The Science of Vinyl/Analog Setups

The Science of Cables’ thread has, unsurprisingly and perhaps somewhat sadly, taken on a life of its own. The topic of cables touches very sensitive nerves in this industry/hobby and it seems most have a strong opinion about it. My hope is that in the vinyl realm, other than comparing it endlessly to digital sources (yawn), there will be civility and education. I’m here to share experience, knowledge and wisdom; I've been playing records for the past 55 years.

It seems to me that there is too little scientific, objective evidence for why vinyl/analog setups sound the way they do. When I see discussions on tables, cartridges, tonearms and even phono cables, physical attributes are discussed; things like isolation, material, geometry, etc. and rarely are things discussed like wow, rumble, resonance, compliance, etc. Why is this? Why aren’t vinyl/analog setups discussed in terms of physical measurements very often?

A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. - W.S.

You must be new. Anyone around long enough to know - arbitrarily and conservatively rated to at least 40 years, or roughly the late 70's - would remember the great "golden age" (sarcasm) of the IM & THD measurement wars  and the enormous pile of crappy amps it produced. You would have quite vividly recall just how great amplifiers measured, and how gawdawfully bad they sounded. You would remember Robert Harley saying, "If the first watt isn't any good, why would you want 200 more of them?" You would know that if we learned anything from this it is that measurements have nearly nothing to do with sound quality. But then you asked anyway. So you must be new.

Also you don't need to be around hardly any time at all to realize the objectivist clique aren't really objective or science-oriented at all, but merely bad listeners. Granted its hard to say if its bad in the sense of they don't believe their own ears, or bad in the sense they really can't hear. Either way, bad.

Anyway, it turns out there is in fact at least one very solid science-based reason why people prefer analog over digital. Its very simple: people prefer even-order harmonics over odd-order, and by quite a large margin. Huge. Not even close.

Every musical instrument ever made pumps out tons and tons of even-order harmonics. The best most cherished and most highly valued among them, Stradivarius violins, in spades.

As does pretty much everything in nature. Or for that matter man-made. Drag a needle through a groove and everything from the cantilever to the headshell to the arm to the platter, plinth, bearing, feet, frame and stand starts vibrating like crazy- and its mostly all even-order harmonics. 

Even-order harmonics are so common in nature our ears mostly either tune them out or actually even prefer them. This long-standing preference by the way is what we call pleasing, or what "objectivists" deride as "euphonic", just one of the many ways they try and manipulate the terms of debate all the while loudly proclaiming their objectivism. Its a sickness.

Where was I? Oh yeah, man-made. There is one thing man has made that breaks this rule. And its not tubes, wire, speaker cones or cabinets, and it certainly isn't records. Its CDs. And yes, digital distortion levels are lower. Absolutely. But we're not talking absolute. We're talking odd relative to even. With digital they are all very low, meaning the irritating odd are just as loud in level - which means much worse in effect. With analog our beloved natural even-order harmonics overwhelms the man-made odd-order noise. 

Which, by the way, perfectly explains why digital recordings sound even better on vinyl.

So the superiority of analog is proven objectively, and we need at the very least to be awfully careful in just how we use tools like measurements and the scientific method.

Which is why I always say: just listen.

@millercarbon eloquently put

“....and it seems most have a strong opinion about it.”

Yes, only a few have weak opinions. 😛

It’s often helpful to read beyond the original post to understand why the original post was made. But, verily, it’s sad the literate are not among us to discern the nuance thereof.