In 2017 I stopped writing about HIFI on this Blog, mainly because I had run out of things to say, since then the vinyl revival has started and I have bought a few modern albums some of which were re-masters of 50's and 60's jazz records. I play them on my modest turntable set up which cost me about £500 complete with a decent cartridge and a half decent phono stage.
It's my view that a vinyl record, that fully exploits the analogue medium, can approach the sound quality of an equivalent cd record, that fully exploits the digital medium; but that it cannot equal or exceed it. All music recording cannot give you 100% High Fidelity, thus all recording techniques degrade the sound if only by a small percentage, but analogue recordings using vinyl technology degrade the sound more than CD digital recording.
Many re-mastered recordings are produced by digital techniques so, most of the time, when you buy a vinyl record you are not purely hearing an analogue recording that does not have some digital involvement. All modern recorded music is now produced from digital recordings, so really no-one can claim that modern vinyl recordings are technically and sonically better than CD's or lossless digital recorded files. If the CD music sounds worse than your turntable through the same amplifier and speakers then there is some radically wrong with your digital player, or the CD was originally recorded badly. It does not bother me if a modern LP has been produced from a digital recording as long as it sounds good. But, if an LP has been digitally re-mastered , why bother buying it when the CD will sound better? There is a case for digitally re-mastering significant past recordings which can then be archived for posterity. I have written about this before.
Recently, I went into a record shop, "The Core of the Poodle" in Haverfordwest which opened as part of the vinyl revival and met a vinyl enthusiast owner who had an encyclopaedical knowledge of jazz. He could also sell you a second hand turn table to play the records on . I bought a Blue Note recording of Donald Byrd "Live at The Half Note Café" recorded in 1960 in Manhattan. The vinyl LP is a re-issue which has been mastered from the original tape by analogue methods: it's the real McCoy. This record sounds fantastic; with very little surface noise, distortion or wow and flutter when played on my equipment. To me it sounds almost as good as the digital file of the same re-issue that I downloaded from the web.
To sound so good a turntable must do the following:
Support the accurate tracking of the cartridge and stylus in the record groove,
Minimize vibrations within the turntable from its mechanics,
Minimize the vibrations from the external environment from footfall ,knocks to the supporting platform and the turntable itself,
Minimize wow and flutter effects from speed variations of the rotating platter,
Run the platter as close as possible to 33 1/3 rpm for LPs and 45 rpm for single and EP records,
Minimize the electronic influence of the mains supply and other electronic circuits,
Reduce the sound of the motor running, and heard as rumble,
Protect the cartridge from acoustic feedback,
My turntable does all of this without having to spend thousands of pounds.
If you do not look after your records then then they will eventually sound awful. If you play your record too loud the music could suffer from acoustic feedback.
My record sounded perfect because my turntable is able to perform almost perfectly and I have set it up properly.
After listening to this record I came to the conclusion that the production of the record is probably the chief limiting factor in the sound reproduction chain, as long as you have good quality amplifiers and speakers.
Unfortunately many LP records come with built in faults, including wow and flutter, noise from the cutting lathe and in built noise from the cutting lathe. The record maybe warped and even scratched before you get to play it. None of these faults are apparent with digital music files. CDs usually will only sound bad if they have not been recorded properly or they have been subjected to sonic compression too make them sound louder -which reduces their dynamic range: analogue recordings can suffer from this too.
A supersensitive turntable which costs £1000s could actually make a LP sound worse as every click and pop can be amplified to make a less then perfect vinyl LP sound bad. I have actually heard this happening when a work colleague demonstrated his very expensive kit to me.
Over the years I have used all sorts of turntables, some with idler drives in the early 1960s and 1970s and latterly belt drives and direct drives; and I aver that £500 will buy you a turntable, along with a good cartridge and phono stage that can play almost perfect vinyl LPs to sound fantastic. Believe you me, you do not need to spend £10,000 on a turntable to hear fantastic music.
However, good luck to you if you can afford 15,000 bucks to buy an electromechanical wonder that gets you a very little closer to perceived perfection.
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