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Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 9:25 pm
by Anubis
I've just recently begun collecting vinyl albums. I'm one of the people that feels there is a definite difference in sound quality between analog and digital music. I can't express the feeling I got when I listened to "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" for the first time on a high end turntable. There was so much more to the music that I had previously heard.

Are there any other Vinyl lovers out here? I'm just curious to see what the other members of this board think.

Which do you prefer, Vinyl or CD?

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 9:55 pm
by Artemio
When it comes to listening pleasure, Analog all the way pal. I went into vinuyl as well, and the sound difference is astounding. If you don't have a vinyl cleaning machine, get one. It is the biggest upgrade I've made to my system. Currently I am running a Pioneer PL-L1000 with a Denon 103R Cartridge and a Rotel RP 2400 Turntable with a Sumiko Pearl. I got the Rotel/Sumiko combo first. As you can see they are both late 70's/early 80 equipment.
Sumiko Pearl
Sumiko Pearl
It is impressive how big a difference it makes.. I have tested the same album in SACD vs CD vs Vinyl, and every time I have third parties that are interested and that listen to the three blindly can't believe that Vinyl actually sounds so superior to CD. Of course comparing MP3s is out of the question. Good SACDs sound very close, but maybe my system's DACs aren't good enough. I have also tested the same things with headphone tube amps and Good headphones /Grado RS1 and AKG K701s) and in that case the difference is lower since I am using a better quality DAC, but it is still present.
Rotel
Rotel
Anyway, nothing beats listening to Vinyl through speakers in a well configured system. If you are into it, I can also give tips on setting up the correct levels for subwoofer calibration and speaker setup. I don't have a great system, but I always try to make the best of what I've got, hence I send lots of time reading and calibrating, as well as measuring.
Pioneer
Pioneer

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 10:12 pm
by Anubis
I have a very cheap turntable at the moment, but I'm going to be picking up a nicer one soon.

Right now I'm just working on getting a decent headphone setup. I'm going to be picking up a Stanton T.80 turntable and some Grados SR60 headphones. I'm stilling trying to decide what kind of pre-amp to get. I'm also considering building a small Cmoy amp for fun.

Any advice setting this up would be greatly appreciated.

On another note, yet another reason I've come to enjoy Vinyl is the effort it takes to listen to an album. It's way too easy for me to put on a CD or put on some headphones and just let the music drift to the background. I put much more time into actually listening to the music.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 10:16 pm
by Anubis
Goddamn, That is absolutely beautiful. I'm in awe. *Drools* :grin:

Also, nice white pressing of "Wish You Were Here". 180 Gram? I hear that album is highly regarded as one of the best recordings of all time, on top of being Pink Floyd's best album. (Opinion, but I state it as fact)

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 11:11 pm
by Artemio
Don't think these turntables are expensive though. The Rotel I got in package with a bunch of things and the Sumiko, recently restored. The actual price should be around the 200 for the pack. And the Other one is a bit more expensive, but not that much either. The arm moves tangential to the grooves on the record, and is magnetic. I got that one for around 200 USD, and the cart for 300.

One thing you need to be sure is of balancing your cartridge, aligning it and measuring the pressure over the disc. All of these you can achieve with cheap equipment, such as:

http://www.needledoctor.com/Shure-SFG-2 ... orce-Gauge
http://www.lpgear.com/Merchant2/merchan ... ry_Code=PE
http://www.lpgear.com/Merchant2/merchan ... ry_Code=PE

(I am not suggesting you buy from those sites, but those are the items you truly need).

Aligning your cart and having set the real appropriate values will make the vinyl sound better and last longer.

As I mentioned above, a manual cleaning machine will do wonders.. I bough the cheapest one in the market, with no vacuum cleaner and no motor, you have to turn the discs manually and plug your own vacuum cleaner. But it does marvels, a clean disc sounds really good.. and you never get any pops or clicks.

It is good you are paying more attention to music man, vinyl does emphasize it. It is specially good to share music listening with other people, and paying attention just to it. Concentrating on the music. I do that with digital as well though.

The Grado SR 60 are a great choice, but I'd advise to pay 20 more and go for the SR 80s. I have tried both and in the long run, you won't regret it. The bowl pads sound better, and upgrading your flats from the 60's is going to cost you the same and the 60's are a bit inferior in cabling to the 80's.

A cmoy is a great choice, I actually have built a couple myself, and they are realy god. I've stuck with others myself, specifically with a a Corda opera at the office and a Darkvoice 336i here at home. The Grados need little push to sound better amplified, so no need to waste tons of money. Of course better amps increase the detail you pull from the music.. but, there is a limited return at certain values. You'll need to find your own value.

In case you need any advice, I am an active member of Head-fi, which I am sure you already know and have read. I have tried a bit of IEMS, UE triple fi 5 and super fi 3, as well as Beyer Dynamics DT 250-250, Grado SR 225, SR 60 and SR 80. AKG 141 and K701.

And yes, I agree WYWH is my favorite Pink Floyd Album, followed closely by Animals. It is a picture disc, so quality wise it is not that good. It is not 180 gram though.. it doesn't say and I haven't weighted it. It does sound nice though, but that one I plan to hand in the wall after being framed.

BTW, do you have a Last FM profile by any chance?

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 11:48 pm
by Anubis
Thanks for the advice.
I've found precision diagrams online for setting up a system, but I'll have to find the page again.

I'll probably just upgrade and go straight for the SR80's on your advice.

Looking around, what do you think of these record cleaning supplies?

http://www.gcaudio.com/cgi-bin/store/sh ... cgi?id=474
http://www.gcaudio.com/cgi-bin/store/sh ... cgi?id=492

Out of curiosity, how difficult was it for you to build a Cmoy. I've soldered before (put a mod chip into a Sega Saturn), but that's about as far as my experience in the area goes goes.

My Last.fm profile is
http://www.last.fm/user/Sharkman23406

What kind of music do you listen to?

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 10:06 am
by Artemio
I think the Audioquest Carbon Fiber Record Brush is a great one, that will certainly help you. Mainly to scrup the records with fluid. I use a very similar one to scrub them before using the vacuum.

The other set, I believe is too expensive and you should just buy the MF record Brush and the KAB cleaning machine: KAB EV1 it is 159 and you'll spend more on cleaning supplies that barely do the work, believe me. I did it.

I also recommend the following:
Zero Dust this one is great for cleaning the stylus. There are cheaper places, ebay is one of the,

Zero Stat And this one is great rro removing the static. Static makes the dust stick to the records all the time. You can use this to eliminate static before and after playback, so you don't have to clean them all the time. It also eliminates some clicks.

Regarding the Cmoy, well it depends on how you plan on doing it. if you are starting from scratch, you'll probably go thought a couple of tries.. the basic materials cost around 50 USD, plus the soldering supplies. I had experience building circuits during my major, so I had some advantage there. I would recommend either buying a kit or buying a prebuilt cmoy. In case you can spend around 100, I would rather recommend buying a pre built amp. My girlfriend uses a Total Bithead.

I have some pics on that process, but we built the circuit boards by tracing the paths and imprinting that onto the plaques, and removing cooper with acid, then drilled the hols and soldered the parts. I guess that is not what you had in mind.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 12:09 pm
by Commander_AK-47
Yea, the sound difference is surprising. Analog is defiantly the way to go. Unfortunately all I have in my house is digital.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 1:41 pm
by Dick Motorman
Unless you spend thousands and thousands of dollars on high end analog equipment, digital will always sound superior. Fact is people play up the whole analog sounding better bs way to much. This is coming from someone who's life is based around music and who is a self proclamed audiophile. Collecting and listening to vinyl is fun. When it comes down to it getting the best sound quality out of either really relies on the person and their knowledge about their equipment. Nothing really is better than the other, it's all personal opinion, and in my opinion digital is the way to go.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 2:47 pm
by Commander_AK-47
Well my "opinion" (and many others agree with this too) is that analog sounds better.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 3:08 pm
by Artemio
I was not going to reply to your comment, but after re-reading the first sentence I will.
Dick Motorman wrote:Unless you spend thousands and thousands of dollars on high end analog equipment, digital will always sound superior.
Here you state something as fact. As a matter of fact you state two thinks as fact, which you later try to lessen saying everything is an opinion.

1) You state analog audio is expensive. In my experience this is not the truth. It is digital audio which is still expensive. It is true very low end digital is very cheap, but for it to sound as analog.. you need very good equipment. i only have a Yamaha RX-V1700, with 192Khz 24 bit DACs os respectable quality. I use HDMI in for all things digital, and a couple of Paradign Studio Reference 60 v2 speakers for music, coupled with a Velodyne Sub that is equalized for my room at +/- 2 dbs from reference from 35 Hz to 200 Hz using a BFD 1124. CDs sound terrible in that setup. You know what I found out? That if I use lossless audio ripped form that same cd, use an external DAC with good stereo quality and an external headphone amp (no matter if tube based or SS based) and AKG K701 or Grado RS1, I get sound almost as good as with a record.

What did I learn? What I typed above. Digital is very practical, but you need very expensive equipment. I used middle-fi headphone equipment that is around a 1100 US setup. That is quite cheap for home audio (a pair of middle end speakers), but expensive for headphones. I learned that digital can sound almost as good as analog, but it has a higher price tag for the quality.

2) You simply claimed as a fact that digital is superior. And I wonder if you have any technical knowledge to sustain such statement. Specially being that any digital format is converted to an analog signal before you listen to it.

In my experience a 200 USD turntable with cartridge connected to my amp sounds way better than the DACs on my 1200 USD receiver via HDMI with 192 Khz / 24 bit dacs.
Dick Motorman wrote: Fact is people play up the whole analog sounding better bs way to much. This is coming from someone who's life is based around music and who is a self proclamed audiophile.
I don't proclaim myself an audiophile, I must admit that I am more of a technophile, specially since I am an Engineer in Computer Science.
Dick Motorman wrote: Collecting and listening to vinyl is fun. When it comes down to it getting the best sound quality out of either really relies on the person and their knowledge about their equipment. Nothing really is better than the other, it's all personal opinion, and in my opinion digital is the way to go.
It certainly comes down to knowing your equipment... but most people don't even bother calibrating the db levels of their speakers to their listening position, much less with room acoustics. You can't discuss this things with them, but I have tested this personally on a technical and personal side, how much more enjoyable the experience is in terms of sound. How alive the thing sounds. And I must tell you this, certainly you won't ever convince someone about your opinion. But unless you try something for yourself, experiment with it, compare things blindly when the difference is not evident (I believe that if you need to do a blind test you are probably fooling yourself with snake oil differences).

Right now you leave me under the impression that you have never tested analog vs digital on the same system, with the same volume and with the same record.

I certainly need to say that I do believe in digital formats, I use them day to day (lossless only). But the loudness war has destroyed the high quality recordings that would benefit from digital. The only problem is you need good equipment to listen to it as it is intended, doing the digital to analog (DAC) conversion is no easy task.. and DACs in regular equipment sound really bad. I don't know what genres you listen to, and that would define a lot in this debate. Depending on that you might be familiar with the digital distortion that current recordings have brought to the table.

And I want to make it clear that I just wanted to point out that your post made a point and then invalidated it itself in the most pure form of Internet forum discussion. Your opinion seems to be based on what you've read and not in what you have tested first hand trying to make out the best of any piece of equipment. I might be wrong, but it is the way your post feels.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Sat Aug 16, 2008 12:28 am
by Commander_AK-47
... OWNED! (sorry I had to :mrgreen: )

But yes I agree, I didn't point it out but I did notice you kind of ran back on yourself. I stand by what I said before, analog is better. More expensive, but better.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Sat Aug 16, 2008 7:24 pm
by Dick Motorman
I'm going to be honest here, I had a rather long and civil rebuttal to your post Artemio, but when it came right down to it I realized that I'm not going to convince you of anything and you sure as hell aren't going to convince me of anything. I also got to the point of slight anger when I kept reading what appeared to be shots towards me, insinuating that I have no knowledge on the subject, or that I've never tested analog vs digital in a controlled environment. I just don't appreciate that. I apologize that my previous post was poorly worded and unfortunately not very well thought out, it was kind of a second thought post, I was busy doing other stuff and I kind of just posted gobaldy gook. But I stand by what I said in that to ME digital is the only way to go with music. And when it comes down to it I really do believe well more than half the people that claim to love analog or digital for that matter so much would have a hard time actually telling the difference between the two (in a controlled test that involved no pops and snaps from the vinyl on the same equipment). Also, you kind of miss understood a lot of what I said in my post anyways, and I just don't feel like correcting you.

And when it comes to commander ak 47, I didn't "run" back on myself, all I said with my last statement is that it's MY OPINION, that doesn't take make what I said any different. Both of you seemed to have missunderstood parts of my post, and like I said, I just don't have the patience to try and piece everything together and explain it.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Sat Aug 16, 2008 9:58 pm
by Artemio
Maybe you shouldn't have posted if you were going to put half baked thought that you didn't care explaining. If you just wanted to state your opinion, then you should have just done that instead of trying to validate it by saying first that any opinion in the other field was bull shit, attacking on the first place, and without even bothering to explain it. Now you say you don't want to "correct us" in terms of your subjective opinions; stating that you obviously think your opinions are objective, otherwise we wouldn't need correction. And as we know, the concept of an objective opinion is completely absurd.

If you could state what you used, how you convinced yourself, what measurements you did, which digital formats you use or even if you've heard a SACD or DVD-A and how that had convinced you. A few years ago I was on that field, and have a vast collection of both. It hurt when I found vinyl sounded better with less money. I can relate to that and have seen many persons go into denial or simple stop caring after they've been "had" for so long. Been there. It is exactly the kind of thing that happens when people from the "mp3 sounds exactly like a CD" front realize the statement is wrong if you have good equipment, I am sure you being an audiophile have shown that to some other people.

Maybe you can't change our opinion, neither you can probably change ours, but at least you could have explained to us why you think so instead of just calling bs on us.

It is either that you have passed our level of Knowledge, appreciation, equipment and tests and you don't want to share the knowledge, or you simply haven't, and it was just a teenager-like "I've read elsewhere that is bs" argument.

I do believe digital can be as good as analog. After all, digital is only trying to copy analog. You probably know how sound is encoded as PCM, and the nyquist theorem and you probable knowhow a DAC converts the stream in the PCM signal to an analog signal on the analog amplifier you use to listen to the music encoded as a digital signal. But what I don't believe is that the current consumer technology which was created in the 80s with a very limited technology and experience with digital signals can be equal to the analog technology it is trying to imitate. Specially when consumers are just happy with mp3.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 12:42 am
by Commander_AK-47
Dick Motorman wrote:I'm going to be honest here, I had a rather long and civil rebuttal to your post Artemio, but when it came right down to it I realized that I'm not going to convince you of anything and you sure as hell aren't going to convince me of anything. I also got to the point of slight anger when I kept reading what appeared to be shots towards me, insinuating that I have no knowledge on the subject, or that I've never tested analog vs digital in a controlled environment. I just don't appreciate that. I apologize that my previous post was poorly worded and unfortunately not very well thought out, it was kind of a second thought post, I was busy doing other stuff and I kind of just posted gobaldy gook. But I stand by what I said in that to ME digital is the only way to go with music. And when it comes down to it I really do believe well more than half the people that claim to love analog or digital for that matter so much would have a hard time actually telling the difference between the two (in a controlled test that involved no pops and snaps from the vinyl on the same equipment). Also, you kind of miss understood a lot of what I said in my post anyways, and I just don't feel like correcting you.

And when it comes to commander ak 47, I didn't "run" back on myself, all I said with my last statement is that it's MY OPINION, that doesn't take make what I said any different. Both of you seemed to have missunderstood parts of my post, and like I said, I just don't have the patience to try and piece everything together and explain it.
Its funny when you complain of that when you did the same to me when I commented about MGS4, saying it wasn't a total failure. You said that people like me fucked up the series and that I didn't know shit about Metal Gear. Funny. And you totally ran back on yourself when you said a fact and then called it an opinion. If thats your idea of a logical statement then I don't know what to make of you.
Artemio wrote:Maybe you shouldn't have posted if you were going to put half baked thought that you didn't care explaining. If you just wanted to state your opinion, then you should have just done that instead of trying to validate it by saying first that any opinion in the other field was bull shit, attacking on the first place, and without even bothering to explain it. Now you say you don't want to "correct us" in terms of your subjective opinions; stating that you obviously think your opinions are objective, otherwise we wouldn't need correction. And as we know, the concept of an objective opinion is completely absurd.
Exactly.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 8:11 am
by Dick Motorman
Disregard this post

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:55 pm
by Anubis
After looking around, I've found a Technics SL-1500 without a cartridge and needle. It's going to run me $100. How much does a decent needle and cartridge cost?

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 10:32 pm
by Commander_AK-47
Hell if I know.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 9:47 am
by TSi
sorry, but analog ftw.

and whoever thinks digital is better... go home plz =P. go buy some music on amazon or itunes, what happens? 128-192kbps? wah wah wah.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 10:14 am
by Artemio
Anubis wrote:After looking around, I've found a Technics SL-1500 without a cartridge and needle. It's going to run me $100. How much does a decent needle and cartridge cost?
It is a matter of how much you are willing to spend, but I believe that you could buy a Sumiko or Grado cartridge/needle. I have tested the Sumiko personally, and the Grado at a friend's place and was my second option for my current one. In case of a Grado I recommend the Black which is 60 USD, or if you want to go a bit higher the Blue for 110. I wanted to go for one at around 300.. but after reading on several boards and here I was convinced that at that price range I couldn't go wrong with a Denon DL 103R.

Regarding Sumiko I have only tested the Pearl, in both turntables. And I must say it is really good, the difference with the Denon, on my system, is not that big. So I wouldn't recommend you spend too much. My current setup is a Yamaha RV-1700, a NAD phono pre-amp and a pair or bi-amped Paradigm Studio Reference 60 v2, paired with a Velodyne VRP-1000 in your case a bigger upgrade might bring better results. In my case I am almost sure that the weak link is the amplifier.

I have no further experience with Cartridges, but I am sure you can get a lot more information from the links above.

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2008 2:18 pm
by Anubis
I finally got my set-up completed and I have to say.

It sounds good.
Damn good.

Yummy

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2008 2:32 pm
by Artemio
I am really glad man, it certainly is a more enjoyable experience. Have fun with it =)

And post pics!

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2008 4:53 pm
by 87th
I'm a little embarrassed to be posting this amongst all the audiophiles here, but I thought my system was interesting enough, all the same.

I have a Panasonic SG-J550L for vinyl, coupled with a Phillips MC 150 for CDs and Cassettes (the MC 150's speakers surround the SG-J550L). What makes the SG-J550L interesting is that it's actually a ghetto blaster that plays 12" and 7" records. It takes a whole bunch of batteries, and though impractical, it's interesting enough. The record deck also ejects from the system, which is a great fun little novelty.

The right speaker is busted at the moment, though, and I'm hoping to find a way to the record player into the CD player to have it play through its speakers (I get full stereo if I plug the record player into an stereo amplifier), but still haven't got round to tracking down the correct cable to do so. Saying that, I think I'm stalling until I move house again, and can plug it into my 250 watt Torque PA. :p

Re: Analog or Digital Music?

Posted: Mon Oct 20, 2008 2:32 pm
by XenoMorph
I'm no expert my any mark, and I generally can't tell poor and good audio quality apart but after I went over to my friends house to compare some CDs and LPs (Death - Sound of Perseverance comes to mind) the difference in sound quality is, well, amazing. Especially when using tube-powered amps. I wish I could afford one.