Digitally recorded lps?

Humorous responses you received....

From one turntable owner to another, I recommend buying any clean-copy digital Lps that interest you. In my experience they've been remarkably better than their CD counterparts in areas of hall ambience, environmental cues, quickness and authority in the bass, low-level info, and a sweeter, if still relatively dry, high end. We're lucky that digital lp's, at least in Europe were pressed up until '89.

I am pretty sure that Dire Straits was a full digital recording if not one of the first. I have always liked that on both the original and Simply Vinyl pressings. Just an example.

Some of the very early digital recordings were made with a 3M system that people still swear out performed Redbook standards. I believe the Ry Cooder "Bop 'Til You Drop" and possibly Donald Fagen's "Nightfly" fall into this category. Both are superb sounding records.

Throughout the 90s it was a common production trick to run digital recordings through either an analog tube processor (usually an EQ or compressor/limiter) or to copy to a wide track analog tape format before final mastering to CD format. To make mattesr even more confusing many pop/rock recordings contained both digital and analog recording tracks which may have then been mixed using both digital and analog mixing consoles. Excellent recordings as diverse as Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and Brian Wilson's "Presents Smile" are of this type. The recent remasterings of Jimi Hendrix's first 3 albums were all mixed digitally and produced outstanding vinyl editions. As mentioned by others above it really depends on the skill and dedication of the engineers rather than any specific technology.

Regarding why some people actually prefer vinyl version of all digital recordings, I think it's because of the distortion components added in the vinyl cutting process. The cutting process introduces channel crosstalk, phasiness, low end non-linearities and subtle compression effects that can be interpreted as added spaciousness and warmth. It's not particularly accurate, but it can be quite pleasant sounding.

Onhwy61, I would add to the vinyl process, the playback system adding more of the distortions you have noted. Also, there is nothing subtle about the compression effects on vinyl. It is true that in the beginning of digital recordings to vinyl, the engineers had to learn a new equalization curve for the cutter to shape the high frequencies, especially. DG's early attempts were really bad, but then we were 'saved' by the CD.
Bob P.

The advantages of digital technology for recording and mastering are many. Just a few examples...
Of course it put an end to tape hiss, and/or the various signal processing methods like DBX and Dolby used to minimize it.
The musical performance almost always needs editing. Cutting and splicing mag tape was never fun.
Multitrack recordings can be exactly synchronized for mixing purposes.
Analog master tapes deteriorate with age. A digital file, particularly when encoded with error correction, does not change.

Much of the criticism of digital sound technology relates to the 16-bit 44 KHz CD available to the end user. Professional digital technology, even years ago, was comparable to what we now call high resolution.