Dogs don't have a vested interest in analog or digital. I once read a letter to the editor in TAS that described how the author's dog did not show much interest when the dog's owner played a recording on CD of nature sounds like birds and such. The dog sort of stirred, but went back to sleep. But the same dog got up, barked, and walked around and around the speakers for quite some time when his owner played the same recording on LP.
The letter writer made it a point to say that he had invested equally in both formats and owned--at the time--pretty much the best equipment available for both formats. Perhaps digital has improved since then, and the best Linn, mbl, Levinson, Burmester, Spectral, Theta, (or whatever) CD front ends would interest that dog now.
Some red book CD's are produced very well and offer some great musical satisfaction (RR, Chesky, etc.). If you really want music to have a therapeutic effect though, a well set up TT of decent quality with good recordings that are in good condition still does the trick better than a CDP in my experience. The bonus is that this therapy method is cheaper via the analog route. You have to spend so much more on CD playback to get something like the ease-on-the-mind effect that you get from a TT setup as qualified above. I do not have any experience with SACD or DVD-A in my own system. That could be a whole other ball game .
All the hassles of a TT are worth it: Siting the TT on a stable, isolated platform, DIN phono cables, phono section or stage, cleaning the records, acquiring them, etc. All worth it.
My 3 cents ..
The letter writer made it a point to say that he had invested equally in both formats and owned--at the time--pretty much the best equipment available for both formats. Perhaps digital has improved since then, and the best Linn, mbl, Levinson, Burmester, Spectral, Theta, (or whatever) CD front ends would interest that dog now.
Some red book CD's are produced very well and offer some great musical satisfaction (RR, Chesky, etc.). If you really want music to have a therapeutic effect though, a well set up TT of decent quality with good recordings that are in good condition still does the trick better than a CDP in my experience. The bonus is that this therapy method is cheaper via the analog route. You have to spend so much more on CD playback to get something like the ease-on-the-mind effect that you get from a TT setup as qualified above. I do not have any experience with SACD or DVD-A in my own system. That could be a whole other ball game .
All the hassles of a TT are worth it: Siting the TT on a stable, isolated platform, DIN phono cables, phono section or stage, cleaning the records, acquiring them, etc. All worth it.
My 3 cents ..