[Closed] For the vinyl junkie, a new excuse to go shopping for your fix...

I used to be a vinyl junkie.

I grew up buying loads of vinyl, every Friday after work I would drive to Soundsville in Bristol and spend a couple of hours listening to the latest releases and white labels and always walked out with a carrier bag full of discs that i would go home and record to cassette to play in my car.

I have continued to buy vinyl but in dwindling amounts (only for obscure stuff that does not get a digital release).

I think it is a crap format though and I do not understand why there is a resurgence. Why listen to four or five tracks and then have to flip the disc when you can play digital files for eternity. I know there is a nostalgia thing and it there is the ritual of getting a record out of a sleeve and putting on the deck but that is where it ends.

I will never sell my record collection (which is huge) but I will probably never play most of them again. If a digital version is available then I would never consider buying vinyl (unless it was an investment like I have done for some of the early dubstep records when it was prudent to buy several copies).

Many audiofile types say they prefer the analogue sound that vinyl records produce to that produced by digital sources, be that CD or high res streaming, seems like a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, bandwagon jumping gits.

@eskay - Honestly, I agree with you completely, I stopped buying vinyl in 1982, after I had to return four copies of Peter Gabriel 4, due to the utter shite that was the pressing quality, background noise was intolerable. As I worked Saturdays in a HiFi retailer, I had access to the first CD players, and quality cassette decks, I bought the CD, again one of the first releases, recorded it onto Chrome tape, and used the disc for shop demos. I continued to buy two CD’s a month for around eighteen months, until I could afford a player, a Denon. I got staff discount, it retailed at £600...

Still, that said, any process that can effectively improve the dynamic range of vinyl, and improve pressing quality, while still being backwards compatible can only be a good thing in the face of streaming, with the truly shocking amount that artists get per stream being immoral.

i think there is a warmth to  vinyl that digital lacks - I have just resurrected my turntable after a decade or so without any ps . I still think most of the stuff I listen to sounds better on  vinyl its just warmer IMHO.

Terrible format. If you want to spend more time looking after your gear than you do actually playing the music, then fine, go right ahead.

Why listen to four or five tracks and then have to flip the disc

well - as you've had to stand up to do it - you've got an excuse to have a bit of a dance 🙂

I have a systemdek 1 turntable, bought it in 1991.

in that time ive had to set the arm up when i moved house a few times.

and replaced the stylus a couple of times, I put some ‘black gold’ grease in the bearing when i got it, its still running perfectly. I have allowed a few people to listen to the same track on lp and via a cheapish cd player on the same setup, 100% prefer the lp.

granted, we’re probably talking less than 20 people in total.

i prefer the sound of vinyl, by a mile.

but 99% of the time i use cd or digital download, it’s just (Lots) easier.

Isn't it a bit weird that vinyl is pushed for it's 'analogue' sound, but the production of these (and I'm guessing all modern records) will mean that the music will have to be converted to a digital format to make the presser to press the vinyl.

Unlike in the good old days, when the transfer was from tape.

Seems, almost pointless... however, one of the joys of vinyl albums is the artwork, the sleeves, the inner sleeves, the whole actual item.

Like CZ and eskay, I only buy special items on vinyl (not even "collectors items" or limited editions - I'm never going to sell them, so what's the point) - mainly because my storage options have just about run out 🙂

Really though "HD"? Higher Definition [i]sound[/i]?? Just for those who kid themselves they can hear the difference between a 192kbps mp3 and a CD. ie.. very limited.

"there’s no better time to start your own vinyl collection." if you have more money than sense.

@vinneyh - everything is recorded digitally nowadays, anyway, so every vinyl record produced now will already be in a digital format before it is engraved to the master for pressing the vinyl copies.

I used to buy vinyl when it was cheaper than a CD and I was a student - I could get 3 LPs for the price of  2CDs - but I gave it all away to Oxfam before a house move as I couldn't be bothered with the faff of storage.  All my CDs are now in the loft after ripping to lossless about 8 years ago!  Bulky formats don't really fit in to the digital world.

I think the word "collection" is pertinent here: you can show off what good taste you have by having a box of records.

And to those that think vinyl sounds better than digital - all digital recordings can be made to sound like vinyl just by altering the EQ and rolling the top end a bit.

I love the sound of vinyl.

Early CD's were awful, especially classic and acoustic music. They sound pretty good now, as do high quality files. Much deeper bass too, if you like that kind of thing. Love being able to hear a full classical piece without having to get out of the zone as well.

And as CZ said, 80's vinyl was awful but the new stuff is really, really good too. If it lasts as long as all of the 60's stuff then it should sound great for years.

It's all good these days.

It’s all good these days.

Exactly.  Personally I never bought into any other format, other than half a dozen cassettes and CDs I have no way of playing, so it's great that for the last few years most new releases are on vinyl (and decent quality vinyl compared to the 80s stuff)

Still have about 120 cassettes, mostly done by friends or from borrowed vinyl/cd. The odd charity shop, my fifth birthday party, my dad reading poetry, my mum laughing...

Had the same Sanyo tape player for 38 years and the speed has always been a bit off. Keep meaning to replace it, but....

Vinyl just effectively compresses the sound which makes it sound better on the majority of systems, plus the crosstalk is greater so it makes the imagery seem better. Noel Keywood, a hifi reviewer, make a box that applied these effects to a CD player output and it had the same effect.

This is just like what they do to radio to make it sound good in cars.

But you have the other issues like noise, quality of the vinyl, the fact a pivot-type tonearms are only in line with the grooves for a small part of the record, and all the other mechanical issues usch as resonance in the tonearm, quality of the tonearm pivot, transmission of motor noise to the cartridge, etc.

You talking about the new HD vinyl TurnerGuy?

I haven't got HD ears so I'll just carry on picking up records for 25p - £4 from the local record shop.

@vinneyh – everything is recorded digitally nowadays, anyway, so every vinyl record produced now will already be in a digital format before it is engraved to the master for pressing the vinyl copies.

There are still  bands/ labels/studios that use analogue only. i.e.

I echo a lot of the comments about crap vinyl and crap CD sound  from yesteryear.Old stuff was made to be listened to on records and crap CD remastering  did it no favours. I can clearly tell the difference between CD and MP3 quality on my  systems and even in my car stereo!  An equivalent priced CD player will deliver more accurate and in many people's view better sound that an equivalently priced  record player can especially with modern digitally recorded music.Factor in how the variable quality of a record pressing,degradation of the vinyl,needle and even slight imbalances in the cartridge weight,turntable speed etc can have a negative effect on the sound and it's clear  that CD is far more user friendly. Is the "warmth" of analogue records just inaccurate reproduction? MP3 more user friendly than CDs but oh how I wish a better quality format had gained such a dominant foothold.I imagine there are lots of people making music today that have been brought up on and only really listened to MP3 and mainly use digital stuff on their laptops and make their music accordingly for the MP3 ear.Sort of analagous with the transition from mono to stereo 😉

DezB, no, old skool vinyl.

And to those that think vinyl sounds better than digital – all digital recordings can be made to sound like vinyl just by altering the EQ and rolling the top end a bit.

Exactly, even using an app on a phone like the Onkyo HD player, which has an 11-stage EQ you could create a custom curve to replicate the sound of vinyl.

Early CD’s were awful, especially classic and acoustic music. They sound pretty good now, as do high quality files. Much deeper bass too, if you like that kind of thing. Love being able to hear a full classical piece without having to get out of the zone as well.

Thing is, early CD’s were mastered from stereo master tapes that had been EQ’d to press vinyl, and early CD players were built to correspond to the sort of music that the Japanese are used to, which has much higher frequencies, female vocals are higher pitched, and bass isn’t as prominent. It was Denon, Philips/Marantz and Rotel who built machines biased towards British HiFi tastes, and the realisation that CD’s had to be mastered from tapes EQ’d to take into account the wider dynamic range, where the compromises of grooves in plastic with a stylus having to negotiate it without skipping or jumping didn’t matter.