edges translate into pops and clicks, and are either alien material or scratches in the surface.   I'd suspect that the former (the squishy molecules) adds the colour or warmth that we associate with the sound of vinyl - hence I don't believe that it can be reproduced digitally or via EQ.

Ok ... but even if that was the case, it wouldn't mean that from an audiophile standpoint vinyls are preferable ... audiophile means to reproduce the original recording as accurately as possible. I think that the CD does a better job than vinyl in that regard ... whether it sounds better is another question. Knowing how things sound in the studio, directly from master tapes through high quality monitors compared to the result on a tape for example, my guess is that the original sounds "harsh" (as Olivier puts it) and that it's analog/harmonic distortion added by analog playback (vinyl molecules / magnetic tape, tube amp etc) that adds the warmth.

Certif1ed wrote:     Nice story from earlier this week:   I played my vinyl copy of "Sleeping with Ghosts" (Placebo) to my brother in law, who's a huge fan, but not even slightly musical.   His parents have, unbelievably, never owned a record player - he's only ever heard digital music in his life.   He was blown away by the sound - and it's not because I have a top-end expensive hi-fi - I don't, as Ollie will verify (Ollie hates my Akai amp!).   My brother-in-law said that he could hear stuff in the music he'd never noticed before - that this stuff was somehow "brought out" by the vinyl. For him, it was like hearing it for the first time all over again - and he's heard it loads of times.     Doesn't prove anything - but it made me proud of my vinyls

I love the sound of vinyl too ... I have several new albums as vinyl which sound really, really well:

Oceansize - Everybody Into Position
Tool - Lateralus
Opeth - Ghost Reveries
Cult of Luna - Somewhere Along the Highway
...

But even though I love the sound of these vinyls, I wouldn't say that I hear more details than on the CD ... my guess would be that your friend listens to badly ripped mp3s. These indeed contain less details ... they are victims of the compression.

MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ information is missing on vinyls too.

Edited by Certif1ed - May 25 2007 at 06:33