Is analog & vinyl anoying? Is it worht it.

Dear Gregadd: +++++ " One thing I do is love music. If I just run across a musician playing music for donations at a subway entrance. If I hear a song on the radio and sit my car after I've stopped waitning for it to end. Listening to a walkman or ipod. I love music and don't care where it comes from. " +++++

This statement is of paramount importance for the people that care about music. We that love music almost always enjoy the music through a walkman or through a music hall live concerto.

I think ( for what I understand ) that the subject in this thread is if it is worht all the time and money that we need to enjoy the music through analog. I don't let very clear my opinion in what I already posted, well: yes it is worht!!!!!.

The point here is that through digital it is worht too, we can enjoy the music with digital sources too.

IMHO, the analog sound reproduction has several tolerance/obsessive people atittude grade levels. Where are we? is an answer that is different as different people are.
I know that you enjoy/could enjoy the music through analog whithin your own grade level of tolerance/obsessive/tweak targets.

There are people that take a lot of time " playing " with VTA/VTF trying to obtain a better quality reproduction, their obsessive/tolerance grade about is really high, higher that your own grade level about.

I don't have very high grade level on VTA/VTF but I'm so high in tolerance/obsessive with distortion/noise on the cartridge signal ( step up transformers, caps, transformers, RIAA accuracy, intermodulation distortions, etc, etc ) or on the tonearm/cartridge matching. I take all the time/money I can trying to be near perfect on those areas for a better quality music reproduction. The best of all is that trying to have better quality music sound reproduction through analog I achieve too a better quality sound/music reproduction in the digital domain!!!!

Like I say: where are you? or you?

I think that all of us that cares about music take all the time/money trying to get better quality music reproduction. Obviously we are limited not only for the time/money that we can have but limited for our know-how/experiences about.

The critical problem with analog/digital music/sound reproduction is when we lost ( or almost lost ) the " energy/emotion " to take the time/money to enjoy the music in our home systems.

Gregadd, I invite you to re-start your energy/emotion on the analog music/sound reproduction.

Regards and enjoy the music.
raul.

I agree that a comparison with live music is a humbling experience for those of us who take pride in our system's ability to reproduce music with lifelike qualities. What always gets me is the sheer explosiveness of the kickdrum at my local club, even when the band is just warming up. I don't know of any system that recreates this effectively- it is not just a question of 'loud,' or 'dynamic' or 'deep' but all of them, and more. This, at least, has been my experience in a relatively small venue, listening to bands of 4-5 pieces. (Saw James Hunter there Sunday night, terrific show).
Classical and larger staged stuff- greater distance, the system seems very capable on massed strings, tympani, horn parts, etc. In fact, it is probably 'better' than real, a hi-fi attribute to make up for others that are missing.
Is the vinyl thing like tubes in that both produce euphonic distortions pleasing to the ear? Or a lack of processing? Most vinyl records made in multitrack studios have progressively more processing added in later years- most of the later Beatles recordings are not very good, IMO, for this reason. The early, primitive recordings, and the audiophile ones that deliberately eschew fancy processing- are often terrific sounding, although the repetoire may be limited unless you have tons of used records and/or don't listen to much new stuff.
As to musicians being the arbiters of a natural sounding system- I don't think so. I think they listen for something beyond, and totally beside, the sound quality. I too can enjoy music, for music's sake, on a small radio, a cheap car hi-fi, over the Internet or via a plastic boombox. But, when I want to really dig in, I like to fire up a serious playback system. If I were starting from scratch, perhaps digital would make sense. But, I'm not. And, it is amazing what you can pull from those musty old grooves. The best analogy I could come up with is a sort of 'purer' (or 'more involving,'-- you supply the adjective, I'm trying to avoid saying 'better'-- just more 'straightforward' perhaps) experience, in the same way that someone else here, in a different thread, remarked on what driving a 73 RS is like, compared to a modern Porsche. The later car is no doubt the better one for almost all purposes, but there is a good reason why the 73 model is so desirable. I surely wouldn't go so far as to make judgements about who is more serious teh music listener based on the equipment or format- by that standard, the one which points to the musician, we'd all be looking for the equivalent of a compact mini-stack.

Herbert Von Karajan... was very involved with the recording process as well as conducting his performances -

Yeah, so was Leonard Bernstein. That certainly gave us some sonic gems!

If HvK used the sonics of his own DGG vinyl releases as a benchmark, it's no wonder he fell in love with digital. What a pity his magnificent Beethoven performances were all released on second rate Dodgy Grungaphone vinyl.

I love HvK's performances, but his "insights" into the quality of different recording/playback media must be counted as worthless. His own records were unfailingly mediocre.

Just a thought. After I found that acoustic polarity ("normal" vs "inverted) made a difference in my system, the next thing I discovered was that it made the MOST difference with DG vinyl, CDs, and R-R tape. No idea why. But before giving up on DG, you might try switching the speaker cables (both of them) and see if you can detect a positive difference. Dave

Yes I do go to concerts. Not the opera. I am more into jazz. If invited to opera I would go. After thirty years of audio with declinig income, failing eyesight and clumsy fingers I wonder if it is worht it.
It appears it is to most of you guys.