2. analog
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is the sound of vinyl due to the physical process of the turntable?

Same here. I do not own a turntable, however, if the sound of vinyl comes from the physical act of the record on the turntable why can't I transfer digital audio or at least emulate that process to digitally recreate that sound? I remember back in the 1970's you had 45rpm records on the back of cereal boxes and they were not vinyl, however they sounded good why can't I do that myself?
guitarsam

Showing 3 responses by mikelavigne

mikelavigne
2,142 posts
 
Why not just buy a good TT, and join the converted?

his vinyl reference is from a cereal box......what else is there to say?

opinions about vinyl have been based on worse data points, after all. :-)
mikelavigne
2,142 posts
 
sometimes the first step in responding is to try to make sure we understand the question.

the ’sound’ comes from a stylus being dragged through a groove of undulations that cause the stylus to deflect and move a coil or magnet to send a signal. the tiny signal then gets amplified and we hear music from a speaker. although there are even more crude methods of using a megaphone to amplify the signal from the stylus.

the media the groove is on can be a round metal cylinder, a piece of vinyl, or a cardboard cereal box. anything you can cut the groove in and will imprint the undulations then be rotated could work. then something has to rotate the media for the stylus to read it and send the signal.

a turntable is what is now used to rotate media, and it’s the choice that has become a mature process. but fundamentally if all you want is sound of some sort the components of the process are not locked into what we view as present day turntables.

OTOH we did not get here by accident. it was 143 years of messing around.

what was the question again?
mikelavigne
2,142 posts
 
Another important point is that if I make a digital file of the playback of a vinyl album I get an exact copy of the ethereal sound. The digital now sounds like vinyl. In 192/24 you can not tell the difference between the actual vinyl and the digital file of the vinyl whereas it is easy to tell the difference between actual vinyl playback and fully digital playback.

absolutely disagree. the high rez digital rip of the vinyl cannot match the actual vinyl. it is easy to hear the difference.

i have 1000 high rez needle drops of my vinyl. these are 2xdsd. 100% of them it’s trivial to hear the difference. i have plenty of high rez PCM rips too of my vinyl, but not as many as the 2xdsd rips.

i listen daily to these files and the vinyl, for the last 10 years.

my digital playback is top level and i love it. mostly listen to it.

but it’s not and never will be vinyl. period.
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