Newbie to Vinyl Seeks Tips

pinwa-

one of the things that is driving me to try vinyl is to see if the records are better than the digital versions.

That's from just above.   

This is you, pinwa, after hearing my system last September:

the midrange/vocal presence is huge. Listening to them at your place I thought it might be too much but coming back home and listening to my 1.7's and one subwoofer I found myself missing that big full round sound your system has.

I wonder how much of that is the Melody amp and how much the various tweaks you made. And I think that sound is also characteristic of vinyl and I have no intention of adding a turntable no matter how good it sounds. While I was there I found myself wanting a dryer more clinical presentation but listening to my system just now there seems to be so much missing that was present in your system.

I can tell you right now the Melody amp is at most maybe 10% of what you heard. If that. A drier more clinical presentation is what you will get with digital. SS as well, but some of that can be pretty good. Mostly the problem is digital.

I've really been struggling to figure out how to characterize my experience and I think it is a little bit like the first time you taste a new flavor of food or wine. I don't even know how to evaluate its "goodness" because my palette, or in this case ear, is so uneducated. Your system is so radically different from anything I've heard before, even the other set of Moabs I heard, that I feel like I need to educate myself more about what I might have been hearing.  

That's a good analogy. Your palate is accustomed to processed restaurant food. My system is home cooking. The number and variety of spices are far greater, the flavors more varied and complex, and while some of them may be a little overpowering at times keep in mind it may not be so much an acquired taste kind of thing as this is just my style of cooking. The beauty with vinyl is you are not stuck with take out digital, you can learn to cook yourself. You can, to a much greater extent than is possible with digital, be your own chef.  

After my Moabs come, and I've had a chance to fine tune them in my system, I would be really interested to come back and give your system another listen if that is something you would be open to.  

Always. You've got your Moabs, they are fine tuned. You have even done what you said you had no intention of doing, added a turntable. Not trying to make you look bad or anything but what you said was, "no matter how good it sounds." This is what we call a Freudian Slip. You know it sounds good. You just need a little more guidance and encouragement. Any time. 

millercarbon - First, I want to be clear, I said your system was extraordinary, which I think it is, but I never said I liked it.  I certainly don't aspire to replicate the sound that you have worked so hard to achieve. 

I have no idea what leads you to constantly argue that you have the best system and only path to great sound, but I am confident that I am not the only person on Audiogon that finds it annoying.  But I do want to thank you for your generosity in letting me hear your system.

I am curious about vinyl.  That same curiosity has led me to purchase 10 speakers and nine amplifiers over the past 9 months.  I wouldn't read anything more into it.  My guess is vinyl will be better for older albums because so many older CDs and digital sources seem to be flat and compressed and hopefully the comparable records aren't.  I think you mostly listen to older material which does more to explain your love of vinyl than any inherent deficit in digitally encoded music.  But I am approaching my foray into vinyl with an open mind and the same curiosity that has driven my audiophile journey so far.

And please don't turn this into one of your flame wars.  Have the last word if you must, but I won't be responding to any rants.

I thank @whart for his writing

@pinwa How has it worked out since your last post? 

@noromance Good question.  Mostly it hasn't.  As I suspected, I find the whole process of playing vinyl to be less than satisfying.  I know a lot of people find the ritual of taking an album out of the case, cleaning it, and lowering the needle and then sitting back for 20 minutes devoting your full attention to the music to be rewarding but mostly I think all of that is frustrating.  But my guess is that isn't really what you were asking.  And all of my points below should be taken in the context of the fact that I still have very limited experience playing records since it isn't something I do often.

A different sound quality is the reason I wanted to try vinyl and my experience with that is hit or miss.  Listening carefully is a challenge because level matching is difficult even with a SPL meter but I do my best. 

Modern records often sound nearly identical to digital sources.  The records that sound significantly different are bolder, more dynamic and brasher.  Going back and forth between streaming and vinyl often leaves me scratching my head about which I prefer and wondering which is truer to the artists intention.  Streaming seems to recess the instruments a bit and bring the vocals forward but maybe it is just more compressed.  Vinyl sometimes almost seems like an exaggerated presentation .  And since I have a very basic vinyl setup I wonder how much of that coarseness, for lack of a better word, is just the turntable and phono amp.

Older records often shine because the streaming source seems so flat and uninteresting.  My guess is this is what drives most of the enthusiasts for vinyl, and it is hard to argue that records don't sound better for older material where streaming sounds bad.  On the other hand, the second hand older albums I have are plagued with snaps, crackles and pops that I find very distracting.  I've tried different types of cleaning without finding something that "fixes" them.  Mostly I play very current music so streaming is fine for that.

And on the topic of noise, well even brand new vinyl sounds noisy to me.  I just bought Ada Lea's "one hand on the steering wheel the other sewing a garden" and there is a low level of hiss on the quiet passages and the occasional pop. I find that distracting/disturbing.  And this is an album where there is a big difference between streaming and vinyl but I simply couldn't decide which I liked better.

And since I use Roon, I really like its ability to play the lyrics on my tv while the song is playing.  When I play a record I often set the album going in Roon just to be able to see the lyrics.  Of course, skipping over a track I don't like simply isn't an option with vinyl.

Bottom line is I don't think I'll be a convert to vinyl anytime soon but I will enjoy playing a record from time to time but I don't like it enough to pay the often ridiculous prices for old, much less new, albums.

My latest experiment is with playing SACDs.  So far no conclusions about that at all other than an enormous sense of frustration at how expensive and difficult to source most SACDs are.  Since so little material is available as an SACD that will never be a big part of my listening even if I decide I love it.

Forgive my rambling answer to your short question LOL.