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-- Vinyls vs. CDs
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lol, u closing this thread now?

am i blind or something? i still see no "factual evidence"...

quote:

Originally posted by TranceGeek am i blind or something? i still see no "factual evidence"...

i dont think there ever will be any, not as far as these forums are concerned

Okay, I've been reading up quite a bit in the last few hours and that includes the linked thread above.

First off, Trancegeek, you state that vinyl is 92KHz, but this is incorrect. 92KHz refers to a sampling rate, which only digital sources have. An analog source has no sampling rate because it is in an original wave form.

This argument is basically, which is a better medium, vinyl or cd. The problem with this arguement is that no one ever defines what "better" is. My idea of better is obviously different than trancegeek's, as shown in all of our posts on this thread and various others.

I believe that Trancegeek is defining better as the medium which has the better capability of reproducing the original source, at this moment in time. Please correct me if I am wrong.

I define better as a collection of convenience, storage requirements, cost, longevity, and future capability in addition to future potential markets.

Given that I have not misinterperated Trancegeek's definition of "better" I still belive that cds are better, according to my definition. We are both correct though, given each of our definitions.

Currently, vinyl does have the ability to reproduce sound better than CD, but it does not have the longevity that CD does. That cannot be argued. CDs are sampled at 44.1KHz, and therefore lose some quality. Believe it or not, the quality loss is not as great as you think, though! To understand why, you first have to understand what a digital sound is, and how it gets to be a digital sound and what happens to it after it is read by the source (cd-player etc). But I shall touch on this in a minute.

The problem with vinyl is fidelity. Fidelity is the the degree to which an electronic system accurately reproduces the sound or image of its input signal(www.dictionary.com). The key words here are "electronic system". This problem is due to the fact each and every time you run the needle through the groove, the needle melts the groove as it passes by. Any dust, smoke or other air particles that are in the way, will then fuse to your record and become part of the surface as it quickly cools. There isn't any point in dictating an exact number of times that you can play the record and notice the quality different. There are too many variables.

First off, if you are in your bedroom, with a computer, dj equip, stereo equip etc, the items in the room have a negative charge due to all of the current running through them. This negative charge will attract dust particles, smoke etc because most of that stuff is positively charged. This is how ionic air purifiers and swiffer works! In clubs, you have a LOT of smoke, a huge amount of dust and other debris floating around. So, no matter where you spin, you are subjecting yourself to an atmosphere which is riddled with the very things that will destroy your records the fastest.

Secondly, even if you manage to keep your records spotless, you still cannot change the fact that you are melting your record groove every time you play the record. (To learn how to preserve your vinyl the best, click here ). This format will inately loose its fidelity over time, making it inferior to any medium that will not loose its fidelity.

Thirdly, there are two more things to consider--that of frequency range and of dynamic range. Frequency range is the difference between the highest pitch and the lowest pitch, which the audio medium is capable of handling. This is typically 20Hz-20,000Hz for most electronics. So can vinyl handle more? Yes, I think that it can, but I cannot confirm that. But, does it matter that vinyl can hold more? Maybe not, and that depends what mixer and what stereo system you have. There are some mixers that only have a master output of 20Hz-20,000Hz. In fact, the vast majority of cheap to decent mixers have this--and even some good ones. There are several other high end mixers made by Rane TTM 56 ( 10Hz-30,000Hz) and Allen & Heath Xone 464 (20Hz-40,000Hz), though if you spin vinyl, how does your mixer stand up? Is your signal degraded from the original source when it leaves your mixer? Chances are, you are eliminating an advantage of vinyl here. The human ear also has to be considered as well as the rest of your system. Does the signal get clipped as it leaves your reciever, your amplifier or your speakers? If not, then surely, you have spent quite a bit of money. Then you have to be able to hear it accurately, which no human can hear up to 40,000Hz anyway, and you can't "feel" that frequency like you can the lower ones.

Another interesting thing is that digital signals flow easier through wires than analog signals because the signal is much more organized and coherent.

So what about dynamic range? Dynamic range is the difference between the loudest sound and the softest silence. Vinyl has the advantage here too.

How much do all of these advantages of vinyl really matter? Some of that is up to personal preference of how you like to hear your music. To a degree it is not subjective though. It has to be enough to outweigh all of the other advantages of CDs, which I will get into later in this post.

So we are back to the DAC/ADC (Digital-to-analog converter/Analog to Digital Converter). There are two important concepts in digital audio. The sampling rate, which controls how many samples are taken per second, and the sampling precision, which controls how many possible different gradations (or quanitizations) are allowed. The sampling rate standard for normal CDs is 44.1KHz, or 44,100 samples taken every second. The sampling precision standard for cds is currently 16-bit, which means that there are 2^16th or 65536 possible quantizations per sample taken. Is this a lot? Well, compared to vinyl it is not really all that good if you are an audiophile. But that is not the end of it. That just covers the conversion of the data to a digital source. You cannot hear a digital signal, so it must be converted back to an analog signal.

To get the digital signal back to an analog signal, it must go through a DAC. The converter relies on noise shaping, a phenomenon that takes advantage of the human ear's inability to notice noise when it occurs in higher frequencies. Basically, the human ear is most sensitive to noise at 5 KHz, and is almost unable to detect it at 20 KHz. A key part of the converter is a circuit called a delta-sigma modulator, which takes the binary signal (1s and 0s) from the CD and changes them to a steady pulse, called a pulse train. The pulse train contains an average of the change in the amount of energey represented in the sample. A low-pass filter removes all time-domain information and recovers only the average energy of the pulse train that feeds it. The key here is to understand that the pulse-train waveform is clocked at a very high frequency compared to the 44.1 KHz sample rate. The pulse train is sent through the DAC and changed into an analog signal. Because of this, the digital signal is smoothed out and retains quite a bit of the original analog quality.

The delta-sigma circuit has two main sections:

Delta receives the incoming digital signal and monitors the outgoing pulse train. It creates an error signal, which is based on the difference between the binary signal coming in and the pulse train going out.
Sigma adds up the results of the error signal created by delta and supplies this sum to the low-pass filter.
The error signal is used by the low-pass filter to average the analog signal. Basically, this means that minute adjustments are made to the analog signal to compensate for the differences between the binary signal and the pulse train.
click here if you want to read a very in-depth article about how the 1-bit DAC works.

So this helps put CDs back up to par with vinyl.

Still, it seems like vinyl is kicking some CD-ass. But for one, the fact that a CD signal will never degrade, they are cheap to make copies of, and are more tolerant of storage conditions definetely help put CDs back up on par with vinyl. In addition, you also have to remember that after a while, the quality advantage that vinyl has at the moment, WILL degrade to quality much worse than a CD.

Again, this isn't the end of the story. There are two other audio formats, DVD and SACD that need to be discussed. Remember, vinyl has been around since 1878 when Thomas Edison made his first recording on a tin cylinder. CDs have only had about 25 years to advance in technology.

DVD audio is very similar to normal CD audio, except that it's sampling rate is 192KHz, which is the industry standard for recording. And has a 24-bit rate, which is also the industry standard. Before discussing SACD, remember, that even if vinyl has the capability of handling more than DVD audio has to offer, it is killed at the very source of the recording, and so for any medium, 192KHz and 24-bit is currently the best RECORDED audio that you can possible have. It is moot to argue any other capability other than what the best RECORDED source can possibly be.

Next we have SACD, which stands for Super Audio Compact Disc. This format encodes music at an astonishing 2,822,400 samples per second, a frequency responce of 100KHz (as opposed to 20KHz of CD) and a dynamic range of 120dB The bit rate is now meaningless because Sony has codeveloped a new ADC/DAC called Direct Stream Digital® encoding. You can read more about it here .

This clearly engulfs even the recording standard. It allows for the next standard to exist at peace with even the most thick-headed audiophile. It far surpasses vinyl and normal CDs both.

Part of my definition of "better" is that the cd format has future capability and future potential markets. The capability is right here in SACDs, which ARE currently on the market, though exist limitedly until people have the need to replace the normal cd player that they have now. The market also involves NOT having to replace your entire music collection too. This is one of the main reasons MD flopped big-time! After a dj builds up his music collection, be it vinyl or cd, that dj wants the music to last him his career as a dj.

Can vinyl do this? In short, no. It will degrage with time, and there is no real market for vinyl outside of djs and audiophiles. That may be a decent sized market, but you cannot deny that MOST music (percentage-wise) is pressed onto cd today. You have to take the entire music industry into perspective at this point, not just trance or techno etc. People own cds. People who like trance own dj-mixed cds etc etc etc. The market for vinyl will slowly fade as those djs who use nothing but vinyl now slowly get older and more and more music is pressed onto cd and not vinyl. The fact that vinyl will slowly fade out is because of the market and because superior sounding audio is knocking on our doors.

You only have to wait for more music to be pressed onto SACDs, which most players are backwards compatable, in addition to being able to store normal 44.1KHz CD audio on the same SACD so that any cd player can read it. Sony knows about what it takes to make a market now because it flopped so big-time with MDs.

In short, CD is where it is at. MP3s are a fad that will wear out when pirating music is finally delt with. (SACDs also have watermarks for piracy concerns). NEW vinyl may have the slight advantage today, but tomorrow is coming very soon. Will you be able to transition your music collection easily to the new formats?

Please people, I spent several hours researching this. PLEASE put an end to this year-long arguement!!!

thank you very much for finally putting an end to this old argument
i think a mod should place this thread as a sticky at the top
possibly even close it?
just have it there for information purposes
so this arguement isn't replicated in the future

yeah i agree. slap it up there to refer back to when needs be

flesh, we were discussing vinyl vs. CD, so do not bring SACDs into this discussion please? thanks you...

ok now, you went into a lot of detail describing the down sides of vinyl records, but never once have you mentioned the down sides of CDs, good job dude!

digital sound can't be better than analogue, its as simple as that... just look at the wave and how it is translated from analogue to digital!! do you even know how its done? that alone is enough to prove that analogue is better...

ok next, i believe you have indeed misinterpretted my definition of better... we weren't talking about storage and size and whatever you said, but we talked about the quality of sound!!

ok next again... you just kept on talking about the production of music and how its all digital already... but thats not correct, only a small percentage of tracks are actually made simply using a computer... all other tracks are produced using standard equipment, ie. beat machines, synthesizers and so on... so that sound that is pressed on vinyl is analogue, and its reproduced in analogue too... you mentioned mixers and amps... dude, they still amplify the ANALOGUE sound, they are not converters into digital!!

lol

Re: vinyl records vs cds

quote:

Originally posted by annon185 what's better (DJwise that is....)?

Trancegeek, the topic of this discussion is what is better DJ-wise. That means the entire spectrum of qualities, not just sound quality.

quote:

Originally posted by Dj Flesch Currently, vinyl does have the ability to reproduce sound better than CD, but it does not have the longevity that CD does.

Dj Flesch agreed with you, vinyl offers better sound quality over conventional CDs. There is a big BUT however. The sound quality of vinyl degrade over use. Vinyl scratches easily and importantly collects dust all of which makes the sound quality worse than CD through time. I can spin my CD for years and it will have the same quality. Can you say the same for your vinyl? I like to see a vinyl dj tell me vinyls are better when their vinyls are crackling and popping, scratching and skipping. While my CD sounds as good as the day I bought it.

Another important point Dj Flesch brought up is practically and relevance. Theoretically analog sound will always sound better. I agree. Is that a valid support for vinyl? No. The differences between digital sampling and a true analog wave is so small the human ear can not distinguish one from the other. If you or your audience can't hear the difference, why should it matter?

Stop talking theory and talk about applicability in a real world environment.

well we weren't discussing whats better dj-wise in our last thread, did we? and you guys brought it up...

oh well, at least you finally admited that vinyl reproduces better sound than CD...

i rest my case

thank you all

Currently, vinyl does have the ability to reproduce sound negligibly better than CD, but it does not have the longevity that CD does.

I'll live with that statement.

quote:

Originally posted by TranceGeek flesh, we were discussing vinyl vs. CD, so do not bring SACDs into this discussion please? thanks you... ok now, you went into a lot of detail describing the down sides of vinyl records, but never once have you mentioned the down sides of CDs, good job dude!

Good god, why do I even try. Man, most of the problems that you have with my post are fully explained IN that post. You obviously didn't read it very well. But I shall, again, go through your concerns.

You're right, we were discussing Vinyl versus CD, and I did just that. Guess what, you win, vinyl CAN infact reproduce a sound that is of better quality than a CD. But my main point is that it cannot do this forever! A CD's quality will never degrade, whereas vinyl's will. It was only at the end that I validated purchasing CDs because they will be backwards compatible with the next generation of high quality audio players. Vinyl will not, so if you want to take advantage of higher quality audio in the future, you cannot simply exchange your decks with new ones, you have to always have and maintain TTs and vinyl to play any of the records that you have now. I did infact list many of the downsides of cds. In fact, if you would have read the post, you would have seen that cds aren't quite as good as vinyl in most of the respects of quality that I touched on. But to me, not slowly erasing my music is the most important.

quote:

digital sound can't be better than analogue, its as simple as that... just look at the wave and how it is translated from analogue to digital!! do you even know how its done? that alone is enough to prove that analogue is better...

First off, you can only hear analog sound. A digital signal is ALWAYS converted into an analog signal before it is sent to the speakers. But I'll assume that you are refering to a signal that was converted into digital at one time.
Again, no where in my post did I ever say that (today's) digital sound was BETTER than analog. Please quote me on that if you want to prove me wrong. I simply say that (today's) CDs APPROACH analog sound decently, and that the next generation of cds will surpass the current RECORDING standard. It is true that you CAN record all of your samples etc through analog machines, but in the end, this is moot because it is more than likely, practically converted to digital for editing purposes anyway. Do you really think that the producers don't edit their samples and tracks etc before they release it? Even if some don't, I feel that I can safely say that the vast majority do. I can't prove it, but you can't refute it with numbers either, so let's just drop it.

In any event, you are changing the argument away from cd versus vinyl to digital versus analog. That is not even an arguement. Analog is better, but what IS debatable is the ability to reproduce that analog signal with more presicsion and more accuracy. CDs can maintain both at a constant level, while vinyl slowly deteriorates. As far as your implications that I don't know how a sound is converted to digital or from digital to analog...well, man, you're making yourself look like an idiot for either not reading my post, or not understanding it. I went into very precice detail and provided an even more precice explaination via the link I provided on how a digital sound is made and how it is converted into analog.

quote:

ok next, i believe you have indeed misinterpretted my definition of better... we weren't talking about storage and size and whatever you said, but we talked about the quality of sound!!

Again with mixing up your definition? If I interperate your definition from your statement just above "we talked about the quality of sound". I did no such thing because I defined YOUR definition of better to be "the medium which has the better capability of reproducing the original source, at this moment in time." Is this not what you are arguing? Good, because according to your definition, of better, you won the arguement. The rest of my post was discussion what my definition of better was all about. Again, reread the damn post, man.

quote:

ok next again... you just kept on talking about the production of music and how its all digital already... but thats not correct, only a small percentage of tracks are actually made simply using a computer... all other tracks are produced using standard equipment, ie. beat machines, synthesizers and so on... so that sound that is pressed on vinyl is analogue, and its reproduced in analogue too... you mentioned mixers and amps... dude, they still amplify the ANALOGUE sound, they are not converters into digital!!

First of all, you cannot state that "all other tracks are produced using standard equipment...so that sound that is pressed on vinyl is analogue" without backing it up with evidence. Do you descide how everyone is to record their music? Until you do, don't try to use numbers to make a weak argument stronger.
And as far as my equipment discusison, again, (not to sound like a repeating record:stongue but reread what I said. I said that you can LIMIT the quality differences between a digital and analog signal. I never implied that you are changing the signal from analog to digital or vise versa. For example, I stated that vinyl has a frequency range outside of 20Hz-20,000Hz. If your needle (ortofon nightclub E's only have 20Hz-22,000Hz frequency range), mixer(Pioneer DJM-600 only has 20Hz-20,000Hz), amp or speakers can't process or reproduce a frequency on your record, then it is eliminated by the time the sound reaches your ears. Period.

There are several mixers that CAN reproduce more frequency range as listed per my original post, and ortofon does make needles that can reproduce 5hz-80,000Hz, but again, as per my original post, what is the limiting factor in your system? You'll only get the maximum quality out of a record if the limiting part of your system IS the record.

game
set
match

trancegeek
if you're going to try to prove a point
try to use some examples and such

lol..... this is gonna go on forever...........

really it is too funny to watch all you people get freaked out about this. who gives a shit whether a dj is using CDs or vinyl, so long as they have real talent and skill, and their mixing sounds good?? both media have their good and bad points and there's absolutely NO POINT in everybody flaming each other over an old argument like this...

personally though i have to say i prefer vinyl. first of all i like to have the precision of being able to touch what i'm mixing. second i find that vinyl has a warmer, more booming sound than CDs do, but thats just my opinion. for me its a far more personal medium and thats why i like it more than cds. but i would have no objection to mixing with cds if i had to use cdj's for some reason. so i say to all the zealots: GET A LIFE!!!

the feeling is way better with vinyls

hmmm

just spin cds. leave the vinyl spinning to big djs like tiesto and digweed.

Re: hmmm

quote:

Originally posted by Aldrian just spin cds. leave the vinyl spinning to big djs like tiesto and digweed.

WHY?

Trancegeek, why do you find it so hard to realise CD's have better sound quality?

vinyl rules

best quality

i just love vinyls cos i like to support the artists that i like, and i can only do that by purchasing theyr vinyl, i feel that im kicking the artists ass when i burn cds, but in most cases i have no choice, cos i cant get a grip at all the tracks i want on vinyl, cos i depand on those three-four vinyl stores here in IL, oh, and also, djing with vinyls is much more accurate IMO, and i dont really give a shit bout the quality of analogue vs. digital, cos its really dont make much different in a party, i just like to know that i have an ORIGINAL tune, and not ripped, just knowing that makes me wanna buy the vinyl... all this nonsense bout quality is really not necesery, cos i dont think that anyone of the clubbers give a shit... oh, and if pvd can use cds, then so can i...

quote:

Originally posted by Vortex_SA oh, and if pvd can use cds, then so can i...

heh

I agree with Vortex_S, and eversince i got my tables i started to support the artists by buying cds(Something that i couldn't see myself doing).

vinyl -> shit

Vinyls are really making a sound that none of digital media can produce..BUT the ear after 44.100 doesnt feel the difference...so cd is better and in quality and in frequences because it straight from a studio mixer with none loss...even the head of the best vinyl player can take exactly the sound is on the surface on the cd...even the vinyl creator can in the same point as laser...and to see it by yourself...and fuck all the djs that is truth because the vinyl is better for mixing...and compare a track recored in a cd and a vinyl and dont say that the only prob in the vinyl is the volume...set your ears to dont hear only the "daba douba" but the quality and frequencies that u hear in the cd...of course u need monitor speakers to understand the difference in frequencies..if u have ass-speakers u hear the bass and u think is better sound..and isnt..its rubbish, think a little, the cds that comes from the company and had become a very good mastering in the tracks inside are state of art...

Re: vinyl -> shit

quote:

Originally posted by Spacer Vinyls are really making a sound that none of digital media can produce..BUT the ear after 44.100 doesnt feel the difference...so cd is better and in quality and in frequences because it straight from a studio mixer with none loss...even the head of the best vinyl player can take exactly the sound is on the surface on the cd...even the vinyl creator can in the same point as laser...and to see it by yourself...and fuck all the djs that is truth because the vinyl is better for mixing...and compare a track recored in a cd and a vinyl and dont say that the only prob in the vinyl is the volume...set your ears to dont hear only the "daba douba" but the quality and frequencies that u hear in the cd...of course u need monitor speakers to understand the difference in frequencies..if u have ass-speakers u hear the bass and u think is better sound..and isnt..its rubbish, think a little, the cds that comes from the company and had become a very good mastering in the tracks inside are state of art...

thats true, but vinyls are just more fun, i dont really understand what ur arguing about, the human ear cant really hear beyond 20000 hertz and cds and vynils have way more frequencies than that, so for the human ear it will sound the same, exept the crackles in vynils sometimes (and thats also depand on how clean the record is), so i belive that the only measurment for me is what is easier for me to mix, and what can i make with the machine, and with both i find pros and cons, and i belive that exept that there is no reason to argue bout what is better...

Off course vinyls have fun, and its the best for a dj because the dj feels that they rule, they "touch" the sound that in the club "takes" so many place, and about mixing is the best. The crackles is not a big problem, u can avoid them if u keep the record in a good condition and u poor liquid in the surface when it playing..Sure the ears cant be hear more but i hear the mp3s of rip teams,, all of them are shit when i hear a cd version of the same tracks..and this is the reason that vinyl is the best for a big places sound because of the high (treble) frequencies of a cd , would be created a chaotic atmosphere that a very little number of people would understand what they hear, the vinyl exports "club sound" but anyway u can eq the cd to export also mainly club sound.

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