Vinyl or wait for the new stuff??


I was wondering whether to dive into the world of Vinyl or wait for the new format to settle. You see, I have not listened to vinyl for more than 20 years now. I have all rated A equipment and cables and good collection of Audiophile and not so Audiophile CD. Recently I have been thinking of taking a dive into the world of Vinyl. However, knowing myself, I will not be satisfied unless I get some highend stuff which will cost me some serious amount of money. Not to mention that I have to start my collection of software. So my question here for you guys who want to help. Shall I make the move or just wait for the SACD/DVDA ? your input would be much appreciated.
myoussif
We have recently gotten back into vinyl. Yes the cd's are more convenient... but there is something very satisfying about cleaning the LP and placing the tonearm on that vinyl. Even my wife was amazed at the sound, she loves the MFSL recordings. The funny thing was, that after quite a long session of farely loud playing, we never felt like turning down the volume. That harsheness never materialized! And you know what the funny part of that was, I hadn't noticed the cd's harsheness, until we started playing our LP's again. My advice is... don't wait. You really don't know what you're missing!
Availability is a huge concern. Is the music you want to listen to available on the "next new format?" SACD ond DVD have extremely limited choices. Virtually anything is available on vinyl. Somethings are just harder to find than others. CDs are convienient but lots of things couldn't be obtained. Most new releases are available on vinyl but only as imports so you still have the choice to buy if you want.
I've been getting back into vinyl recently after doing turntable/CD comparisons and am very happy with the results.

Nate
a guy could wait til hell freezes ovrfor the new formats to proliferate. in the meantime, a guy can have a load of fun assembling a decent LP playback system and acquire a mountain of black vinyl. i have around 7k of them and still buy nearly weekly, and sometimes more (too) often).
meanwhile, conventional cd and the LP format will satisfy the need for music and quality playback.
the immediacy and solidity are readily detectable. the spaciousness and solidity with LP is quite reassuring and changing cartridges shows you the different strengths of these devices. a lot more fun than changing d/a convertors. i have about 9 carts mounted and ready to swap.
.......regards.....tr
My response has a historical turn to it, because I think the question is the product of its time.

Vinyl was brutally attacked and discredited with lies by the CD's promoters when they needed market share to survive. The CD was only just good enough at that point to replace the vinyl LP for many listeners who had poor-quality turntables. Ironically, the Linn Sondek had only just come onto the market and started to convince a small number that the problems of music reproduction should be addressed at the source. We were not source-oriented before this.

The Linn was expensive. Cheap CD players replaced background noise with distortion in the highs and loose rhythm but these failings were of an order we were not used to. This unfamiliarity was enough to allow many to believe the hype and dump the LP for CD. However the attention that was paid to the source had the result of opening ears to the CD's problems and consequently CD media and playback have improved. Again ironically, if the CD had not appeared the way it did, it might have failed on the market and something with higher sampling rates and longer words, something genuinely competitive with vinyl, might have appeared five years later and convinced many more listeners the LP was dead. Recycling was not then in vogue, so much vinyl which might have been useful for raincoats would have wound up in landfill.

Vinyl and the CD have thus helped each other. The CD was introduced when digital technology was only borderline, barely ready as a music medium. Vinyl has preserved some wonderful music and served as a reference, showing us the promoters were lying. Perfect sound forever, for Pete's sake !

Vinyl and the CD complement each other. One gives more natural music, the other gives us performances we can't get on vinyl. CD is also more convenient to use, and that's good. I think it only makes sense to get into high-end vinyl if you already have a lot of records and you know you want to hear them. However, if you are not satisfied with your CD system and you have bought it using your ears ; if you have looked into room treatment, cables, power supply and component synergy ; if you have heard vinyl do it so much better that you know that's what you want ; then you are condemned to spend a lot of money on a turntable setup and a record collection.

But no reproduction system is perfect and you could instead rest where you are and concentrate on finding software you want to listen to. When there's a critical mass of good software available in another format, you can make the move. In the meantime, if you need to spend more money on music, you could, if you don't already do it, support live music in two ways : go to concerts, and subsidize young musicians to study and purchase instruments.
tobias, while i tink there's much merit in what ewe say, there's a major glitch - the linn sondek was awailable for 12 years prior to the introduction of the 1st commercially awailable cd-player. and, *many* less expensive players would smoke the cd-players, not yust the linn.

and, as far as being "condemned" to spend a lot of money if ya wanna listen to winyl, i disagree - a prudent shopper can get a way-musical winyl rig for ~$1k - yust ask bigo, from a recent thread in the analog section of these forums... his rig will smoke most any cd-rig at *any* price, imo... getting a nice winyl rig will condemn ewe only to listening to *music*, & wishing yer favorite cd-releases could be found on winyl! ;~)

doug s.