4 ms·

I collect my favorite artist albums on vinyl for a few reasons: * Big artwork and liner notes. I have shelves on my wall to display my current favorite albums

I collect my favorite artist albums on vinyl for a few reasons: * Big artwork and liner notes. I have shelves on my wall to display my current favorite albums and change them out over time. * Conversation piece. Friends can actually browse a collection and talk about common interests. It's fun to hang out and listen to records with people. * Vinyl requires some heavier duty stereo equipment. Regardless of how you think the vinyl itself sounds, it's a great way to get into building an actual hifi system, and that will make any format sound better. The stereo equipment becomes a hobby and collection in itself. To me it's not a competition. Different formats can happily coexist. I own many albums on several formats (Vinyl for the living room, CD for the car, etc.) I use streaming too, especially for discovery and portable use. And then there's the whole debate between lossy and lossless compression :) P.S. For those who are interested in vinyl but annoyed by the prospect flipping records every few songs check out an auto loading turntable. These can stack several records and automatically play them one after another.

gmarx 9y ago
I love that you call it a "hi-fi" which is what it would have been called the generation before mine. We always called it a "stereo". I've always been amazed by how rare it is for a person to be interested in a system that makes the music sound better. The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares Without optimum room design, even half-decent earbuds are better than pretty high-quality speaker systems, if you don't need multiple simultaneously listeners. And I don't think it's that most people don't care, I think it's just that most people have a utility function where the additional utility of high-quality sound gear is far too low to ever be justified by the cost of the gear (and the necessary environmental improvements to make sure that the effect of the gear isn't wasted.)
  - gmarx 9y ago
    optimum room design is great to get the best out of your gear but a $5000 stereo set up in your current living room will be significantly better than the earvuds
    - cranjice 9y ago
      I put together a modest priced system using quality but not quite "vintage" parts from the 80s (NAD amp, Klipsch heritage, Pioneer tt). It punches well above it's weight and I'd be hard pressed to build a comparable system today without spending 5x the money. Things really aren't made the way they used to be (for better or worse) and I think that nostalgia is definitely part of vinyl's appeal.
- tnecniv 9y ago
  At least in my experience, it's one of those things that you don't know what you are missing until you have it. I remember when I bought my first pair of IEMs. They were pretty cheap, but still better than whatever earbuds came with my iPod at the time. After listening to the new IEMs for a while I was unable to go back to the Apple ones because they sounded so much worse. If you asked me a few days prior, I would have told you the earbuds sounded fine. Then I got a real pair of headphones...
  - gmarx 9y ago
    yup, that's the downside of the hobby. I spent years chasing improvements which only satisfied me for a week. Took me years to stop and enjoy "good enough". Recently played something on my system for a musician friend and he was unimpressed...then I was crestfallen
    - tnecniv 9y ago
      You eventually get to a Pareto optimal front where the changes you make to your system aren't necessarily better, just different (i.e. more bass at the loss of some other part of the spectrum, which you may or may not prefer).

gmarx 9y ago

I love that you call it a "hi-fi" which is what it would have been called the generation before mine. We always called it a "stereo". I've always been amazed by how rare it is for a person to be interested in a system that makes the music sound better. The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares

dragonwriter 9y ago
> The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares Without optimum room design, even half-decent earbuds are better than pretty high-quality speaker systems, if you don't need multiple simultaneously listeners. And I don't think it's that most people don't care, I think it's just that most people have a utility function where the additional utility of high-quality sound gear is far too low to ever be justified by the cost of the gear (and the necessary environmental improvements to make sure that the effect of the gear isn't wasted.)
- gmarx 9y ago
  optimum room design is great to get the best out of your gear but a $5000 stereo set up in your current living room will be significantly better than the earvuds
  - cranjice 9y ago
    I put together a modest priced system using quality but not quite "vintage" parts from the 80s (NAD amp, Klipsch heritage, Pioneer tt). It punches well above it's weight and I'd be hard pressed to build a comparable system today without spending 5x the money. Things really aren't made the way they used to be (for better or worse) and I think that nostalgia is definitely part of vinyl's appeal.
tnecniv 9y ago
At least in my experience, it's one of those things that you don't know what you are missing until you have it. I remember when I bought my first pair of IEMs. They were pretty cheap, but still better than whatever earbuds came with my iPod at the time. After listening to the new IEMs for a while I was unable to go back to the Apple ones because they sounded so much worse. If you asked me a few days prior, I would have told you the earbuds sounded fine. Then I got a real pair of headphones...
- gmarx 9y ago
  yup, that's the downside of the hobby. I spent years chasing improvements which only satisfied me for a week. Took me years to stop and enjoy "good enough". Recently played something on my system for a musician friend and he was unimpressed...then I was crestfallen
  - tnecniv 9y ago
    You eventually get to a Pareto optimal front where the changes you make to your system aren't necessarily better, just different (i.e. more bass at the loss of some other part of the spectrum, which you may or may not prefer).