The latter being how we arrived at this mess that we have today, one where engineering prettiness (i’s dotted, t’s crossed...) is more important that the reality of human hearing, human hearing --which is not looked at by the specialized people doing the ADC/DAC engineering.I will gladly second you on that....
But for the eternal analog/digital debate, my point and experience is the 3 embeddings of an audio system contribute way much to the S.Q. than the choice of a dac or a turntable....
But who gives a damn for embedding the audio element where they cost so much in dollars and are state of the art? Almost nobody....I know because the discussions are about vinyl or digital, cables, tube amplifier versus S.S. etc.... All that totally secondary in S.Q. to the rightfully 3 embeddings in a dedicated room....
:)