CD standards not quite good enough?

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #60 on:** 28 Jun 2007, 10:57 pm »

Quote from: miklorsmith on 28 Jun 2007, 09:31 pm

So, your carefully tweaked vinyl system sounded better than your $39 cdp? I find that hard to believe, John.

A little like hunting with a Howitzer, hmmm?

Actually my less-than-carefully tweeked $610.06 vinyl setup from a year ago was as good as my (then) fully-tricked out $4500.00 Transport / MSB Gold Link III DAC & Revelation Audio Labs cryo'ed silver cable (and quite carefully tweeked with brass toes, heavy weights on top, fancy Power cord, etc) .

My $39.00 CDP player (okay, it's actually more like $69.00 as it has an old 'linear supply' Radio Shack regulated 12v source powering it now to good effect) is plenty good enough (for me). My carefully tweeked $1500.00 vinyl set-up properly whoops both now.

Didn't need a howitzer...CD went down with a feather.

Mike - you really need to get a mid-line TT with good speed regulation, a decent phono stage, a decent cartridge, all properly setup and isolated, and vacuumed cleaned records to compare against. Allocate maybe, ummm, $1000.00-$1200.00 to do it. You're a young guy with good upper register hearing still, it'll likely thunderstrike you down with it's musicality.

If I lived in Seattle I'd set it all up for you, too...or bring mine over.

I don't dig vinyl for anything but the music....there is nothing convenient about it and I am not THAT nostalgic. It's solely about the music for me

Please read my journey back to the music less than 2 years ago....it's a good read, mostly, tho long: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=22938.0

Rocket · « **Reply #61 on:** 28 Jun 2007, 11:10 pm »

Hi,

I like both mediums. I think i've invested similiar amounts in both of my systems which include the following:

vinyl: bluenote piccolo turntable; denon dl103 cartridge, bluenote de medici phonostage (approx $2500us_

cd: pioneer pds 507 (used as a transport and has g&d modifications to the digital section); perpetual technologies p1a/p3a with modwright mods.

With well recorded music both formats sound very good imo.

Regards

Rod

miklorsmith · « **Reply #62 on:** 28 Jun 2007, 11:20 pm »

Ahhh - my ignorance is my bliss! My entire music universe is digital and I love it! I've heard vinyl setups and liked them very much, I've never said otherwise. If it was just a hardware aquisition, I'd be all over it. The software thing is another entirely and I just don't have the chutzpah to take it on.

I wish we lived closer too, John. I'd happily session with you at both places, and I'm sure we'd walk away mutually impressed.

p.s. - nice job on the economical music maker, you got me beat there!

TONEPUB · « **Reply #63 on:** 28 Jun 2007, 11:25 pm »

I hear you on the software. If I had to start over from scratch today, I don't know if
I'd have the guts for it either.

And I have to say as much as I love LP's, I've been completely addicted to digital
music servers and having so much music available from the couch!

Either way its all good as long as you are digging the music.

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #64 on:** 28 Jun 2007, 11:55 pm »

CD definitely has improved the past 5 years to a point of even $39.00 players being adequate. No TT for $39.00 exists (or maybe has ever existed) as the mechanical parts cost too much...and now the market has shriveled up. Lack of economies of scale means higher prices for consumers.

Hey, both formats are sounding better to me, too. With steadily improving CD at better prices, inherent musicality of vinyl in tact....and my advancing age, it's all starting to sound real good now

alphinmike · « **Reply #65 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 09:45 am »

Good morning all - while I was asleep I seemed to have given things a little stir as it were! I would have to say that the average commercial CDP in my view is flawed and to get it to perform at a high level you need the services of an experienced engineer. I'm with Mike on this one and think that CD set up properly will smoke vinyl.Naim can do it for the rich and famous and good engineer can do it for the cash challenged ie Chevin Audio.Hi-fi dealers would have you believe that there is a direct connection between what you spend and what you get! Do you believe it? Me, I will continue with my CD happy in the knowledge that I am comfortably better off from a sound quality point of view than when I owned so called Hi-end vinyl!Spent far less money too! Having an Active system helps but that's another story!

alphinmike · « **Reply #66 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 04:26 pm »

Hi Guys - Great news; a local Hebridean guy up here has launched a new turntable - He's marketing it as The Graniton Radius Two.
It has many special features including a special plinth guaranteed to please your 'trouble and strife' ie W.A.F.
It has several unique features to enhance sound quality:-
1.A special Di-Litheum bearing from the special mines in Outer Mongolia where Khan himself used to live.This is said to give zero levels of friction so no motor is required - just a quick push and she's away - good for Global Warming!
2.Special 'The Q' Arm.This arm is in the 'Q' continum so dynamic compliance,tracking angle and acoustic feedback and vibration from the cartridge are all but eliminated.As it's in the 'Q' continum the arm itself is invisible to the naked eye!
3.A 'Clarke Kent' cartridge with a unique Kryptonite tip for the elimination of 'clicks & pops'
Finally Record Deck manufacturers have a product to challenge the best of CD.

WEEZ · « **Reply #67 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 05:56 pm »

alphinmike,

I concur with your statement(s) regarding power supplies making significant improvement(s) in cd playback. The same holds true for any audio component..pre-amps; amps; and yes, even phono amps and turntable motor supplies.

As for "CD set up properly will smoke vinyl"......that's a pretty strong statement with which I strongly disagree. Perhaps you are in denial..

WEEZ

alphinmike · « **Reply #68 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 06:25 pm »

News Flash from the makers of the New Graniton 2 Turntable.
People have asked how you mount a cartridge on 'an invisible tone arm'
Apparantley you log on to : q@thecontinum.com and fill in in your cartridge parameters into the grid provided ie tracking weights etc and press send: When you receive the acknowledgement whisper the words ''MAKE IT SO'' Then it all takes place automatically. I am asked to point out that this turntable works very well with Krell amps. The marketing platform for the new turntable will be ''PERFECT SOUND FOREVER'' Finally The Q have said that THE CHAIRGUY shouldn't worry about being 44. It's just a twinkle in the space/time continum!

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #69 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 06:38 pm »

I am gathering from your jovial posts that what you may like most about CD is it's utter convenience...this much cannot be denied.

But, as I am a slave to the music, I prefer to make that additional effort to extract that additional music that, currently at least, only exist in the inky black grooves of the old LP. CD standards are not quite good enough....DVD-A is much better....vinyl still has 'em both beat on most important musical counts.

Where one falls on the convenience aspect often is the dividing line of where your attentions fall as format choice.

I figure I use up an extra 100 calories a day getting up each day I'm in my office listening to vinyl...so with the inconvenience comes some benefits, too

alphinmike · « **Reply #70 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 07:09 pm »

Hi it's me again! Did I really say it - that CD SOUNDS BETTER THAN VINYL?eem - I think that's what I said - didn't I? Look at the King - He's in the alltogether. Oh dear - What a thing to say - in the words of John Mc Enroe ''You can't be serious?'' '' Can you?''

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #71 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 07:16 pm »

Okay Mike - have a Prozac, chase it down with some Jack Daniels - and enjoy your Friday

martyo · « **Reply #72 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 07:32 pm »

John,

You are very elequent in your descriptions of vinyl and music, etc. I almost regret getting a preamp without a phono section. I mean that in a positive way.

This has been a very interesting thread.

Marty

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #73 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 08:30 pm »

Hey Marty,

Thanks - I don't mean to tick anyone off, but I know I do sometimes as I frame results to my investigations rather forcefully. I, in no way, mean to infer that anyone committed to CD is a musical dope...I just describe my path back to vinyl after a spell away as illuminating and try to describe it.

For me, it was vexing why a much newer format like CD wasn't in all ways better than vinyl....in Tim de Paravinci's Q & A I think I found the 'nugget' or clue why. It's not the playback....it's back at the original standard for CD itself.

I realize not everyone gets the vinyl experience, nor wants to for a variety of reasons. Oh, well...more pickens' for me at the $1.00 bins at the Salvation Army

Thanks for your kind words.

John / TCG

mcullinan · « **Reply #74 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 08:31 pm »

Au Contrare I listen to CD and Im on dope...
Mike

Wayner · « **Reply #75 on:** 29 Jun 2007, 11:16 pm »

How do I like vinyl? Tomorrow I may be purchasing a VPI Aries 3 turntable at 3+ big bills, not including cartridge. That is how much I like vinyl. I'm not sure which cartridge to start out with it but I probably will put my Grado Gold Longhorn in. This is a great big bastard turntable!

JLM · « **Reply #76 on:** 30 Jun 2007, 12:11 am »

Moderator help!!!

This has gotten way off topic and turned into a CD bashing.

Personally I can't tolerate any vinyl surface noise and accept vinyl as something only a mother could love.

mcullinan · « **Reply #77 on:** 30 Jun 2007, 12:19 am »

um, i like vinyl on a chick, man thats hot! shiny and hot... though the CD rules down with you LP throwbacks from the carnivorousstonehedgeness era. But Jesus CDs from the 80s and early 90s suck. So bright and horrible, no bass... who mastered these things?
Mike

opnly bafld · « **Reply #78 on:** 30 Jun 2007, 12:52 am »

Quote from: mcullinan on 30 Jun 2007, 12:19 am

But Jesus CDs from the 80s and early 90s suck. So bright and horrible, no bass... who mastered these things?
Mike

People that didn't know they could turn the RIAA eq off for digital recordings.

Lin

TheChairGuy · « **Reply #79 on:** 30 Jun 2007, 01:55 am »

Quote from: JLM on 30 Jun 2007, 12:11 am

Moderator help!!!

This has gotten way off topic and turned into a CD bashing.

Personally I can't tolerate any vinyl surface noise and accept vinyl as something only a mother could love.

JLM - it's gone moderately off-topic. No one has slagged CD....everyone who has posted owns at least one and still listens to it. Some believe it's nothing better than a small appliance, others would argue (as you have) that there is too much unacceptable about vinyl in return.

If anything, your comment is far more off topic than the premise of this Topic implied.

Please make your own topic touting the virtues of CD sometime...and frame your beliefs and or points carefully and or pointedly, if you'd like. If you don't want to and think it's a waste of time - okay, so be it.

This topic has probably run it's course, tho. Before it stirs up our slightly daft and troll-ish English lad 'alphinmike' when he wakes up shortly, I'd rather just lock it up now.

ta-ta