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
Dear @magister : """  Subjectivity versus objectivity is an obsolete scientific false debate for almost a century now....


The repudiation of subjective perception has no scientific meaning at all, and reduction of subjective perception to a "so called" objective one no ultimate meaning....Only a dialogue is meaningful but on the basis of the ultimate irreducibility of individual perception to any numbers there is.... ""

I have to disagree with you in what you posted there and the post that followed this one.

Maybe could be because I'm talking of different subjects than you and other gentlemans.

Even if through my posts you can think I'm diminished subjective opinions I want to confirm again that I did not and don't and my expression of the word " illusion " was not with a despective or dimished way to offend in no way the subjective gentleman opinios and if they take it ( as you ) my apolize for those.

Now, exist no debate between subjectivity and objectivity. It can't exist in any way.

Facts/objectivity are inviolable and with absolute certainty when in the other side opinions/subjectivity can't gives any one else but the one person with that opinion absolute certainty.

The main subject in what I posted before is to know not what we like to listen and its quality levels but if the self inherent LP limitations non-accurated technology can be more accurated than the digital medium.
Again what you like it or what I like it is almost unimportant to other than you or me and useless to analize that accuracy levels in those way different mediums to listen MUSIC. No room/system quality levels can't change/improve any medium limitations.

Here two of my posts to read it as an " abstract " way and only as facts where exist not only certainty about but a lot of measured information all over not only the links other gentlemans posted but over the internet:

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/vinyl-high-qual-analog-tape-high-res-digital-one-of-these-is/post?postid=1972331#1972331

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/vinyl-high-qual-analog-tape-high-res-digital-one-of-these-is/post?postid=1972922#1972922

Till today any advocated audiophile to LP over digital on which is truer to the recording posted yet any single fact that could tell us the LP superiority to be truer to the recording than digital medium.
This is the subject idea I'm posting in this thread but maybe I did not understnd it what you or other gentlemans are or have under discussion.

Btw:

http://harryshifi.com/images/vinyl_tutorial.pdf


Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.


@rauliruegas


If someone says cable A sounds better than cable B, that is a Subjective opinion. If that same someone can reliably differentiate between cable A and cable B in a controlled blind test, then we have Objective proof the cables are different.

Anyone who doesn't believe in blind testing really does not trust their ears no matter what they may claim.
Pure baloney!! This is the oldest con game in audio, so-called “objectivists” dismissing listening results when listening results are empirical evidence, you know, one of the foundations of the scientific method. Don’t let the pseudo scientists con you. At least we have identified 👀 them. Just more jibber jabber from the usual suspects. Be vigilant, they can be very slippery, like eels.
rauliruegas
I respect your polite and factual tone...

I want to say that what i read incline me toward your view point in principle, but in concrete experience  with one anolog  audio system or another more refined, i am not sure that a very refined analog system  will not surprise my factual reasons to place the digital technology ahead ( the reasons you described)...

I respect you and thanks you for your interesting posts anyway....
When a dude who lies about his qualifications as a physicist (I read old posts), sells Magic Pebbles to improve sound, and claims to improve audio via a telephone call .. just the call, not a call about audio, ...calls you a pseudo scientist, I will take that as high praise.  Must really burn your Geoff that you never got published, not once, after that paper in what Junior High and people who actually contribute to science like me get published, cited, even invited to speak. Your envy and jealously is really ugly but keep doing you.

Your repeated Wrong use of the term empirical evidence shows you do not know how to do research and I expect you never have. What you describe as empirical evidence is anecdotal evidence. I borrowed someone else's words but here, let me spell it out for you. Maybe you will learn something.



Anecdotal evidence is using your personal experiences and stories to illustrate your point. Empirical evidence is measured, unbiased, and replicable.


As a layperson in research I can understand your error. Empirical evidence can be observational, not hard measured, and you make the leap that that includes anecdotal evidence but it does not. It still needs to meet the scientific requirements of unbiased and repeatable


Here, this article may help:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-anecdotal-evidence-can-undermine-scientific-results/