Vinyl foibles
I'd like to make this a space to ask questions about vinyl problems you're having trouble solving. I have a lot of questions, but I think it's better if we ask one at a time, or else I think we could have long lists.
Here is my first question. I have a Degritter album washer. I think it works great. I wash all my albums once, but not before I play them again and again. Somehow, though, and this includes new albums no one else has ever touched, they pick up ticks and what sounds like scratches. I rewash the album and it sounds like new again. I only touch albums by their edges. How do inner bands become so dirty that sometimes a smudge can last a minute or more? I've been playing vinyl albums for more years than many of you have lived, and I have learned to be very careful with vinyl. Are there vinyl gremlins haunting my album shelves?
@speedthrills - just curious - why would somebody with such a distaste for vinyl be reading and posting on the 'Analog' section? Are there people on the 'Digital' section who go on about how much digital sucks and everybody should listen to analog? Maybe there are, I don't know. |
@larsman on being curious and @speedthrills on what sucks… The two different observations:- Venting anger on an analogue discussion could be a knee jerk reaction after wasting a lot of money….. on analogue. What would make anyone who had used vinyl before, “l stuck a toe back in” (if it sucks) do the same thing again? Wouldn’t that simply be a self administered sucker punch? |
I really tried to troll, but @speedthrills got much better responses. I will remember next time: criticizing you is ok, criticizing vinyl is outrageous |
I had a friend, who passed away several years ago, who received a large inheritance about twenty-five years ago and asked me to help him spend a lot of money (from my perspective) on a stereo. It was fun. We drove all over L.A. and even Santa Barbara listening to various gear. He finally bought the new Wilson Shashas (I think) which had just come out and were half the price of the Watt Puppys. (I must say, I found them a bit dry but did not say so. It was his fantasy. My job was just as a guide) He purchased the latest ARC Reference preamp and a Hovland Radia amp. It was over $30K which was much more than it is today. He'd grown up a poor kid from the Bronx and was very proud of himself, now a Harvard professor with a high-end stereo. But I absolutely could not get him to invest in a turntable. I brought him to my house a number of times to listen to the difference between records and CDs. Perhaps part of the problem was that my system cost a fraction of his and was not super revealing. Still, I heard the difference. He said he did not want to get up all the time and change records. He did not like the idea of purchasing media that would wear out every time he played it. All rational reasons, I guess. Except records sound so far superior to my ears over digital music (if only I could purchase that quarter of a million dollar Dcs dac!) that I happily get up and turn over the record. It's kind of like breathing. The irony was that he spent all of his time in his office at Harvard and listened to music on his computer. His wife who did listen to his system, and who gave me the amp and preamp and Moon CD player, did not like it at all. She gave the heavy speakrs away to the guy next door in Cambridge. I took her to a dealer who sold Golden Ear speakers and NAD Swiss Army Knife streamer, integrated amp, and whatever else. She liked that so much more than the expensive stereo. Do I have a point? I think so.
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