Vinyl record story

[Highlander]

It's that ole subjectiveness called sound...

Almost never get the chance to play anything at home (vinyl and amps have been in the loft since '92) so most of it gets played on the ipod (which disappeared just before Christmas, and I have now given up the hunt for it  ) a lot of driving and it (was) the simplest of means of playing for me on my road trips...

[Psycho Bass Guy]

BTW, screw ipods. Mp3's sound like ass. 

[Highlander]

At 70mph on the M4 it's a real bugger to keep the stylus in the groove... 

[Psycho Bass Guy]

Solid state media does just fine as long as you feed it good stuff to start with.  With gigabytes of storage being cheap, there's no real reason to ruin music by compressing its format. 

[SKATE RAT]

You have a valid point about books, but your vinyl records won't play with the power turned off either. Sure, a record is a physical object and an mp3 isn't, but the physical object is nothing without an electromagnetic cartridge to convert the info in the grooves into voltage.

Dave, didn't you ever watch "Gilligan's Island" ? you can run a record player off a bamboo bicycle.

[lowend1]

Dave, didn't you ever watch "Gilligan's Island" ? you can run a record player off a bamboo bicycle.

I still have most of my LPs (1300-ish), although I did thin the herd a little some years back. IMO, each format has its place. I HATED the advent of compact discs, because I felt the size ruined the impact of the album cover art and liner notes. I still feel that way. There is also an inherent quality to an old analog/vinyl recording that doesn't transfer well to CD - nothing like the sound of a mint vinyl record on a quality turntable through an old Scott 299-D, Dynaco Stereo 70 or McIntosh MC275. Oh, and that feeling of slitting open the shrink wrap and sliding the LP out of its sleeve for the first time was like opening Christmas presents! (when was the last time you enjoyed opening a CD package? Ugh!)
Having said that, the CD was undeniably an improvement in key areas - more portable, durable, and easier to make mix tapes (did I say tapes?) with. The iPod was a godsend to me - no more tapes or discs rattling around the car, and I can carry all my favorite stuff around with me - all I have to do is plug the 'pod into the AUX jack on the car stereo, and I'm good to go. Wonderful.

[Dave W]

I don't have an iPod, and if I did it would hold less than advertised because I can't listen to much at 128kbps. OTOH I've read that blind listening tests have shown that most people can't distinguish a .wav from a well done VBR mp3 at 0, 1 and 2 settings. And most can't tell the difference between a .wav and a 320kpbs CBR.

None of this will ever satisfy purists, and that's okay. Personally, I like the convenience of listening to my playlists on the computer through a good set of headphones. YMMV.

[Dave W]

Dave, didn't you ever watch "Gilligan's Island" ? you can run a record player off a bamboo bicycle.

I was too busy fantasizing about Lovey Howell.

[OldManC]

I was too busy fantasizing about Lovey Howell.

I came across a website a while back that showed how to replace the hard drive in a Creative Zen, which is what I have for an mp3 player. Going from 40 to 250GB allowed me to dump everything and rip it all again as VBR. Much better. There may be a difference between that and the WAV/AIFF files but as Ken alluded to, that difference is lost in the car, which is where I use the player.

[Psycho Bass Guy]

And most can't tell the difference between a .wav and a 320kpbs CBR.

I can.

None of this will ever satisfy purists, and that's okay.

This is not a matter of "cork sniffing." Make an mp3, at ANY resolution, in a digital audio editor from a PCM or AIFF file. Then make another at exactly the same resolution. Invert the polarity of the copy and mix the two together. The phase cancellation should leave you with a completely null track, but the pops, clicks and noises you have left are compression artifacts and are very real because your computer never does the compression math the same way twice. Do the very same thing with the original uncompressed file and you'll get silence.

[Denis]

I still have nearly all the LPs I've ever owned and have never regretted keeping them.

As a volunteer dj at a local college station I still play records but have an interesting chance to change over from records to cds to minidisks, etc. One thing I have to say about records and why I will always like them is  that a turntable will play any record put on the table. It might surprise you how often you will run across a cd that one of the three cd players WILL NOT play but that one of the others will. That becomes a pain in the ass when you are playing a set of 2 minute punk or surf songs.

[Hornisse]

I do have my old Denon, Technics, Marantz and Sony single disc CD players from the mid 1980's and those sound much better than the multidisc players.  My Denon is the warmest of the bunch but it does have trouble reading a lot of the newer CD's.

My Chicago Transit Authority LP is the original Columbia 360 sound and they sound better than the later issues.  I find that the early issues of any LP will sound better than one pressed 5 years later.  And my favorite smelling LP was Toys In The Attic by Aerosmith.  I remember opening the plastic and the new vinyl smell was just wonderful! 

[Psycho Bass Guy]

CD players actually will wear out the laser emitter diode with age and have more and more trouble reading discs. My wife has a boom-box that won't play any disc with a dark-colored label because not enough light gets reflected. It's literally worn out. I had a CD burner do the same thing in my studio computer. As far as sound quality, the older CD players were "experiments" of sorts and as they found ways to make them smaller and cheaper, sound quality suffered. Ironically, it is because of their analog components, and not the actual digital operation.   

[Dave W]

I'm not suggesting it's cork sniffing, I'm sure some people can tell the difference. Most can't, and most don't care anyway.

[Hornisse]

I can sure tell that MP3's sound like crap.