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The microphones faithfully follow the soundwaves.. the A class amplifiers faithfully follow the sound waves.. the cutting needle faithfully follows the sound

The microphones faithfully follow the soundwaves.. the A class amplifiers faithfully follow the sound waves.. the cutting needle faithfully follows the sound waves... the grooves in the record faithfully follow the soundwaves.. the needle on the record faithfully follow the soundwaves.. the speakers faithfully follow the sound waves... the soundwaves faithfully follow the soundwaves... Even with a crackle and pop, you are hearing the real thing...you hear betweeen the noise.. You are there...

cormacrelf 7y ago
Only one item on your list faithfully follows the soundwaves. The rest are inaccurate in their own unique way. Microphones throw out sound you don't want. The entire cutting needle thing has some pretty fundamental accuracy limits. The record player introduces all kinds of distortion, my favourite being the 'wow' of a motor turning at an inconsistent speed, causing minor fluctuations in pitch. The speakers, if they were actually accurate, would make the flaws in most recorded music really obvious (which is why those speakers never make it outside recording studios/aren't marketed to consumers). Not even the soundwaves do, if you're in a room. You missed the point of vinyl, which is that the inaccuracy sounds good. Digital inaccuracy, like what you get out of most crappy builtin DACs, doesn't sound good. If you have to have inaccuracy, which you do, vinyl folks prefer the vinyl kind. It doesn't bring you closer to the original sound, it just sounds old, and old must be closer to the past, right? But it sounds better, so you are right to enjoy it.
- numpad0 7y ago
  In defense of vinyl, real good vinyl setup sounds just like CD, only better. (said this in another tree but: my understanding is CD sucks among digital formats, not necessarily vinyl rocks.)
  - some-guy 7y ago
    How does CD suck among digital formats (at least, from a sound quality perspective)? For what it's worth, I am a member of a private music tracker and there are plenty of vinyl rips available. I've found that in many cases, the vinyl rips (which are digital files, by the way) sound better than the CD. This isn't because a) vinyl is better and b) CDs suck, it's because the CD masters in many cases compress the audio more and there's less dynamic range. Ironically, CDs have a lot more dynamic range than vinyl!
noisem4ker 7y ago
You forgot tape in the recording chain.

cormacrelf 7y ago

Only one item on your list faithfully follows the soundwaves. The rest are inaccurate in their own unique way. Microphones throw out sound you don't want. The entire cutting needle thing has some pretty fundamental accuracy limits. The record player introduces all kinds of distortion, my favourite being the 'wow' of a motor turning at an inconsistent speed, causing minor fluctuations in pitch. The speakers, if they were actually accurate, would make the flaws in most recorded music really obvious (which is why those speakers never make it outside recording studios/aren't marketed to consumers). Not even the soundwaves do, if you're in a room. You missed the point of vinyl, which is that the inaccuracy sounds good. Digital inaccuracy, like what you get out of most crappy builtin DACs, doesn't sound good. If you have to have inaccuracy, which you do, vinyl folks prefer the vinyl kind. It doesn't bring you closer to the original sound, it just sounds old, and old must be closer to the past, right? But it sounds better, so you are right to enjoy it.

numpad0 7y ago
In defense of vinyl, real good vinyl setup sounds just like CD, only better. (said this in another tree but: my understanding is CD sucks among digital formats, not necessarily vinyl rocks.)
- some-guy 7y ago
  How does CD suck among digital formats (at least, from a sound quality perspective)? For what it's worth, I am a member of a private music tracker and there are plenty of vinyl rips available. I've found that in many cases, the vinyl rips (which are digital files, by the way) sound better than the CD. This isn't because a) vinyl is better and b) CDs suck, it's because the CD masters in many cases compress the audio more and there's less dynamic range. Ironically, CDs have a lot more dynamic range than vinyl!

noisem4ker 7y ago

You forgot tape in the recording chain.