Vinyl vs Streaming

@mulveling Says it best if you ask me. 

As to digital and streaming ever being the equal to quality analog recording, maybe it will at some point or maybe it has in some instances. In my own system, the closest that I have found to vinyl or tape, is HDCD. There are other hi rez digital formats, SACD, DVDA and others but with the gear that I have, it's been HDCD. I wish I could find more of them.

If you compare audio to photography............bear with me here. There was a point in time when digital resolution or photo quality overtook the 35mm film camera. I asked someone in a camera store when that occurred and they said it was when digital cameras got up to about 7 megapixels. I think cell phone cameras are now up to over 30 megapixels in some cases. Kind of crazy. I had a very nice SLR digital camera from Nikon and I stopped using it out of the convenience and quality of cell phone cameras. I sold one Nikon and gave one away. 

If there is a digital/analog equivalent to the photography analogy in music or sound reproduction, I'd like to know what it is. It seems plausible that there would be a similar story but I do not know at what resolution or bit rate, this revolution would occur. Maybe we have a recording engineer out there who can answer this? 

This is a tired topic. I use Qobuz for streaming and the biggest problem I have with it is that it’s often limited to "re-mastered" files, which are almost without exception the compressed, dynamically limited versions. So of course they tend to sound not as good as an original LP or early CD.

After comparing similar digital and vinyl set ups, both being equal quality, I find it’s more a mastering and recording differences that make more of a difference. I have vinyl that sounds better then the digital and the opposite. Mostly due to what mastering version both are using. Then there is the remastered vinyl taken from an all digital source (or worse)- mastering- recording processes.  What’s truly fully analog anymore (other than your old records from prior to the digital age)?  Practically all new (newly remastered) vinyl has a digital process somewhere in the chain.

@billpete - interesting analogy; I've been a photographer for many decades, and I sure didn't trust the quality of digital images when they first started coming out. But it didn't take long for them to improve to the point where I went that route, too. I make much better prints using photoshop and my printer than I ever did in the darkroom - no Ansel Adams me! But most of my work is on film as it's concert photos from the 70's, so I scan them in with my Nikon film scanner and do the rest of the processing from there. If somebody thinks that vinyl is an inconvenience, they should try their own film developing and darkroom printing! A much bigger gap there, I think, than in audio. 

I prefer to own my music, thanks. Streaming has its place, but no internet, no music. Not doing that. 
 

As to quality, streaming’s as variable as media sources. A crappy recording is a crappy recording. 

That being said, the user interface with streaming is unparalleled. When I just want to listen, I’m usually spinning media. When I’m kicking it with friends and nobody’s really paying that much attention, streaming is the call.