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Topic: LPs that actually do sound better? (Read 33489 times) previous topic - next topic
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LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #25 –
One of the few Lps that sounded better than CD - Kind of Blue....until the remastered and pitch corrected version came along.

Any of the Robin Trower's LPs I have sound better digitally (torrents are still legal in Canada)  than on the LP versions I own.

The best LP I have - the canadian (1st?) edition of the first Rolling Stones LP. Amazingly clean, well produced and sounding great.

The worst...too many to mention (tough to select, even if I only own about 2000.)


Quote
greatly reducing the higher frequencies


why would you do that? When I still ran my behringer deq 2496 for room correction, I had the RTA running all the time. There is on most CDs very little content compared to the total spectrum above 16kHz.

LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #26 –
I think the main reason to buy new Vinyl these days is for the albums that are brickwalled on CD only. There are plenty of them out there...

http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/

LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #27 –
Quote from: kraut on
One of the few Lps that sounded better than CD - Kind of Blue....until the remastered and pitch corrected version came along.


With so many CD releases of KoB, there's gotta be one or more which are lesser than an LP.  Now at least one CD remaster fell prey to the loudness war. Before that, some of the CDs used pre-emphasis, which could possibly lead to incorrect frequency response due to
- the studio's pre-emphasis circuit being slightly off mark (not uncommon!), and/or
- the consumer's de-emphasis cirquit being slightly off mark (absolutely not uncommon), and/or
- the consumer ripping to file and playing back without applying de-emphasis at all (who hasn't?), and/or
- the CD by mistake getting pre-emphasised signal, but not flagged in TOC/subchannel, and/or
- the CD getting the pre-emphasis flag, but by mistake the un-emph'ed signal.

(And it wouldn't even surprise me if some moron didn't know the difference between CD pre-emphasis and RIAA pre-emphasis and mistook the tapes.)
Memento: this is Hydrogenaudio. Do not assume good faith.

LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #28 –
Quote from: Brod on
I think the main reason to buy new Vinyl these days is for the albums that are brickwalled on CD only. There are plenty of them out there...

http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/

What is your definition of "brickwalled"? Usually this refers to a low-pass filter with a very sharp cutoff.

LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #30 –
I tend to distinguish between dynamic range compression and limiting. In this case are you referring to extreme dynamic range compression, or hard limiting? Just trying to understand your terminology.

Re: LPs that actually do sound better?

Reply #31 –
Sorry to resurrect an old thread but this topic is quite relevant to how I choose my music and on which format.  The whole debate on whether a particular album has been mastered better on vinyl or CD is somewhat subjective and opens a can of worms.  As others have pointed out, there can be different masterings on various LP releases and different masterings on various CDs of the same album.
Which is best?  There are so many variables, which album, which release, how does a particular mastering interact with your playback chain and room acoustics, what are your subjective preferences?  This is why there can never be a definitive best release of any LP or CD which satisfies everyone.

For example, one member here claimed that the original Beatles LP pressings sound better than later digital versions.  To my ears it is an album by album proposition.  I prefer the sound quality of the 2009 CD remasters of most of the later albums, the 1987 CDs for the White Album, Sgt Peppers and Abbey Road and LPs for the rest.  But even with the LPs, there are some albums I prefer the later 1978 blue box pressings over the original pressings and even the Japanese Red wax for others.

Another member expressed a view that the LP version of Supertramp’s Crime of the Century is the best sounding of this album.  To my ears, the best sounding is the MFSL CD version, even compared to the MFSL and Speakers Corner LPs.  The only problem with the CD is that it is mastered very quiet and can sound weaker than the LPs at normal volume.  But crank it up and it clearly is superior IMHO.

It is difficult to compare a digital recording with vinyl as they rarely are mastered the same way, even if the same masters are used.  However, given equal quality mastering CDs typically come out ahead, as every measure of fidelity says it should.  The closest comparison I can think of is Brothers in Arms below (for a digital master) and Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of  the Moon Japan Pro Use LP vs the early non TO Black Triangle CD as they used the same 15ips master tape.  Both are excellent but the CD comes out ahead if only because of better dynamics and consistency across the album, ie no IGD toward the end of the side of each LP.

The upshot of all this is that what is the best or better is very subjective to the individual and influenced by many variables apart from the actual mastering – excluding those CDs which are obviously squashed or LPs which are slightly off-centre of course.

The main mystery I have is why some people prefer the LP half speed cut versions of Dire Straits Brothers in Arms over the original CD when it was originally a 16 bit digital recording.  I have no doubt that those that do hear the LP as sounding better probably do, but surely in this case it has nothing to do with the recording or mastering.
 
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