Vinyl, compact disc or mpc

[half diminished]

Just wondered, vinyl or CD?

Which do you find best, which do you listen too most

 

[Mamos]

I do have quite a few CDs but I usually convert them to MP3 so I can listen to them in more situations

mamos

 

[Chris98]

What's vinyl?

Hi Ian,

What's vinyl?

I'm of the CD generation, well I remember tapes but all the music I have ever bought was on CD, and then came iTunes from which I buy a few tracks if I'm not keen on the rest of the album other wise I'll get the CD by choice.

All the best,

Chris

 

[old git]

Surely it depends on what playback system you use. Wallace and Grommit have a wonderful turntable inside their A35 van but I've never found a way of ensuring satisfactory performance when moving, yet.

Vinyl needs a considerable outlay to recover the information available. Linn Sondeck or something similarly pricey, one of those exquisite, hand carved Japanese moving coil cartridges and a Williamson amplifier, if you can get valves and transformers, or something equally exotic. Vinyl came in the usual, half speed and direct cut forms. YC has a direct cut of mine at the moment but has been told that if he scratches it, his pensionable years are zero.

Similar priced gear is available for CDs and worth it.

Not sure if someone has brought out some super MP3 playback system but if you are old enough, take yourself back to the small transistor radio/early pirate radio days and how you convinced yourself that amplitude modulated radio and those tiny speakers provided a cheerful and usable sound. Funny thing is if you put them in the next room or corridor, they sounded even better.

If you're happy with what you've got, no problems. If you want to help Gordon with his 'spend your way out of recession' policy, make your way to the most expensive high fidelity shop.

Me? I use all forms.

 

[Jules]

CDs, out of pure practicality- I've always loved the idea of vinyl, but scratches, dust, warps, the amount of space they take up etc tend to outweigh the romance.... MP3, not really assimilated the 'download culture' yet.....

 

[half diminished]

Hi Ian,

What's vinyl?

I'm of the CD generation, well I remember tapes but all the music I have ever bought was on CD, and then came iTunes from which I buy a few tracks if I'm not keen on the rest of the album other wise I'll get the CD by choice.

All the best,

Chris

Oh the innocence of youth! Trouble with you youngsters today.........

Surely it depends on what playback system you use. Wallace and Grommit have a wonderful turntable inside their A35 van but I've never found a way of ensuring satisfactory performance when moving, yet.

Vinyl needs a considerable outlay to recover the information available. Linn Sondeck or something similarly pricey, one of those exquisite, hand carved Japanese moving coil cartridges and a Williamson amplifier, if you can get valves and transformers, or something equally exotic. Vinyl came in the usual, half speed and direct cut forms. YC has a direct cut of mine at the moment but has been told that if he scratches it, his pensionable years are zero.

Similar priced gear is available for CDs and worth it.

Not sure if someone has brought out some super MP3 playback system but if you are old enough, take yourself back to the small transistor radio/early pirate radio days and how you convinced yourself that amplitude modulated radio and those tiny speakers provided a cheerful and usable sound. Funny thing is if you put them in the next room or corridor, they sounded even better.

If you're happy with what you've got, no problems. If you want to help Gordon with his 'spend your way out of recession' policy, make your way to the most expensive high fidelity shop.

Me? I use all forms.

You seem to have made some assumptions here old git. I have no problem in people using whatever and in my experience, a cheap record deck and poor quality vinyl thats not been looked after is way inferior to even a modest CD system.

However you don't need to spend a fortune nor run half-speed mastered vinyl to get great sound from vinyl.

MP3 is heavily compressed so you are on to a loser before you start but then I do love my iPod which along with the Mac/iTunes gets the most use here.

I do love vinyl though, not just the sound quality (and I do have a great deck) but the whole experience.

Anyway, just off to oil the old penny farthing as I'm off for a ride later.

CDs, out of pure practicality- I've always loved the idea of vinyl, but scratches, dust, warps, the amount of space they take up etc tend to outweigh the romance.... MP3, not really assimilated the 'download culture' yet.....

A good vinyl set up and a cleaned record - you barely hear any pops or crackles and most of the better decks cope well with warped vinyl through clamps of one kind or another. Or you can just look after them - none of my vinyl is scratched.

 

[Lloyd]

Vinyl needs a considerable outlay to recover the information available. Linn Sondeck or something similarly pricey, one of those exquisite, hand carved Japanese moving coil cartridges and a Williamson amplifier, if you can get valves and transformers, or something equally exotic.

You don't need to spend a fortune to get a good deck. I bought my Rega Planer 3 about 20 years ago for around £150 and it still produces a really nice sound along with Audio Monitor speakers and Arcam CD & amp. I have doubled up much of my vynil with CDs and/or MP3, which I use most frequently due to convenience rather than sound, but I still like to pull out some old records.

 

[Taz]

I have to say that for ease of use, I mainly listen and practice to mp3's. I've set up play lists to practice to depending on what mood I'm in. For mood and emotion then its got to be vinyl.

 

[kreggurree]

I am just about old enough for vinyl to exist in my world, though I only started buying my own music when it was all cd's cd's cd's, so i am mainly CD but recently I got a small amount of vinyl and a cheap player which exploded upon my return to the uk so i have no player at the moment.

I quite like that you can get a lot of old Jazz vinyl second hand.

 

[Justin Chune]

I have quite a collection of vinyl. An elderly lady gave me her Hi-Fi system when she downsized her home. Back in the 70s she and her husband used to host musical evenings. She gave me her record collection of mostly classical music with it.

The equipment consists of a Thorens turntable, a Quad amp and two tall Tannoy speakers in teak cases. I bought a cheap Duke Ellington album from a market trader and played that. When Johny Hodges played "A Prelude To A Kiss" it was as if he was present. Cd's are so much more convenient and that's what I listen to most of the time.

 

[Sloth]

I got a nice turntable a few years ago and scouted the local car boot in Brighton regularly for old vinyl, which comes up lovely with a bit of a rub in soapy water. At car boot prices you can afford to take chances, and you can get a few good surprises!

You can't beat MP3 for convenience though.

 

[Jules]

I got a nice turntable a few years ago and scouted the local car boot in Brighton regularly for old vinyl, which comes up lovely with a bit of a rub in soapy water. At car boot prices you can afford to take chances, and you can get a few good surprises!

You can't beat MP3 for convenience though.

you've probably got my old vinyl colleciton if you frequented the late, much lamented brighton station bootsale!

 

[old git]

Just as a warning to anyone who cares to disagree with me, Alleyn's the school with the Swine Flu in Dulwich, is where I spent many junior and senior happy years. So don't upset me or I'll turn up in my sombrero and sneeze all over you.
Also note that YC was married in the School Chapel, so he's lethal too.

 

[Sloth]

you've probably got my old vinyl colleciton if you frequented the late, much lamented brighton station bootsale!

That's the first I've heard of it, it wasn't the same after the car park was tarted up and it was all hemmed in - but now its gone? Those traders must have gone somewhere. Mind you I'm about three miles away now so it's not such a gentle stroll!

 

[Justin Chune]

How about a line of sombreros with "KISS MS QUICK" written on them. Would they sell? I still have lots of cassettes around. A friend of mine recorded every edition of the BBC's Dance Band Days on cassettes, and I inherited them. Those are long gone now though.

Jim.

 

[TomMapfumo]

I have a 1000 plus record collection, and about 850 CD's at present.
As I have a high quality Linn/Naim system I listen to both regularly. Both turntable set-up (Linn LP12/Aro/Lyra Lydian MC/Armageddon) and CD player (Naim CD2) cost more than my Selmer Ref54 Alto, so use them both when I can. Use different set-up in my music room which is CD only - for playing backing tracks etc.

Tom

 

[old git]

Lloyd,

Cast your mind back to the normal price of reasonable turntables when you bought your Rega. Pioneer 12, Sansui et al were around half the price of a Rega. Even my ERA 6X/SME2009, obviously invented before its time, (wonder if McFly brought it back), was around your Rega price. Still can't afford a Planar, my only luxury these days is a moving coil cartridge and even that is ancient.

Ian,

Please remember that most of my posts are meant to be semi-humorous. The praise for the cigarette sized transistor radio in the other room is one of the mysteries of psycho-acoustics but it is surprising how the brain will reproduce missing frequencies.

Half speed cut vinyl can be as good as CD quality but direct cuts, where the record was recorded live directly into the cutting head with no editing, are something else. See if you can get hold of Thelma Houston's 'Ive got the music in me' or the 'Harry James big band' and see what vinyl can really do. The only problem is wear but that was also the drawback with tape and they are even worries about the stability of CDs, so the chances of even flash memory in its varied forms are suspect.

 

[Young Col]

What I listen to most are CDs because they are convenient and with anything modern, that's all you can get (mp3 is far too fiddly for me, except for a few downloaded CD tracks that I have on my mobile phone player). But I still have a lot of vinyl that I listen to sometimes. Some I don't have on CD (like a cracking Zoot Sims and Count Basie LP) but others are part of my life and I treasure them - the order of tracks sticks with me and if I hear a modern CD compilation in a different order to my vinyl one it just doesn't sound right!

OG - I was looking after your Harry James direct cut LP very carefully but I was just putting the stylus down on it when I read your post about what you would do if I damaged it and I was so shocked that I dropped it. It's only a small scratch - hardly shows out of sunlight.

 

[old git]

YC,
Don't worry, the drummer on it was rubbish, so who will notice?

 

[half diminished]

Lloyd,

Ian,


Half speed cut vinyl can be as good as CD quality

Hm, it's that way round huh

Well I'm 50 next year and I reckon high on my 50th birthday pressie list will be a Michell Gryodec or maybe even and Orbe. Vinyl still does it for me in the outright sound quality stakes.