digital vs vinyl thoughts

I own both and have spent roughly the same amount on both. My DAC is considered to be "analog sounding" by many - the Rega DAC.

To my ears, vinyl has a certain coolness or swagger to it that digital doesn't have. That's not to say I prefer vinyl to digital. Both have their inherent pros and cons...

People misunderstand the "perfect sound forever" line IMO. I think it was more meant as no degradation in sound quality no matter how many times you listen to it. Cassettes and vinyl albums wear out, CDs don't. CDs don't need the cleaning regimen vinyl does. Digital is far less OCD than vinyl - isolation, cart alignment, tracking force, VTA, yadda yadda yadda.

Vinyl to me sounds more organic and cohesive; more real, more natural.

But that doesn't mean any vinyl album will sound more real than every CD. There's far more consistency in CDs than in vinyl.

The at I look at it, why decide when I can have both? I view digital as everyday listening (not that that's a knock by any means), and vinyl as a special occasion.

Bringing this back to the original post, just because I feel this way doesn't mean everyone or anyone else will or should feel this way. It's all about what makes you happy and what makes you connect to the music. It's your music, system, time, and energy. I really dig what I've got and wouldn't let it go. You should feel the same way, no matter what you decide.

Good points Kbark. But where you have tried to make your digital setup sound more like analog, I've just tried to have the best digital sound I could muster.
That being said, since both my sources have slowly and painstakingly moved up to the higher end it's amazing how similar they actually sound.

Tmsorosk,

I see why you'd think that I tried to make my digital setup sound more analog, but it's not true. I simply bought the best sounding (to me) DAC I could afford. Same as when I bought my turntable and cartridge. I hate it when people say digital piece 'sounds analog,' much in the say way I hate it when people say a solid state piece 'sounds tubelike.'

Truth is, when people talk about digital sound, they're either refering to a bad component or a recording that's either bad or was mastered in the days when engineers had no clue what they were doing when first stepping in to digital.

Good digital doesn't sound harsh, and good vinyl doesn't sound all warm and fuzzy.

I think we're both on the same page, so please don't take my post as an arguement. Absolutely no arguement intended.

I'm a younger guy into audio. I run both vinyl and digital.

They do sound different but once again it depends on the system. If you have a 1K CDP vs a 5K TT, 2K cart, 2K phono stage, well then it's not even.

Also there can be so many differences in digital. Are people running SACD? Is it just a CDP or is a blue ray, cdp, dvd, and SACD machine?

To me vinyl sound warmer overall compared to digital. Digital does have more of an edge but there are CDP that will make it sound more like vinyl and then again you can have a TT that sounds more like digital.

The only thing is the vinyl upkeep. The cleaning, etc and then all the choices of carts, phono stages, etc can just make you go nuts after awhile. I think thats also why some young people like to run CD's as its just easier to use.

However I know several people younger than me even (18-23) that like vinyl and they think it sounds more real and warmer to them on just an entry level table. They like the iPod etc but think vinyl has a better SQ. I always ask how they got into it and they said they just listened to it one day and thought it sounded better. There are still young people who like to listen, and its good, its the future of the hobby IMO.

Only had a TT for about 3 months now, so my experience is very limited. What seems to ring true often is music recorded before the advent of digital I seem to prefer on vinyl when listened to on both. Stuff released in the 90's can go either way depending on the mastering. New music 2000 and beyond I usually prefer the digital version when compared to the vinyl version. My gut instinct is that whatever the recording was optimized for has the edge. That being said now I have to keep both!