Worth pursuing analog sound from digital?

rauliruegas9

Let me say this about accurate.

First, I never said anything about accurate, analog or CD, and I did say Digital can be involving.

Your list of LP chain of distortions is phenomenal, OMG, thanks for that, I mean it.

How do we not hate LP after hearing accurate digital?

How can many of us find severely compromised LP 'more involving' than accurate and admittedly involving CD?

My answer, after 45 years of paying attention, by instinct (no evidence I know of), is analog's reproduction of overtones is somehow better than digital's, and somehow our brains perceive the difference.

My most accurate speakers were JSE Infinite Slope Model 2's. Measured and positioned using professional sound meter in my listening space, via acoustic designer, I moved my big efficient horns/15" woofers elsewhere and listened to accurate noiseless CD's and those accurate speakers via accurate McIntosh SS 300wpc amp for a few years.

I decided to move the horns/15" woofers back, Oh Happy Day, preferred them. Then, because they are so efficient, I moved my 30 wpc tube mono blocks back in. Oh Happy Day.

Then I resurrected my Thorens/SME/Shure MR back in. New LP's sounded terrific, more involving. Older LP's, too much obvious noise. I had to re-acquire my brain's ability to filter the noise to be immersed within those noisy LP's. Of course new LP's, especially ones recorded by people who knew what they were doing are preferred.

Gave the JSE's to my son, he came of musical age during the period of their use, he loves them.

Thorens 124 bearing's weakness was bass transferred from my springy floor (split level built in 1951), so I sold it, got a modern digital drive TT, it sounds terrific, as good as the Thorens/SME without the floor vibration transference problem.

And, here we are, advising OP, many of us who love LP's, that he will do better with TT/LP's than digital, IF, as he says, he desires the elusive 'LP Sound'.

OP mentioned digital mid-range preference, but like you, I suspect that is a speaker/room interaction issue unrelated to Analog or Digital.

Analog is wrong but I prefer it!

mijostyn

re: personal involvement in results is a part of LP preference I agree.

In the beginning, CD players were prohibitively expensive, acquired by people likely to already have excellent TT and acquired cartridge alignment skills.

Those skills, bit by bit (hah, that's a digital process)) steadily improved their existing LP sound. (and R2R as Tape was also a rich mans game).

CD took away all personal involvement in the results, 'threw away' the years of acquired skills. 

Also, early CD's were conversions of old analog masters. Incredibly, (I read somewhere back then) some LP masters, having 1st stage phono eq, were converted without 2nd stage Phono EQ. The complaint of harshness was true because those digital copies had exaggerated highs and cut bass. 

A switching DAC, alternating left/right processing was less desirable than dual Burr-Brown dacs. more bits, 1 bit, less jitter, OMG, green stripes on the outer edge of CD's, the string of what could be 'improved' was longer than the list of what is wrong with the entire LP chain.

Except for the green stripes, and placing barbell weights on top of your CD player, personal involvement was/is still missing.

Of course, every response here is based on the personal equipment of the poster.
How can there be any accurate judgement when everybody’s listening on different components?
Fruitless endeavor.

Longtime vinyl lover here--someone who successfully transitioned to digital-only in the desktop audio setting (including quality headphones--very revealing of digital). A few observations:

1 - The trad way to get better sounding digital is to throw extreme money at delta-sigma conversion chips. Things like intricately designed input sections; big power supplies; heavyweight output sections; and sometimes, exotic bit-shaping circuitry in the digital section (ie, not defaulting to stock filter options of the chip itself. I haven't heard any of these dreadnaughts, which can cost upwards of $20K-$30K, but trust the comments I read that these DACs are a glimpse of sonic heaven.

2 - But back in the real world, I found one needn't spend so much or work nearly so hard to get better digital sound. I'll echo what teo_audio said about R2R & ladder DACs. Yes, it's an old technology and requires precise resistor matching (if a true ladder is used); or absent that, a very well conceived & programmed FPGA section. But these types of DACs sound far less "digital" than anything I've yet heard.

3 - In my experience, the NOS (non-oversampling) variant of R2R & ladder DACs is best for me. The sound is simply more organic, relaxing, suggestive of recording space, and representative of actual, 3-dimentional instruments (which produce 3D notes). Not all NOS DACs are amazing--these designs have to be very carefully planned & executed w/quality parts. But that's a given in any audio sphere.

My 1st non-D/S DAC was the humble NOS 19 by the well-known Chinese audio designer/mfr, Audio GD. It completely transformed my relationship w/digital. For the first time, I could relax and hear music coming from this DAC. I got interested in Audio GD and decided to buy their biggest selling DAC ever, the resistor ladder DAC-19. It, too, is very fine-sounding digital. 

I since sold the NOS 19 & replaced it with an NOS DAC I got interested in, the MHDT Labs Orchid. It, too, offers very humane, musical sound. I just swapped out the stock tube from the buffer circuit for a highly-recommended NOS variant. Even w/o the tube being fully burned in, it already sounds rather amazing. 

(forgot to say) Ladder DACs are hardly a "new thing." Theta Digital & a couple others did tremendous development/refinement of early R2R circuits in the '90s, and some of those DACs are still around, sounding amazing. But the mass market never adopted this form of digital, preferring delta-sigma instead (by a wide margin). And now R2R & ladder DACs are having a distinct renaissance, luckily for me.