2. digital
  3. 1063091730

Rediscovering the Joy of Digital?

Guys,

I've been into analog for a long time, and it's always been a royal pain in the neck to perform all the necessary adjustments to keep my tt at its best; not to mention the record cleaning rituals and the inflated prices they're charging for high-end analog gear these days.

I bought an early generation CD player back in the mid 80's, a modified Magnavox CDB-650, which was considered good at the time, but is not so good by today's standards. I also invested in some of Audio Alchemy's early DDE's, but they had some problems as well. So I went back to analog and bought a VPI Aries/JMW 10 and more recently, I have moved to a Michell Orbe SE with a Wilson Benesch arm and a Shelter 501 II cartridge.

It took a lot of work to get the Orbe/WB combo to sound its best and in reality, it's not a whole lot better than my much less expensive digital gear, but it sure is a lot more work. It's been my experience that you have to spend a lot more money on analog to get it to sound as good as today's respectable digital gear. I own a Parasound transport, a Bolder Cable modified ART DIO, and a Perpetual Technologies P-1A and it kills most of the Linns, Regas, and all but the highest priced VPI's that I've heard.

With my digital, there's no futzing with VTA, no worries about an expensive and delicate stylus assembly, and I have instant track access. Plus, it sounds virtually as transparent and liquid as analog and eschews those annoying ticks and pops.

My records and gear are sure taking up a lot of space. Perhaps I should dump my whole lot of LPs at the local Salvation Army and be done with it. Then I could sell that expensive analog front end that is a constant source of angst and buy something really cool with the money like a lot more CDs. Whadaya tink?
plato

Showing 1 response by jposs

jposs
99 posts
 
As far as high priced analog, it has been my own personal experience that you can definitely better CD with good analog, but you have to spend much more to do so. I realize this may have to do with poor matching, or bad synergy, so this is not to be taken as an absolute statement. I have a relatively entry level turntable setup: Rega P2 with RB250 arm and Grado silver cartridge. I bought it used for $350 bucks. In the same system I have a Sony SCD-CE775 that I bought used for 175 bucks.

The Sony at least matches the Rega as far as redbook playback goes. Of course it is recording sensitive, but more CDs sounds better than LPs sound better.

My brother has a no holds barred Teres setup that sounds glorious; there are recordings that sound better on my SCD-1, but more recordings sound better on his TT than recording that sound better on my CD player. However his turntable setup cost a helluva lot more than my CD player.

Now if you compare SACD to the vinyl, there is no comparison at the same price point. I couldn't tell you whether a 10k digital SACD setup sounds better than a 10k TT rig, because I have never heard a 10k digital setup. But I do know that at the entry level of both, SACD sounds better. My cheap little Sony playing back SACD surely has some glare, ill defined bass and lightened highs, but those weaknesses are not as pronounced as the weaknesses in my TT.
But I do know that my 3k SACD play rivals my brother's 13k TT setup. It may not be better, but it is damn close. 10k is a lot to pay for something that is only sometimes marginally better.

I realize software is another issue altogether, but I am just talking about analog prices here.

Has anyone else noticed this, or am I just goofy?
More to discover