Vinyl vs. top-notch digital

@millercarbon
Your last post, I didn’t understand what you meant. Sorry but I have to ask. Did you agree with me or was that a disagree. Either way. All good.

sdr, he does not know and you will confuse him by asking:) I love R to R.
I grew up with an Ampex in the days when you could get prerecorded tapes for just a little more than the vinyl. But when you have to pay $350 to $500 for just one title and when you can count the number of titles on two hands? Does not seem very practical. If you were a rich guy who just wanted to use it for demonstration purposes I suppose It would be fun. If you had access to live venues with permission it would be a lot of fun.
Music is emotional. Digital and analog are methodologies. 

@sdrsdrsdr

Yes. 1/4” tape. I’ve never heard any debate from the vinyl crowd on which is more superior, many discussions though. All seem to agree that tape is the best. I don’t know if this is also the same consensus the digital crowd shares too.

here’s the rub.

i love my tape (observe my system page), and have plenty of great tapes. but as my vinyl has improved over these past few years, more and more times i find that my vinyl equals or even slightly betters the tape reference that i had. it’s not that tape should not be better, more that tape varies so much as to the provenance, quality of transfer, and age at transfer.

i have now 20 year old 45 rpm re-issues that were transferred when the master was much younger. now we see these same titles offered on tape that are not as good as my vinyl. OTOH; acquiring those fantastic 20 year old 45 rpm reissues might cost you more than the tape, so a case can be made to own that tape for less.

the answer is, like most things, is that ’it depends’.

tape is king, but only when it’s optimal. i have been very selective as i’ve acquired tape titles over the years, and my tapes are generally a cut above my vinyl, but i do find lots of exceptions. and this has caused me to slow down my tape buying considerably and be very picky.

now when you get into 1/2" tape titles, or 30 ips tape titles, sourced from 1/2" or 30 ips, then it’s easy to be confident that it will be superior. nothing quite like 1/2" tape. if digital people think it can compete with 1/2" tape, i have to laugh, that is just ignorant.

Thank Mike. Very interesting. How many titles do you think are available in 1/2" 15 or 30 ips? 

there are a few labels that disclose a choice of 1/2". and those sometimes disclose the source tape’s details. so you have to dig a little to find this information. the cost of 1/2" is typically 66% to 100% more. it’s not just more expensive tape stock, it’s also setting up the 1/2" machine.

with grey market tapes this is a ’grey’ subject. how do you know the exact source tape? was it 1/2" or 30 ips? again; hard to know.

i have maybe a dozen 1/2" albums i know are 1/2" sourced, then another 10 i don’t really know. a 1/2" dub of a 1/4" tape will sound better than a 1/4" dub.

read Lp jacket covers and many times you will see a 1/2" tape source.

how many legit 1/2" tapes are out there to buy? can’t say, but would guess a few dozen. a separate question would be how great is the music?