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Vinyl / High qual analog tape / High-res digital -- One of these is not like the other

One common theme I read on forums here and elsewhere is the view by many that there is a pecking order in quality:

Top - High Quality Analog TapeNext - VinylBottom - Digital

I will go out on a limb and say that most, probably approaching almost all those making the claim have never heard a really good analog tape machine and high resolution digital side by side, and have certainly never heard what comes out the other end when it goes to vinyl, i.e. heard the tape/file that went to the cutter, then compared that to the resultant record?

High quality analog tape and high quality digital sound very similar. Add a bit of hiss (noise) to digital, and it would be very difficult to tell which is which. It is not digital, especially high resolution digital that is the outlier, it is vinyl. It is different from the other two.  Perhaps if more people actually experienced this, they would have a different approach to analog/vinyl?

This post has nothing to do with personal taste. If you prefer vinyl, then stick with it and enjoy it. There are reasons why the analog processing that occurs in the vinyl "process" can result in a sound that pleases someone. However, knowledge is good, and if you are set in your ways, you may be preventing the next leap.
roberttdid
roberttdid OP
534 posts
 
@geoffkait, Has anyone every told you that you project (In the psychological sense), an awful lot? I don’t think I have seen one post from you that indicated you had any significant knowledge in any area important to audio. Pretty much most posts are blathering about CD players, and perhaps vibration, no matter what the topic and whether that was relevant.
geoffkait23,012 posts06-29-2020 4:00pmRobberrttddidd is a pseudo scientist. He is the very definition of one. Notice he doesn’t debate the subject, apparently he would rather pretend to have all the answers and call names.

Wasn’t it Niels Bohr who said never think you have all the answers?

An ordinary man has no means of deliverance.

glupson
7,842 posts
 
"Pretty much most posts are blathering about CD players, and perhaps vibration..."

What about wire directionality?
mikelavigne
2,199 posts
 
Musicians say it sounds truest to what they hear coming from the instrument......
it’s been multi-decades since ’musicians’ had any idea about anything other than digital.

’a’ musician......maybe one in a thousand.

one in a hundred working pro audio guys. and even those guys very rarely have a clue about high end vinyl.

so the opinions of that group about this is just not relevant to me.
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,800 posts
 

Leland Sklar, one of the most-recorded electric bassists in history (James Taylor, Jackson Browne, Carole King, Phil Collins, Toto, many soundtracks) posts a video on YouTube every day. They are filmed in an upstairs bedroom of his very nice 2-story house in Pasadena (not a low-income neighborhood), showing him playing along with recordings of songs he is the bassist on.

Leland is VERY particular about the sound of his basses and amp/speaker stage/recording rigs. In todays video, the speakers in the room are shown, and they are little Bose sound bar types. Ay carumba! Lots of musicians I know listen to music on their computer’s speakers, car stereo (people in Southern California spend a LOT of time in their cars), or even a boombox. When I recorded with Evan Johns (look him up, he was quite a character) in Atlanta (his Moontan album), before work on each song commenced he played the musicians his solo acoustic demo tape of the song, recorded and played back on a boombox!

Just like other non-audiophiles, most musicians don’t expect LP’s, CD’s, tapes, and streamed music to sound anywhere close to that of live music. They are viewed as separate events, the attempt to narrow the gap not of particular interest to them. I know: weird, right? ;-)

geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 

roberttdid OP
@geoffkait, Has anyone every told you that you project (In the psychological sense), an awful lot? I don’t think I have seen one post from you that indicated you had any significant knowledge in any area important to audio. Pretty much most posts are blathering about CD players, and perhaps vibration, no matter what the topic and whether that was relevant.
geoffkait23,012 posts06-29-2020 4:00pmRobberrttddidd is a pseudo scientist. He is the very definition of one. Notice he doesn’t debate the subject, apparently he would rather pretend to have all the answers and call names.

Wasn’t it Niels Bohr who said never think you have all the answers?

An ordinary man has no means of deliverance.
>>>>As I said, robberrttddidd is excellent at name calling, poor at actual debate. Well, what do expect from Mr. Smarty Pants? 👖The new pseudo scientist, same as the old pseudo scientist. Pseudo psychologist, too. Anyone who makes the statement in the OP that high end tape and high end digital sound the same has most likely been listening to a great many mediocre systems, they oft sound very generic, rather poor and boring and similar. It’s due to lack of real quality. It’s what separates the advanced audiophile from the average clutz. The average clutz is plug and play and bits is bits. Fair enough?
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