Why will no other turntable beat the EMT 927?

If it were possible the best tonearm length would probably be no tonearm, or 0 length. Tonearms are necessary evils given the inherently flawed design of vinyl and teh systems needed to play it. Bigger/longer might be OK if done well but is definitely not better.

The thing is almost every aspect of vinyl record playback is a compromise. I suppose that's what makes it so interesting say compared to digital, there are lots of ways to do it yet no approach is perfect, much less any record being played.

So it is what it is. Long tonearm, shorter tonearm, whatever....it is what it is. WHatever you do there will always be a compromise somewhere. Its part of the vinyl mystique I suppose.

Mapman, don't assume that digital is better. Remember it is just math that converts 44.1 kHz to 96 kHz. There is rounding error. Every transformation other than in even jumps, is subject to errors just in the math. Converting from USB to SP Dif is subject to errors as are all other conversions. Even magnetic master tapes loose high frequencies with time.

Perhaps when everything is captured in double dsd or 5644.8 kHz, we will get digital right and of course have 10 terabyte drives in raid systems.

This fall I am going to do my 45 rpm reissues to a harddrive in double dsd with RIAA done in digitial. I'm hoping that I can have the wonder of these reissues in a convenient format.

Tbg,

Of course digital is subject to errors are well and nothing is perfect , but there can be no comparison IMHO either in design or practice between the precision, significance, magnitude or commonality in practice of the errors common or possible with the half century old 33 1/3 vinyl system compared to modern digital.

I still like and often might even prefer a good vinyl recording, but I am not going to delude myself about the inherent flaws and compromises that are involded with playing records, both in theory/on paper and even more so in practice. It often sounds much better than it probably has any right to still, but good sound and accuracy/precision are two separate things.

I am NOT fond of any digital vs. vinyl spat. I have good gear for listening to both, and because of convenience and availability of material, I listen mostly to digital media at home (exclusively digital in the car and at work). Very little in the way of current issue classical, is available in vinyl, and so much of current issue popular music is actually recorded digitally, so listening to digitally sourced material is, for me, inevitable.

I really love the convenience of a music server and the ability to put together a wide, and unusual program of music for an evening with much less effort. I like being able to scan a large collection of music (so far, I have ripped 3,700 CDs to WAV files), which helps me find long-neglected items in my collection.

Still, when it comes to "showing off" the music that is most stunningly realistic and exciting to hear, it is MOSTLY records I turn to. I have no idea whether there is some, as yet unquantified, and inherent, superiority of vinyl, or if it is a case of better mastering (or deterioration of original masters used for the digital reissue) or any other reason, but, really good vinyl delivers better dynamics and a sense that real bodies producing sound occupy the space in the soundfield. I do find that clicks and pops too often intrude in the playback of classical music, and so I don't do that much listening to classical on records; with all other genres, I find vinyl to more often sound better than the CD issue. High resolution files can sound really good, but, the amount of material issued remains limited.