Analog vs Digital

A month ago I was talking to my friend who's works at a Antiques Store, He use to work at a Record Store selling Vinyl Records...

We talked about Analog vs Digital, He told me about Vinyl sounds better...

I know the right niddle it will sound better then CD's

vinyl sound pretty good, if you have a record that isn't scratched, and you have a turntable with a good magnetic cartridge on it. Most of the cheap plastic turntables that are being sold at department stores have a plastic tone arm and a ceramic cartridge on them. I actually like the sound of records. Most of the time it sounds better than the loud distorted over processed audio that is being sent out by radio stations these days.

Analog vs Digital easy one there ...... cd mp3/4 sound lot better .... why back up copys off them ... Viny olny one copy ..

and how long more will we see it around

8-track
late 1960s to the early 1980s ..

audio cassettes
began in 1964 1990s . sony walkman lol
as of 2010[update], blank cassettes are still being produced and are sold at many retail stores, and facilities for cassette duplication remain available. Cassette recorders and players are gradually becoming scarcer, but are still widely available and featured in a notable percentage of Hi-Fi systems .

Compact Disc
CDs have been commercially available since October 1982 , 200 billion CDs had been sold worldwide . CD audio, CD-ROM, and CD-R

Digital Compact Cassette (DCC) was a magnetic tape sound recording format introduced by Philips and Matsushita in late 1992

MiniDisc
Was one of two rival digital systems introduced in 1992

now we Ipod ..... mp3/4 on pcs

flytrap said:

vinyl sound pretty good, if you have a record that isn't scratched, and you have a turntable with a good magnetic cartridge on it. Most of the cheap plastic turntables that are being sold at department stores have a plastic tone arm and a ceramic cartridge on them. I actually like the sound of records. Most of the time it sounds better than the loud distorted over processed audio that is being sent out by radio stations these days.

Click to expand...

We don't over process that crap. The LABEL's do. We complain about it all the time. All modern music comes to us as clipped, overprocessed junk.

chriscollins said:

flytrap said:

vinyl sound pretty good, if you have a record that isn't scratched, and you have a turntable with a good magnetic cartridge on it. Most of the cheap plastic turntables that are being sold at department stores have a plastic tone arm and a ceramic cartridge on them. I actually like the sound of records. Most of the time it sounds better than the loud distorted over processed audio that is being sent out by radio stations these days.

Click to expand...

We don't over process that crap. The LABEL's do. We complain about it all the time. All modern music comes to us as clipped, overprocessed junk.

Click to expand...

The producers do that so the product can be heard in the "normal" environment. Despite a digital delivery with immense dynamic range it means squat in noisy car or through a Coby home theater system. Unfortunately the hyper processing of the music battles a radio station processing schemes if they go thick.

The whole analog/digital thing is how each handles excess. An analog signal bends when pushed causing an interesting ear pleasing effect. Digital lacks this character, 0 dBFS is the peak and beyond that is ear piercing clipping.

AAh...an analog signal bends (ie...Cool Edit Pro "soft knee") when overamplified through a tube circuit. The hard clipping occurs in most Solid State designs, creating square waves from sine waves. And ALL audio is analog at the start, except synthesizers.

The new product being sent to Broadcasters is a nightmare. It is the worst engineered product in what should be the peak of engineering enlightenment. There is near zero dynamic range. The industry USE to have equipment to expand and limit the music...now it's reversed, and it "undoes" the disaterous audio on contemporary CD's.

The only companies that 'get it' are the ones reissuing "oldies" and "classic rock" from the original multitrack tapes, like EMI and Rhino. Not the safety Stereo dubs they used to press the LP's years ago, but THE analog Master multitrack.

And saving a file in mp3? You might as well save it on an 1 7/8 ips cassette. It's convenient for storage and emailing, not for fidelity.

Common sense will tell you, should clue you, that when a file size it 10% that of the original .wav file, you've lost 90% of the information! You've lost all the magic of the nuances of the performance captured on that Master. Now, I'm talking about classic recordings on Reprise, WB, Columbia, RCA, ABC Paramount...not Hip-Hop and Rap. Forr that, mp3 is just fine because there is no complicated waveforms like violins and horn orchestration...or even a cymbal in most. Just 50Hz bass...not complicated.

flytrap said:

vinyl sound pretty good, if you have a record that isn't scratched, and you have a turntable with a good magnetic cartridge on it. Most of the cheap plastic turntables that are being sold at department stores have a plastic tone arm and a ceramic cartridge on them. I actually like the sound of records. Most of the time it sounds better than the loud distorted over processed audio that is being sent out by radio stations these days.

Click to expand...

Funny thing, I tend to like the way ceramic cartridges sound. Despite having an Audio Technica AT-LP120 with a magnetic cartridge, more often than not my records get played on the Montgomery Ward console with its BSR changer. The records seem to have a smoother more mellow sound. Especially 45s, which let's be honest, are mastered with lots of distortion.

Tracking force? The BSR with it's Tetrad red socket cartridge tracks at 3.5g which is the same force as entry level magnetics.

@info...if you prefer the sound of a ceramic cartridge on a console hi-fi, it's hi-fi, not the source. That ceramic cartridge has a frequency respnse of about 100 to 7.5khz...that's it. The same as most AM radios. The magnetic is 30 to 17khz, wider than FM. It WILL reproduce all the grit and clipping in a worn record. And if you've been playing 45's on a 5 gram weight tone arm, they're toast. The "diamond" (man-made) on that ceramic cart is massive, and conical, compared to the fraction sized, elliptical one in the magnetic, tracking at 2 grams.

Another possiblity, the 8uf capacitors used for the crossover to the tweeters in the hi-fi have dried out, and thy're rolling off at 7khz, taking all the harsh clipping out. And that's why you like the sound.

Basically, you'd get the exact same results, without further 45 wear, by playing with the magnetic cart, turning up the bass and killing the treble! Also, if your receiver/amp has a mono/stereo switch, and the 45's are mono, throw it in mono to reduce the lateral clipping by half. Also, be SURE your tracking weight is high enough. Magnetic carts sound dreadful when they are misadjusted too light. Don't guess, find out the factory reccomended tracking weight range for that one, and set it in the middle. (1.5 to 2.5g...set it for 2 to start) Lighter is NOT necessarily better. You choice of Magnetic cart is a good one IF the stylus is good.

The console does indeed need a recap for best performance and general maintainance. I've wondered what the exact frequency response is myself. Someday I'll make some recordings and check them in Cool Edit. The results will be a bit skewed since the BSR does run a bit fast

Both the Audio Technica and the BSR/Tetrad track at 3.5g. I have brand new 45s that have never been played on anything but the Audio Technica and they sound horrible: fuzzy, distorted, and dull. The worst of them are pressed grossly off center.

It's amazing how good some of those old 78s sound on either system. For recordings made in the late 40s/early 50s, there's plenty of bass and high frequency response.

I'm sure Nostalgia has it's influence here. And it's probably not just the ceramic cartridge, but the presentation of the console as a whole that has a pleasing sound.

I will meet the critics with regards to those new retro record players. I measured the down force on one of them at 7g. The cartridge in that player is only meant to track at a max of 4g.

amfmsw said:

Also, be SURE your tracking weight is high enough. Magnetic carts sound dreadful when they are misadjusted too light. Don't guess, find out the factory reccomended tracking weight range for that one, and set it in the middle. (1.5 to 2.5g...set it for 2 to start) Lighter is NOT necessarily better. You choice of Magnetic cart is a good one IF the stylus is good.

Click to expand...

I shouldn't say this, but when I dub my vinyl, I like to have FDR go on a ride above the merry-go-round. A dime on the stylus quiets things down, even though it's probably too much weight.

In a perfect world, yes the vinyl does sound better. But throw into the mix my wife whom the nieces and nephews call Auntie Packrat and my poor hand dexterity & general mobility problems from a spinal cord injury, mp3's at 320 kb/s seem like a good compromise.

I was looking for the right board to post this question and I think this thread relates.

It's cool that you're seeing a few records being sold in stores these days. Some of it on nice, heavy vinyl. I haven't popped for the $25 vinyl that are coming out for new releases. Does the vinyl sound any better than CDs? Or does it sound like digital being played off a vinyl record? I know they're recording (for the most part) digitally from the source. Does the new stuff on vinyl sound smashed and over-processed like it does from CDs? Is there any warmth to it?

The reason some people find the sound of vinyl more pleasing than digital formats are:
* Intermodulation Distortion, generally caused in the phono preamp or just by the nature of having a double-sided groove that the stylus rides in. IM is the result of two or more signals mixing together that are not considered harmonic frequencies. Many find this form of distortion to be "warm" or pleasing to the ear.

* Noise floor: There are various noise components with dragging a pointy stylus through a groove. That, and as with IM, some noise is created by the amplification stages of a standard phono preamp. Digital recordings lack the same components of signal to noise ratio as vinyl recordings do.

Granted it sounds strange that distortion and noise presented by listening to vinyl recordings are somehow advantageous, but like anything involving audio, it's all subjectively in the ears of the beholder.

I listen to music on both formats. When I want convenience, while I'm working around the house and want several hours of music, I'll load up an MP3 playlist. When I want to sit and enjoy the performance, as if I were in the studio, I'll put on vinyl. They both have their place, their good points and their bad points.

At my drive-in theatre, the (digital) automation I use for pre-show and intermission programs plays 'wav' files out of a library of over 5,000 cuts. Whenever I find a good vinyl record, I'll transfer it to a 'wav', using a Technics direct-drive table and a Stanton cartridge. When the vinyl isn't perfect, I sometimes let the occasional click stay in the file, rather than edit it out in 'Audition'. There's an authenticity and warmth to those old tracks that doesn't translate to the CD remasters you get at the "record" store. Say what you want, but there is a difference that is noticeable over time.