LP made from a digital master recording...

I love vinyl, but there is no way listening to an LP from a digital master will be better than listening to the digital file. That is, unless your turntable and phono stage are adding so many colourations that you prefer the coloured version to the original.

When you listen to an LP from a digital master, you are still listening to a dac - and it is whatever dac they use in mastering the record - which may not be all that good - which is then recorded, dynamically compressed and subject to massive equalisation . Then there are the distortions inherent in playing the record - groove noise and inner side distortion... It’s amazing an LP sounds anything like the original. But it certainly cannot sound better than the digital file from which it is copied.

Now, a pre-1980 LP from an analog master produced by a good mastering engineer ... while it still has some inherent problems, a true analog LP retains something special that digital still has not quite captured. But listening to digital recordings on LP is just an exercise in self-delusion.

I used to operate a vinyl mastering studio. I have cut lacquers /dubplates of digital files that sounded 'better' after the transfer. Some not. Once you get your hands on the process you learn that it is not easy to generalize on the topic.
Mastering / manipulating digital files at whim is not an easy ride either.

So...as a consumer you just gotta listen. Buying records is a winding, sometimes bumpy road.

ebm, never say never. It will come back to bite you. A good digital master is going to sound better than a bad analog one. What a recording sounds like is more a result of the way it was mastered than whether or not it was digital. 

digital vs analog.  here we go again.

Digital "samples" signals at a certain clock rate and bit sampling rate.  this means for example if you were to digitally record a live concert, the the digital signal records the analog sound/signal at a certain sample rate.

you are inherently missing part of the signal. no matter the sample rate.  

However, the higher the sample rate, the closer you get to the accurate signal.

So, if you take the people playing analog music via microphones and digitally record it and that is the only recording. Then convert that digital recording to an analog recording for vinyl and listen via equally good vinyl system and the same digital recording via a digital playback system, will you hear a difference?  probably not.

But, take that same concert and record it analog and also record it digitally and play the analog recording on a very nice analog system and also play the digital recording on an equally nice digital playback system and I would bet a nice lunch you will hear a difference and the analog system will sound more spacious.

Take a concert or performance and record it analog.  Then also  remaster the recording digitally.  Play the original analog recording on a vinyl system and then play the digitally remastered recording on an analog system and you will hear a difference. Play the digitally remastered recording on a digital system vs the analog system/recording and you definitely will hear a difference.

But, as mentioned previously, it really depends on what you are listening to, how the music was recorded.

A very nice  digital system will sound wonderful.  It has come a long  way.  non fatiguing, great sound.  

But, when doing this type of comparison, one must compare apples to apples.

equally nice  digital and analog system:

analog recording vs digitally remastered analog recording: analog wins
digital recording to analog vs digital recording:  coin flip.

just my opinion.

enjoy

Since no one seems willing to just come out and say it, this is all beating around the bush. It will never be the LP, or CD. Its the master tape. RTR uber alles.