There isn't any. That's exactly point- once a format is established in the market, no-one bothers (understandably!) to market the format. There were probably niche markets for 78s and old mono LPs. "By crackey, them old shellac records sound more MUSICAL than these newfangled slow-motion black horrors those damn kids listen to these days!"
I guess I was responding to Copperwhozzit's comment that vinyl only survives because of marketing and since you jumped in countering my argument I assumed you felt the same way. He doesn't seem interested in responding so you became an opponent by default. 🙂
John
John
Good Grief! This thread moves fast.
Still... there is just something about the sound of good vinyl. It sounds more alive. Probably its imperfections that do that, but isn't life imperfect?
Which is interesting, because to me, the SET was a revelation. I'd never heard anything so detailed, so uncolored. I figure we have both heard a lot of different SET amps and have a fair basis to judge. I do find the good ones (they aren't all good) to be cleaner, clearer, more neutral than anything else.
I certainly agree that can be a factor. However - you know me - I go to a lot of audio shows and demos. In that case there is no inconvenience, ritual or risk for me, I never touch the disc. And yet I've heard vinyl sound as good or better than CD in those settings many times. The two systems can be very close.
Still... there is just something about the sound of good vinyl. It sounds more alive. Probably its imperfections that do that, but isn't life imperfect?
Could come down to the fact that you have speakers a SET is generally happy with and Stu doesn't?
Could be that good vinyl is continuous...digital is discontinuous.
dave
Nope. As Pano said, I've heard a lot of amp and speaker combos using SETs. To be honest, I never even tried to use an SET on my own speakers, they're totally inappropriate for that. Pano likes that particular coloration, I don't. I like cilantro, my wife doesn't.
Hmm. I'm looking at the output of my sound card. Looks pretty continuous to me, but admittedly I understand the function of a reconstruction filter and don't omit it.
That can have a lot to do with it, except that I believe SY has heard SET amps on high efficiency speakers well suited to the SET. We'll have to have him elaborate.
EDIT. Cross post with SY.
Maybe. And that might account for vinyl "fixing" some of the digititus.
The main thing that bugs me about the CD format is the stupid 44.1Khz sampling rate. Couldn't they have just left it at the standard 48Khz? Then there would have been no need at all for the downsampling from the pro recording formats. Downsampling has gotten a lot better over the years, but I always wonder if the rate conversion didn't do subtle, but audible, damage to all those CD masters for so many years.
Staying at 48Khz on the CD would have lost us what? Maybe 5 minutes on the disc?
Because to you, a high and variable source impedance (and consequent non-flat frequency response) and harmonic and intermodulation distortions well above audible thresholds mean "lack of coloration"? 😀 😛
😛
I'm with Pano here. The SET I heard for a short while in my own system had the least amount of coloration of the all the amplifiers I have ever heard. It nailed human voices. By "nailed" I mean, they sounded very real. Some of the singers I've heard live back home. The sounds the SET produced sounded like the real person's voice. It was amazing. So, IMO, they are definitely the least colored of all.
Anyway, this thread is about turntable v CD. I don't see it as a choice. I have both and enjoy both equally.
Anyway, this thread is about turntable v CD. I don't see it as a choice. I have both and enjoy both equally.
If your aural references are club PA systems then how do you determine what is coloration and what is not? There are some things a big push-pull amp can do better but there are things an SET amp can do better than push-pull especially when your references are non-amplified live performances. I don't care what a particular type of measurement indicates; it's not germane. The same thing goes for cd vs. vinyl.
John
John
If the output is significantly different than the input, it's colored. You may like the color, but it's colored. This is true not just for electronics, but data storage and replay (to get back to topic). One may like certain colorations, but colorations they are.
I'm not talking about hearing singers through PA systems. I'm talking about hearing them without a mic in front of them. That's what the SET produced.... the spoken words. And no other amp has come even close. I'm guessing a lot of people haven't heard such sound and therefore dismiss it as being impossible because their measurements don't justify it.
How does this post relate to our topic? The recording of the same singer played through the SET was on CD (although not the same performance I heard live). Believe it or not, this amount of detail (or realism) was on a recording. Singers can sound real. But that doesn't mean I don't enjoy vinyl. There's a lot of good music on vinyl and it can be extracted using a properly set up playback system.
How does this post relate to our topic? The recording of the same singer played through the SET was on CD (although not the same performance I heard live). Believe it or not, this amount of detail (or realism) was on a recording. Singers can sound real. But that doesn't mean I don't enjoy vinyl. There's a lot of good music on vinyl and it can be extracted using a properly set up playback system.
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But SY, what if we are measuring the wrong things? What if the colorations you talk about are not important to me? Variations in frequency response there may be, but what if it doesn't matter to our brain. What matters, what makes it real and appealing and likeable is something quite different, something that we don't know how to measure yet? Could it be possible? Or are you going to stick with your belief that the earth is flat?
You cannot dismiss the experience and preference of different people from different parts of the world. There's got to be something there, right?
You cannot dismiss the experience and preference of different people from different parts of the world. There's got to be something there, right?
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I'm not sure how the shape of the earth got into this, but if you can't hear frequency response variations of several dB, your ears and brain aren't normal. If 10% intermod is transparent to you, your thresholds are abnormally high.
Put measurements aside- compare input to output by ear. That's the measure of audible coloration.
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