I’ll admit I don’t actually own any vinyl. But when I think about the possibility that I would actually buy music (instead of just listening for free on YouTube), it makes sense to me to gravitate towards vinyl. It will sound noticeably different, tends to have better aesthetics and accompanying materials, and playing it would be more of an experience.
If I didn’t have streaming, then I’d probably still want the CD to get the best quality audio in a more convenient to play (or rip) package. But since I already have that, the vinyl becomes more appealing.
And if, by any chance, I do actually find the vinyl sound to be more appealing (unlikely with modern stuff), I would of course rip it to a digital file for the convenience factor. Again, playing the record would be for the experience, not for the music.
Heh. I was driving my car after my post and noticed that my tach is digital even in the layman’s definition. I somehow forgot that I don’t have a display needle on my tach. I have little LCD bars that build up as the engine revs. Shows how much I pay attention, or how good my memory is. And it’s not my car that has the digital readout, it’s my wife’s (which I typically drive more often than mine.) Where’s the headsmack smiley?
In the context of this conversation, I would call that analog, in that it’s an analog-type graphical display. In this conversation I’m contrasting that with a purely numerical display, which I argue is much less ergonomic.
I assume from context you are saying the vinyl is better,.
Then no, you can’t. Especially not, if you believe CDs have only mp3 quality! Sheesh!
CDs have greater dynamic range than vinyl, and not only that, reproduce low frequencies way better, Deep bass can actually make a needle skip!
No, 9000 rpm is pretty warm no matter how it is read!
But what they do have is a handy illustration of the difference between precision and accuracy. No one, but no one, cares if the engine is turning 4502 v 4514, but the digital gauge shows the difference. The analog needle tach does not have the resolution to show that, And no one needs it.
But the difference between 59 and 61 mph can get you a ticket!
The graphical display goes beyond what the pure analog display was capable of, though. You can highlight the entire instrument in a bright color; you can make it flash; you can print a nearby message explaining exactly what the error was; and so on. Yeah, monochromatic text sucks as an indicator, but a plain analog needle is only marginally better. Digital displays can do all the things analog instruments could, but a whole lot more things besides. They can even be a better analog display than the analog display was: in a cramped cockpit, you might have to trade off instrument size vs. number, to the point where some might be hard to read. A reconfigurable one can show only those instruments relevant for the current phase of flight, making the most important ones larger and more readable.
I’m not arguing against the use of underlying digital technology or digital displays. As I said just upthread, I’m arguing against the utility of numerical displays, as opposed to graphical displays, whether physical dials or digital representations of dials or bars or sliders. This whole argument started with someone claiming that numerical-type speedometers were better than dials. They aren’t, and there’s a good reason that they’re not used any more as the only means of indicating speed; where they exist at all, it’s in conjunction with some type of graphical analog-type display. And that’s for very valid and safety-related ergonomic reasons.
True, though on the other hand, I’m not sure the analog tach provides anything beyond what I can hear already (I drove a 4-speed manual without a tach for a long time and did just fine). The speedometer, too–yeah, I can see my speed at a glance to within 5 mph. But I already know my speed to within 5 mph just by looking at the road. I care more about driving exactly the speed limit and for that the digital display is superior.
Many people in this thread, who drive every day, presumably, disagree. Including me. I only look at the digital. If it were a heads-up display, it would be perfect.
That’s not true, BTW. My 2018 car has only a numeric speed indicator, with no dial-like or sliding indicator at all. There’s no evidence of it being unsafe at all.
FTR, there’s no such thing as “MP3 quality”. The quality depends entirely on the sampling rate. At 320 kbps or above, you’re getting quality at least the same or better than a CD.
They also reproduce high frequencies “better”, sometimes altogether too well, which is why CDs often a have a harsh sound compared to vinyl. A lot depends on how well engineers mix and equalize the audio. Vinyl tended to be equalized with some of its limitations in mind, which in some cases, for some source material, actually gives it a more pleasing sound. As I’ve pointed out numerous times – and contrary to the proclamations of some “experts” – CDs are far from perfect – high-bandwidth digital like the newer Dolby Digital formats totally blow CDs out of the water. Some people just prefer the imperfections of vinyl more than the imperfections of CDs, but again, it depends on the source material and how it’s been engineered.
I believe you but I’ve never seen that in newer models. Where numerical displays exist at all for speed, they’ve always been accompanied by an analog display. I’ve rented a number of almost brand-new cars in recent years and most of them had no numerical display at all.
Are you kidding? How old are you? Do you even hear 20K hz?
The bit rate of a CD is 1411 kbps. So 320 kbps mp3 isn’t “better than” (HA!) a CD. NO lossy compression format is “better than” a CD. And no one, especially no experts, ever said, in the history of the world, that CDs were perfect. But it does seem there are many that claim vinyl is.
FYI vinyl is biased and equalized and mixed for the medium as well. A vinyl pressing is NOT the master tape,
I just want to say that CD is an incredible format - possibly one of the greatest format inventions in history (aside from the formats that allowed for something to be recorded for the first time such as the cylinder record). Something that has the equivalent 700mb of digital storage in 1979 (when the CD was invented) was an insane amount of storage. To put that into context, in 1980, Seagate introduced a new hard drive with much fanfare which cost $1,500. It held 5mb.
Because of its massive capacity the data was encoded in such a way that extra digits could be added forcing 1 and 0s to be bunched into particular ways which meant that if a laser missed the odd digit the chips would be able to work out what data was missed and fill in the gaps - which meant minor scratches didn’t affect the output.
Also the conversion mathematics for analogue to digital and vice versa is a little over my head but works in such a clever way as to force the signal coming out of the CD to be 100% certainly identical to the analogue signal that was put in. i.e. you don’t get a wav form that is made of straight lines, you get the same curve as you recorded on to it and it’s mathematically guaranteed to be the same curve. I wish I could find a cite for this…
That’s the Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem. It depends on some factors which aren’t quite true for real-world equipment, but it’s nevertheless a good approximation. Signals up to very nearly half the sample rate (44,100 Hz for CDs) are reconstructed almost perfectly. Much, much, better than you might anticipate: a signal at 18,000 Hz is only getting a handful of samples per wave, which looks rough compared to the perfect sine wave that you expect, but after the reconstruction step it’s basically perfect.
