The Paradox Of Why Vinyl Sounds Better.....

[XenMaster]

Vinyl sounds better....

It's not something I personally question, I've been obsessed by music all my my life, and part of that has always been exploring the sound, trying to look as deep into it as I can....

I grew up when vinyl was the just about the only game in town, but by the time I was addicted to music CD was the present and future....I resisted, but the availabilty of music that you would never find, or have to pay through the nose for on vinyl meant I at least played both....still, when I really wanted to have an evening really listening to music, it was the black discs I would reach for....

In the 20 years since I gave in to CD, never having spent much on audio equipment, but always really listening, I've never found an exception to the rule that a vinyl sorce will sound more pleasing, exiciting, realistic and revealing than a similarly priced digital one.....

Now we can put this down to loudness wars or lossy compression, both of which do digital no favours, but neither of those explain why if I record vinyl at CD quality, through a soundcard that is supposed to sound as good as anything below three times the price of my record deck, there is an obvious difference....now at 96/24 that does dissapear to my ears....but still, CD was supposed to be the future, was supposed to be better than vinyl in every way (and indestructable!, funny though how I have more unplayable CDS than records)....

To me, the place vinyl beats CD is at high frequencies, the sound of cymbals, acoustic guitars, even the attack of voices or bass, both of which intitially can have high frequecies present....CD sounds to me like it misses the b in bang....

But this is the parodox, that is exactly the place where CD measures far superior to vinyl....so what is going on? is it all down to that 22 kHz brick wall? is it something to do with odd or even order distortion? maybe even that high noise floor and random crackle does something psychoacoustically? certainly the needle dropping on a record makes the hairs on my neck stand up....the expectation, but mixed with uncertainty about just when the music will kick in....an ultimate tease....

So, it shouldnt sound so good, but I have never doubted it did....anyone got ideas why that is?

Mike

[covalongacurta]

i like vinyl records and i think they sound very well! Some people prefer analogic but for me that's not the point because i don't like cassettes . I had a walkman because in that time cassettes were more portable and i really like music. I can't explain why i like records . Some records sound better than some cd's but there are cd's that sound better than some records . Perhaps i'm a nostalgic person . I would call it "the spell of vinyl"

[swingburn]

to use visual analogy...

vinyl is like looking and touching the original Mona Lisa painting. you can see and feel the music. CD is like looking at the same painting with a pane of glass over it. glossier and smoother but less immediate.

i think that there is no doubt that vinyl as a playback medium imparts it's own signature, due to the way the needle flows through the groove. someone once said that "overshooting" gives vinyl it's more holographic, tactile sound. I have no idea.

if you are looking for the ultimate truthful sound reproduction, i think hi-rez digital will give it to you. if you listen to a lot of live music you may agree. vinyl will never be "beat", tho. not because it's creates a more faithful sound, but because it has "something" that digital does not.

[PCMHiFi]

I remember reading a post at Stereophile a few years ago that I thought was an interesting take. A reader drew an analogy between audio and movies.

A movie is a series of still pictures in rapid succession, and the brain fills in the "blanks" to give the illusion of motion. He was saying that with CDs sampling at 44.1kHz, it is similar to a motion picture, except that our brains can't fill in the "blanks" with audio like they can with pictures. I think the result was a "grainy" sound. I suppose in some way, whether one is able to hear this "graininess" depends on whether the individual's brain can "sample" 44,100 sound clips per second. If not, one might not notice the grainy sound. If yes, the graininess becomes audible. It makes sense to me.

As far as vinyl vs. CD, I've also heard records I liked better than their CD counterparts and vice-versa. Sofar, my preference seems mostly consistent with the domain of the original mastering. Music originally mastered in analog, I prefer on vinyl. On CD, it sounds coarse and too "crispy" to the point of sounding artificial. I prefer most music originally mastered digitally on CD. Some of the finer details seem to be missing on vinyl, at least in my system. I don't have enough material in both formats from the "transitional period" of the '80s to be sure what my preference would be from that era.

I think CDs lasting forever is a marketing myth. So for my favorite CDs, I purchase a vinyl copy where available as backup in case of "CD Rot".

I know for many, it's 100% about the music. But I also enjoy all of the different elements of the equipment. Quick access to what I want to hear on a CD is nice. But actually moving the turntable's arm, pressing the buttons on the unit itself, and watching it do its thing is fun and relaxing too. The kid in me is still amazed that all of that detailed sound can come from something smaller than a pinhead.

I suppose in the end, it's nice to enjoy both, as the contrasts between the two help keep the novelty of each alive.

[swingburn]

with CDs sampling at 44.1kHz, it is similar to a motion picture, except that our brains can't fill in the "blanks" with audio like they can with pictures

As I understand it, when listening to CDs, there are no blanks for our brain to fill in. The Digital-to-Analog converters do that for us, so the sound we hear is contiguous.

[flavio81]

Vinyl sounds better....

Better than what? Better than a CD? No, it does not.

Good mastered LPs sound better than badly mastered CDs. And viceversa. If you enjoy the sound of the LP compared to an identically mastered CD (i.e. a modern production) , then surely it's due to the copious amounts of added 2nd harmonic distortion on the LP. Which won't be present if you use an advanced stylus such as the MicroLine, by the way.

neither of those explain why if I record vinyl at CD quality, through a soundcard that is supposed to sound as good as anything below three times the price of my record deck, there is an obvious difference....now at 96/24 that does dissapear to my ears...

Well maybe your soundcard isn't that good. To do A/D, requires more exacting equipment than to do good D/A.

There was a test done some years ago by the Boston Audio Society (one of the most sensible, no-nonsense audiophile groups, which have many vinyl enthusiasts that actually invent things such as the Longhorn modification): It was a double blind test where the audience could either listen to a LP or to the same LP but through an A/D -> D/A digital audio processor that ran at 44KHz and 16bit, just as a CD. In other words, the LP was digitalized and then brought back to analog.

People couldn't hear a difference between the straight, analog LP and the LP through a digital conversion. And this was done with a pretty high quality turntable...

[flavio81]

with CDs sampling at 44.1kHz, it is similar to a motion picture, except that our brains can't fill in the "blanks" with audio like they can with pictures

As I understand it, when listening to CDs, there are no blanks for our brain to fill in. The Digital-to-Analog converters do that for us, so the sound we hear is contiguous.

Yes, it is. It is continuous up to 22KHz. Smooth and continuous. Unless that D/A converter is crap.

[swingburn]

Vinyl sounds better....

Better than what? Better than a CD? No, it does not.

I think you are missing the point of the original post. Is CD more faithful to the original source? Is it perfect sound? Maybe.

But does it sound better? Not to many of us. That's the paradox.

Personally, I prefer fantasy to reality.

[PCMHiFi]

As I understand it, when listening to CDs, there are no blanks for our brain to fill in. The Digital-to-Analog converters do that for us, so the sound we hear is contiguous.

Yes, it is. It is continuous up to 22KHz. Smooth and continuous. Unless that D/A converter is crap.

I don't remember all of the specifics anymore but perhaps the poster had a crappy DAC or otherwise objected to some audible artifact of normal DACs doing this.

[DrFFT]

Oh boy;
This is a constant area of contention .
Some very disturbing listening test where conducted on a wide selection of younger listeners to determine what they liked better.
Without thier knowledge the differences where between LO-FI MP3 style recordings and HI-FI (uncompressed higher definition).
The results tended towards them liking LO-FI because they could hear everthing more directly .
YEP compression tends to give that illusion doesn't it.
Next is the recording industry itself.
Many engineers indicate that with master files (digital) that there is a significant difference between 44.1 , 96 and 128 Kbit recording.
BUt thats only the sampling frequency it does NOT indicate BIT depth IE 8 bit, 16 bit, 24 bit or higher.
Recording with 96 Kbs at 24 bit depth requires almost 10 times the data Memory space that recording at 44.1 with 16 bits requires.
Next is this idea that "Nyquist sampling theorum" actually accounts for a "complete" sample of any frequenices within the 20 Hz to 20 Khz spectrum. In my opinion it doesn't.
The Nyquist sampling theorum at 44.1 kbs sampling frequency breaks down due to all the instantanious or spurious information generated within normal music production .
Several reasons for this , including the fact that various musical instruments actually produce ultrasonic information within thier inidividual ranges. (IE CYmbals are a perfect example) If you consider that those ultrasonic frequencies actually modulate or re-modulate the frequencies within the spectrum that we can hear , then you've got some issues.
Vinyl wouldn't necessarily pick up those frequenccies , but because of the "continuous data collection" that ANALOG represents it will not disciminate either spurious information (like low sampling frequencies do) or filter the subsequent hamonic effects produced over time that lower sampling rates may tend to ignor in the data stream .
THe biggest issues come back to sampling rate versus storage and also a individuals taste in music and thier ability to discern high-quality versus something that sounds like music.
Another big issue within the studio/recording environment is that often an artificial sound stage has been created .
Our ears are actually extremely good at hearing differences in phase and whenever instruments are recorded within a studio environment they are usually recorded in various different sound rooms producing phase artifacts that our ears can in fact discriminate . Then the whole mess is mixed into a virtual reality sound stage that by definition has numerous phase differences that have no distinct reference (ie common point in time or space)
This is exactly the reason why many of the OLD recordings using 2 discrete microphones (typically ribbons) right off the stage, sound so coherant and product audible and definable sound stage . Thats usually very pleasing to listen to.

[teac4010]

.......listening test where conducted on a wide selection of younger listeners to determine what they liked better.

........ interestingly, what percentage of younger listeners have ever attended a real unmodified musical event? ........... Pavlov trained dogs ...... the music/entertainment industry trains children.

Peace. Regards.

[Jim Leach]

Interesting thread which ties to mine: "Let's talk about digital for a while".

I'm reading all the replies!

[satanfriendly]

what percentage of younger listeners have ever attended a real unmodified musical event?

I take it you mean a concert? If so I for one keep the HiFi as HiFi and live music as live music. Digital or analogue I like recorded music to be exactly that. Live music has too many other aspects to be drawn in comparrison.

Back on to the other matter I have just spent most the evening switching between vinyl and CD and despite CD being very good it just lacks in the satisfaction stakes.

I do agree with Flavio though as either depends on the quality of the recording and mastering in the first instance. No amount of anlaogue or digital processing is going to rescue what was wrong from the offset.

I'll stick to the vinyl though which I have done for years thank you.

A nostalgic b'stard? Oh yes.

[teac4010]

what percentage of younger listeners have ever attended a real unmodified musical event?

I take it you mean a concert? If so I for one keep the HiFi as HiFi and live music as live music. Digital or analogue I like recorded music to be exactly that. Live music has too many other aspects to be drawn in comparrison.

I was ruined in my childhood. I played trombone in a band.

Since then the Hifi challenge has been to reproduce real electrically unaugmented instruments playing in a natural environment.

......... like large pipe organs, marching bands etc..

......... not like keyboards, string instrument amplifiers, PA amplifiers etc.

Peace. Regards.