My conclusion: mid level $$ analog vs digital

Reruam

Thanks for link
1 hour long.      
Great listen 

I agree with intro turntable setups description 
They all sounded dull and lifeless to me , too

The knee for “ that vinyl magic” 
where you get the “ wow” moment is the big question ............

The tone audio guy said $10-20k , now days 

I had my wow moment on a setup, about 8 yrs ago
      acoustic solid Tt
      Triplaner arm
      Kisiki cart
      Esoteric phono 

So, I know what it sounds like 

But, The 3k in mine is , gosh darn , I get a good pile of the magic 

jeff

Enjoy both as I do.

I swore off vinyl years ago.  I have been staring at my big shelf of records for a long time with no way to play them.  I decided to buy a PS audio nu wave phono stage, party because of it's AD converter to use for other reasons.  I have always kept an old Dunlop Systemdek IIX laying around.  It has a Grado black cart.  I plugged it all in and played a couple records and was quite disturbed at how great it sounded, this was with a worn out 75 dollar cart.  I decided to get a better cart.  Ortofon Quintet black.  Now this was a big jump up.  Music I had tried to connect with via digital (and really good digital, DCS Rossini DAC and clock) I was now getting into.  There is a density to the sound that the digital lacks.  Also yes very frustrating at times with the pops and clicks and even complete crap brand new records (I swear the colored vinyl sounds worse)  I have upgraded my player to a VPI Classic 3 and Hana ML cart.  Nowhere near the top of the heap but mid level analog probably.  I know I can do better with phono stage and probably cart and table and arm but for now I am enjoying the ride and playing full albums and getting to know things I thought I should like but always my mind wandered when playing.  Now I have a connection to albums I hadn't before and if it takes playing it via vinyl then it's worth it.  There is so much to learn and tweak with vinyl it's not an easy thing but there are moments of pure bliss in sound you can achieve.  I am coming from very top of the line digital and dollars to dollars aren't even close in my digital system vs current analog but when the record is good and quiet I have to say I prefer the analog over the digital.  There is also a bit of joy in owning the music as an actual item you can hold in your hands.  Shopping for music has always been a lot of fun and now I'm able to do that again.  I just need to learn how to best clean these records to make them as silent and pop and click free as possible now.  

Just by chance the CD happened to come out when I was just out of college, broke, and moving around a lot. My turntable and records were boxed up. By the time I had anything to put into audio it seemed CD was the way to go.

Several years of serious system building later I am feeling "almost done" when I read Robert Harley saying "the turntable is the heart of a high end system." WTF? I never saw a turntable in any store the whole time I was searching stuff out.

My Technics was still in a box in the garage so I dug it out. The only thing I had for a phono stage was my old 1974 Kenwood integrated. I hooked it up. Told this story before, totally true: the cantilever was bent. I carefully straightened it out.

Could have knocked me over with a feather. Wife comes home, What’s that? Tom Petty. No, I mean what CD is that? No CD, record. WTF?!?! We are both incredulous. Especially me. 25 year old $325 Technics with Kenwood is absolutely kicking butt on $1200 California Audio Labs CD. With a cantilever with a kink in it.

Then followed many years of improving both, until gradually slowly realizing the only thing CD had going was convenience. I could program which tracks, hit one button, but that was it. With CD I was playing music. With records I was enjoying music.

The rest, as they say, is history. https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367

I really don’t care one bit which format anyone prefers and the reasons why.  The endless debate about which format sounds better and the insistence on the part of some that I can’t possibly hear what I do hear gets kinda tiresome.  What I do care about is what my ears tell me and my ears tell me that there is a fundamental difference between the sound of analog and the sound of digital.  To one degree or another, this fundamental difference can be heard at any price point.  As one climbs the ladder on the way to SOTA equipment and assuming intelligent/synergistic system matching of gear this difference becomes less important, if not less obvious.  Everyone has different tolerance levels to ticks and pops, the inconveniences of one format vs the other, and those or other things can be deal breakers; especially at the lowest price points.  

I listen primarily, not exclusively, to music that is minimally processed and mostly acoustic in nature and FOR ME, analog recordings simply do a better job, OVERALL, of mimicking the sound and the feeling of music as heard live.  This is not to say that digital doesn’t sound good and it is true that sometimes it does a better job OVERALL; but, that fundamental difference is always there.  Simple as that.