When does analog compete with digital?

PTM hit it on the nose with the multiple components fact of life in analog. I think we all have a price threshold that we psychologically are willing to spend on a component. With analog, over time, we can get up to that level on multiple items cartridges, tables, arms, phono stages, and cleaning. Before you know it, you have a considerable investment because it is in pieces.

I have a problem with the concept of "competition" between formats. I need both to enjoy all of the music I've collected and I expect both to deliver a high level of performance. Also, my system has been assembled so that, on a basic level, both sound quite similar.

For classical music, I listen primarily to CDs. Very few current releases of classical music are available on lp, so collecting CDs and SACDs is the only option for new releases. I appreciate the long, uninterrupted playing time, the lack of ticks and pops in quiet passages, and the ability to easily find my place in the libretto for operas when using CDs. The other factor is that most of the classical labels are actually doing a better job now with recording quality than they have done in the past (e.g., DG) which is a far cry from most popular labels which are making crappier and crappier recordings these days.

For rock, jazz and other popular music, I listen mostly to lps. Particularly with older recordings, lps most often sound much better, in all respects, than their digital counterparts. To me, it doesn't matter if it is a case of one format being superior to the other, or poor digital mastering or degradation of the original master tapes, etc.-- it just is simply the case that most often the lp sounds better. Because most popular recordings do not have the dynamic range of classical music, surface noise (clicks, pops, sputtering) become almost irrelevant with popular music.

When I am doing a demonstration of the very best source material, it is almost exclusively lps. I've never heard digital sources match the dynamic impact of well recorded lps, or have the same kind of vast, open and realistic soundstage.

Because there are so many more components to lp source components, I have spent more on those components, but, my CD player is no slouch (Naim CD555).

CDs or vinyl......These are the big questions we ask ourselves. Regardless of preferences I have personally found it difficult to listen to vinyl in my car. My gimbaled turntable (that's turntable not tonearm) still skips. While I work out this engineering feat I'll continue to listen to CDs.
At home the fullness of sound vinyl delivers in comparison to the silhouette cutouts CDs offers makes an easy choice.

Sincerely,

Drewmb1? You have a gimbaled TT in your car? I would love a gimbaled TT. Just for the sake of it. I guess the right way to do it is have a gimbaled platform and mount a TT on it...

"I have personally found it difficult to listen to vinyl in my car." Simple solution, try a Technics SL-10. I seem to remember them coming with a 12volt adapter for use in a car.