Vinyl sound quality?

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summersault
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Vinyl sound quality?

Post by summersault » Fri Oct 08, 2010 12:59 pm

Warning: Noob questions ahead

To be honest, I never really worried about sound quality before getting into electronic music but now I'm saving up for a decent soundsystem and I'm wondering if it's worth spending a little extra on a gramophone player?

I don't have a lot of vinyl records, only a few from when I lived at home with my parents and could play them on my dad's gramophone but if the sound is that much better, I would'nt mind buying my own gramophone and more vinyl.

So what's you opinion on vinyl vs digital quality?

Of course I'll do some research and comparisons myself but opinions from people who take good sound seriously never hurt anyone.


elibomyekip
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by elibomyekip » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:04 pm

Unless you're listening to WAVs, vinyl is quite a lot better. It'll sound even better in comparison if you're playing standard MP3s through a shitty soundcard from your computer too. The whole vinyl collecting thing is a massive money sink though, incredibly addictive. It's good being able to bag those limited press vinyl only releases though.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by FackOff » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:12 pm

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elibomyekip wrote:Unless you're listening to WAVs, vinyl is quite a lot better. It'll sound even better in comparison if you're playing standard MP3s through a shitty soundcard from your computer too. The whole vinyl collecting thing is a massive money sink though, incredibly addictive. It's good being able to bag those limited press vinyl only releases though.
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aliasa
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by aliasa » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:26 pm

Unless you have some very high spec kit a well mastered mp3 will be indeterminable from a wav. Both of which will sound better than you vinyl. I still buy vinyl but don't kid yourself into thinking your getting better quality sound or warmth from it. Any perceived warmth comes from the tops being rolled off at 16khz and resonance of the tone-arm. After a reasonable amount of plays the sound will of started to degraded and it's downhill from there with hiss, pops and crackles. Further to this Technics 1210/1200/Standard dj decks are not designed for audiophile playback, they are designed for djing ie. pitch control, stronger tone arms for scratching, tough build. Even with a high quality needle on a technics you've still not got a great sound coming from it.

So if you can buy the music that you want to listen to on cd buy it, if not buy 320mp3/flac/wav (boomkat is good for this), then vinyl if it's not available on anything else. Spend money on a decent amp and speakers, a decent soundcard and a turntable for those bits that you can't get anywhere else.

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badger
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by badger » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:52 pm

aliasa wrote:Unless you have some very high spec kit a well mastered mp3 will be indeterminable from a wav. Both of which will sound better than you vinyl. I still buy vinyl but don't kid yourself into thinking your getting better quality sound or warmth from it.
i'm sorry but that's nonsense. even people who are sworn digital DJs will tell you that vinyl sounds better

also your point about a well mastered wav is key. this is quite often not the case whilst vinyl that's been pressed by a decent studio will have been properly mastered by someone who knows how to get the best possible sound out of the format

when swapping between vinyl and 320s on serato i can instantly tell the difference in sound quality and i've hardly got what you would call a trained ear

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by pompende » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:55 pm

aliasa wrote:Unless you have some very high spec kit a well mastered mp3 will be indeterminable from a wav.
no. even on cheap speakers you can tell. its just the nature of the compression. that would be like saying a dvix is as good as a dvd iso....
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by egoless » Fri Oct 08, 2010 1:55 pm

aliasa wrote:Further to this Technics 1210/1200/Standard dj decks are not designed for audiophile playback, they are designed for djing ie. pitch control, stronger tone arms for scratching, tough build. Even with a high quality needle on a technics you've still not got a great sound coming from it..
The Technics SL-1200 MK2 MK3 MK4 MK5 M5G MK6 LTD & GOLD are a series of turntables manufactured since October 1972 by Matsushita under the brand name of Technics. S means "Stereo", L means "Player". Originally released as a high fidelity consumer record player, it quickly became adopted among radio and club disc jockeys.
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aliasa
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by aliasa » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:13 pm

badger wrote: i'm sorry but that's nonsense. even people who are sworn digital DJs will tell you that vinyl sounds better
mungoshifi » Tue May 05, 2009 1:25 pm wrote:
we use traktor skratch as well as vinyl and were recently testing cut dubplates against wav versions and one thing was clear, the only audiable difference over the soundsystem when the dubplate was synced with skratch was the bass was rolled off slightly on the dub.
At outlook this year they were using thier own rig they'd brought over from the uk along with serato SL3 I believe. If they felt vinyl sounded better i'm sure it wouldn't be much of a struggle to bring over a couple of crates along with the rig.
badger wrote: also your point about a well mastered wav is key. this is quite often not the case whilst vinyl that's been pressed by a decent studio will have been properly mastered by someone who knows how to get the best possible sound out of the format
I know, this is why i specifically said a well-mastered. A well mastered mp3 will be mastered differently to a well mastered wav. If you played all three side by side (vinyl, mp3 and wav) there would be more difference between the wav and the vinyl than the mp3 and the wav.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by Sirius » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:19 pm

Vinyl is gets the real representation of the source.
WAV & MP3 are made out of 010001101101
there is no other sound source out there that can fully capture the real waves except....
vinyl & tape!!!

this is not to say that you will notice the difference though.
shit, most people cant tell the difference between the way a wav & mp3 sound,
let alone, understand how the analogue & digital wave forms are made!

!!chea


p.s. bullshit a wav is better than vinyl!!!
http://www.dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.p ... 8&start=20
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aliasa
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by aliasa » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:26 pm

egoless wrote:
aliasa wrote:Further to this Technics 1210/1200/Standard dj decks are not designed for audiophile playback, they are designed for djing ie. pitch control, stronger tone arms for scratching, tough build. Even with a high quality needle on a technics you've still not got a great sound coming from it..
The Technics SL-1200 MK2 MK3 MK4 MK5 M5G MK6 LTD & GOLD are a series of turntables manufactured since October 1972 by Matsushita under the brand name of Technics. S means "Stereo", L means "Player". Originally released as a high fidelity consumer record player, it quickly became adopted among radio and club disc jockeys.
First link if you google audiophile, technics and 1210
http://www.discogs.com/groups/topic/155536

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by aliasa » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:27 pm

Sirius wrote:Vinyl is gets the real representation of the source.
WAV & MP3 are made out of 010001101101
there is no other sound source out there that can fully capture the real waves except....
vinyl & tape!!!

this is not to say that you will notice the difference though.
shit, most people cant tell the difference between the way a wav & mp3 sound,
let alone, understand how the analogue & digital wave forms are made!

!!chea


p.s. bullshit a wav is better than vinyl!!!
The source being a computer almost 100% of the time whihc works in 1's and 0's. I don't think i know of any dubstep that is recorded to dat.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by Basic A » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:31 pm

Sirius wrote:Vinyl is gets the real representation of the source.
WAV & MP3 are made out of 010001101101
there is no other sound source out there that can fully capture the real waves except....
vinyl & tape!!!
Oh yeah THIS matters when we're working with ELECTRONIC music made of 100010111001
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dr h
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by dr h » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:39 pm

More regurgitated crap posted by people who don't have a clue.

I've made a reply in a thread like this before, but think about this: the VAST majority of electronic music producers make their music digitally and render their music digitally. In other words, they mix down straight to wav/aiff, usually in 44khz/16bit. This will be further mastered if it gets a proper release, but unless the chain is all analogue (like AFX's analord releases or those sexy Fortune8 12s by Lee Purkis) then this whole "made out of 010001101101" stuff is exactly what your music is made from. The original wav is the closest that you'll get to the artists original vision for how the music should be. Vinyl doesn't magically make music sound superior.

Vinyl is all about the distortion and colourisation of the sound. This isn't strictly a bad thing and some music sounds "better" because of the high end rolloff inherent with vinyl. Just like old dub records actually sound nicer on tape, because the hiss really adds to the whole thing. But let's be serious people, vinyl as a format is just another lossy format in the chain. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to learn some facts and not just spew out the same spiel that they were led to believe by others.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by wolf89 » Fri Oct 08, 2010 2:57 pm

I just did a module on audio quality on my degree and as one part of it we had a listening session where we were blinded as to what was what.

On most of the music played everyone picked vinyl as being the most pleasing sound quality. Not all albums sounded best on vinyl but most did.

However you really are kidding yourself if you think that vinyl is in any way more accurate because it's analogue or something. I mean the sound of a track is coloured hugely by process of playing it off a record. It just happens to sound good.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by wolf89 » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:01 pm

dr h wrote:More regurgitated crap posted by people who don't have a clue.

I've made a reply in a thread like this before, but think about this: the VAST majority of electronic music producers make their music digitally and render their music digitally. In other words, they mix down straight to wav/aiff, usually in 44khz/16bit. This will be further mastered if it gets a proper release, but unless the chain is all analogue (like AFX's analord releases or those sexy Fortune8 12s by Lee Purkis) then this whole "made out of 010001101101" stuff is exactly what your music is made from. The original wav is the closest that you'll get to the artists original vision for how the music should be. Vinyl doesn't magically make music sound superior.

Vinyl is all about the distortion and colourisation of the sound. This isn't strictly a bad thing and some music sounds "better" because of the high end rolloff inherent with vinyl. Just like old dub records actually sound nicer on tape, because the hiss really adds to the whole thing. But let's be serious people, vinyl as a format is just another lossy format in the chain. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to learn some facts and not just spew out the same spiel that they were led to believe by others.
I should have read this before posting. It's entirely right,

vinyl is less accurate compared to a wav. It just can sound nice

101010
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by 101010 » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:03 pm

aliasa wrote:don't kid yourself into thinking your getting better quality sound or warmth from it. Any perceived warmth comes from the tops being rolled off at 16khz and resonance of the tone-arm. After a reasonable amount of plays the sound will of started to degraded and it's downhill from there with hiss, pops and crackles. Further to this Technics 1210/1200/Standard dj decks are not designed for audiophile playback, they are designed for djing ie. pitch control, stronger tone arms for scratching, tough build. Even with a high quality needle on a technics you've still not got a great sound coming from it.

dr h wrote:
I've made a reply in a thread like this before, but think about this: the VAST majority of electronic music producers make their music digitally and render their music digitally. In other words, they mix down straight to wav/aiff, usually in 44khz/16bit. This will be further mastered if it gets a proper release, but unless the chain is all analogue (like AFX's analord releases or those sexy Fortune8 12s by Lee Purkis) then this whole "made out of 010001101101" stuff is exactly what your music is made from. The original wav is the closest that you'll get to the artists original vision for how the music should be. Vinyl doesn't magically make music sound superior.

Vinyl is all about the distortion and colourisation of the sound. This isn't strictly a bad thing and some music sounds "better" because of the high end rolloff inherent with vinyl. Just like old dub records actually sound nicer on tape, because the hiss really adds to the whole thing. But let's be serious people, vinyl as a format is just another lossy format in the chain. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to learn some facts and not just spew out the same spiel that they were led to believe by others.
dr h wrote:More regurgitated crap posted by people who don't have a clue.
lol ,Irony.


Stuart Hawkes disagrees with you

" Vinyl is an extremely high quality medium "
http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/vide ... _me_do_it/
Last edited by 101010 on Fri Oct 08, 2010 4:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

pompende
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by pompende » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:10 pm

I know, this is why i specifically said a well-mastered. A well mastered mp3 will be mastered differently to a well mastered wav. If you played all three side by side (vinyl, mp3 and wav) there would be more difference between the wav and the vinyl than the mp3 and the wav.
That's crazy talk. Why don't you briefly summarize your understanding of how mp3 compression works and then reflect on how it necessarily reduces audio quality.

Vinyl will never have the accuracy of wavs but we all like the hi end roll off and a bit of texture.
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danoldboy
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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by danoldboy » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:12 pm

wolf89 wrote:
dr h wrote:More regurgitated crap posted by people who don't have a clue.

I've made a reply in a thread like this before, but think about this: the VAST majority of electronic music producers make their music digitally and render their music digitally. In other words, they mix down straight to wav/aiff, usually in 44khz/16bit. This will be further mastered if it gets a proper release, but unless the chain is all analogue (like AFX's analord releases or those sexy Fortune8 12s by Lee Purkis) then this whole "made out of 010001101101" stuff is exactly what your music is made from. The original wav is the closest that you'll get to the artists original vision for how the music should be. Vinyl doesn't magically make music sound superior.

Vinyl is all about the distortion and colourisation of the sound. This isn't strictly a bad thing and some music sounds "better" because of the high end rolloff inherent with vinyl. Just like old dub records actually sound nicer on tape, because the hiss really adds to the whole thing. But let's be serious people, vinyl as a format is just another lossy format in the chain. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to learn some facts and not just spew out the same spiel that they were led to believe by others.
I should have read this before posting. It's entirely right,

vinyl is less accurate compared to a wav. It just can sound nice
Try again people, vinyl mirrors a sound's waveform more accurately than a cd can.

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Re: Vinyl sound quality?

Post by dr h » Fri Oct 08, 2010 3:14 pm

101010 wrote: Stuart Hawkes disagrees with you
" Vinyl is an extremely high quality medium "
http://redbullmusicacademyradio.com/shows/1141/
It is colourisation. Nothing more, nothing less. Vinyl is a high quality medium, but assuming it magically makes electronic music sound better is just nonsense.

Acoustic or analogue music is a different story entirely. But the moment you introduce digital into the chain, you can forget about any benefits it offers.

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