Vinyl or stick with .FLAC library?

[Gimpymoo]

I already have a hifi setup with Monitor Audio, Bronze 2's.

Thinking of getting a turntable and a few vinyls to test the waters. However, the question is, is it worth it?

All my CD's are in .flac on my Plex server.

I see the cost of Vinyl has reached "silly" territory, CD's are peanuts. However, all relevant, I spend the same on computer games.

I "get it" that Vinyl is about the "experience" but overall, is it worthwhile if you want to sit there and "listen" to your music collection?

Feels like this Vinyl resurgence has made the snake oil peddlers come out of the woodwork after decades of being almost silenced.

 

[Sirrel Squirrel]

Depends if you like the sound of vinyl or not, it isn't technically better than a CD.

 

[Gimpymoo]

Depends if you like the sound of vinyl or not, it isn't technically better than a CD.

I agree.

To be honest, I cannot remember what Vinyl sounds like. I do find digital music to be "flat" if that is a thing.

 

[Sirrel Squirrel]

It's all subjective at the end of the day, I think many people say vinyl sounds 'warmer' but again all down to the person.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

If you don’t already have a bunch of vinyl, my opinion is no.
Some more thoughts:
- as already mentioned, CD has better technical specs of dynamic range and low end bass
- pretty much anything recorded in the last couple of decades will have been recorded in digital format. My assumption is that remasters of older albums are likely to have been conducted digitally
- cheap record decks really aren’t great. However, going up market results in the question of whether you’d have been better off using that cash on upgrading the digital side of things
- my experience with vinyl has included hearing decks where some sounded quite similar to CD and some quite different. That can IMO create a big issue with synergy with the amp(s) and speakers. I heard one system that sounded sublime playing vinyl, as that was how it was optimised, but ear piercingly unpleasant with CD
- have you tried hi def digital, eg 24 bit music? I’ve got around 400 hires albums now, and really do rate “some” of the recordings. I get most from HDtracks. Some say that it’s pointless. Doesn’t sound it to me. Related to that, Qobuz now have a good selection of hires to stream. Sure, that’s not free, but it’s cheaper than say a new record every month
- using a record deck does require a bit of effort, to both setup and use. Digital is far more WAF and child friendly

Having said all of the above, I do think that vinyl can sound amazing. I’ve previously owned an Linn LP12 and have heard some brill systems. So I’m not trying to say that it’s a poor medium, it’s not. However I do believe that it really needs a lot of effort and money to both use and source.
Me, I stepped away from vinyl in the early 90s and now run a decent digital only system.

If you just like the presentation style of vinyl, it’s also worth trying a valve amp in the replay chain, whether that’s at the source, pre or power area. I do think that they result in a smoother presentation style, vaguely akin to vinyl.

 

[mid_gen]

Main thing to bear in mind with vinyl is that it is ridiculously expensive. They are really killing the golden goose with the prices these days.

I still buy the odd record but it's usually obscure soul or world music that's sensibly priced, and not on CD anyway. Any new stuff I tend to buy on CD as you can usually get 3 albums for the price of an LP.

It's also a really good time to pick up second hand CDs, I occasionally buy a batch from music magpie or whenever, you can pay 1-2 quid for em.

I have a pretty good deck, Thorens TD160 with a Denon DL110 HOMC cart into a Rega Fono..... It's good, and different to CD for sure.... But my 20 year old CD player still puts a smile on my face when I pop an album on. I like both and depends what mood I'm in really.

 

[kitfit1]

Hi Fi is and always has been a minefield along with a potentially bottomless money pit. But let's get the question of the cost of LP's themselves out of the way first. I'm 66 years old and bought my first LP in 1974, the average cost of a new LP then was about £5. That same £5 then is worth £65 now, so in real terms LP's now days are less than half the price they were then. CD's were partly brought abought and became popular very quickly because the cost was much lower than LP's and the perceived quality of playback was better than LP's. It's therefore no surprise that CD's cost less than LP's nowdays, even second hand.
The reason that most people thought that quality of playback was better is because there is just one standard (Red Book) that all CD's must meet. There were no crackles and pops on playback and you didn't have to turn the CD over half way through an album.
Of course those of us that had good Vinyl replay systems back then never did have the same perceived quality issues and we still don't now. Why ? Because most people, both then and now, are very reluctant to put in the sort of money it takes on the hardware side to get the best sound out. That includes speakers, amp, CD deck, record Deck, phono stage, power source and yes, even the dreaded power leads and signal cables. That takes us back to potential bottomless money pit.
Now i'm no stranger to this money pit and i'll give you an example. Up until a couple of months ago i had a Naim CD5 XS powered by a Naim HiCap DR. I bought it in 2015 second hand and have always been over the moon with it. A friend and i went to a hifi shop just to have a look around and had a listen to a Hegel Viking CD player, i liked it a lot and asked to demo it at home. Once home i could compare it side to side with the Naim...........................it was a night and day moment. Once you hear something that good you just can't unhear it. Needless to say the Naim has now gone and the Hegel is sitting in it's place.
The same thing applies to record decks as well. At the age of 16 i had a Garrard SP25 MK4 that i thought at the time was the doggies danglies. It wasn't of course, but i didn't know anything better then and certainly couldn't afford anything better. My current deck is a Michell Orbe SE and has been for the last 25 years.
The cost of starting out on a Vinyl path really is not the cost of the Vinyl itself. The true cost is how much you are prepared to put into the hardware and just how far are you prepared to look down that money pit.

 

[mid_gen]

Hi Fi is and always has been a minefield along with a potentially bottomless money pit. But let's get the question of the cost of LP's themselves out of the way first. I'm 66 years old and bought my first LP in 1974, the average cost of a new LP then was about £5. That same £5 then is worth £65 now, so in real terms LP's now days are less than half the price they were then. CD's were partly brought abought and became popular very quickly because the cost was much lower than LP's and the perceived quality of playback was better than LP's. It's therefore no surprise that CD's cost less than LP's nowdays, even second hand.
The reason that most people thought that quality of playback was better is because there is just one standard (Red Book) that all CD's must meet. There were no crackles and pops on playback and you didn't have to turn the CD over half way through an album.

I've not problem with LPs being more than CDs.....but with the resurgence of vinyl, they've started taking the pee. Many new albums are £27+ and the shops are full of limited edition nonsense well over 30 quid a go. Going into a record shop and seeing a new album I want at £27 for the vanilla black LP, or £12 for the CD.....bearing in mind I've already got access to it on Tidal.....most of the time I will buy the CD.

Going back to the OP.....if you're looking at building a music collection. Right now you could made an absolutely amazing CD collection for peanuts, but a vinyl collection is going to be 10x the price.

My music collection is split though, my vinyl is mostly all soul, hip-hop, jazz, frequently pressing that don't make it to CD. My CD collection is mostly electronic and pop. I like that split, vinyl suits the more acoustic sounds, and electronic just sounds better on CD.

Of course those of us that had good Vinyl replay systems back then never did have the same perceived quality issues and we still don't now. Why ? Because most people, both then and now, are very reluctant to put in the sort of money it takes on the hardware side to get the best sound out. That includes speakers, amp, CD deck, record Deck, phono stage, power source and yes, even the dreaded power leads and signal cables. That takes us back to potential bottomless money pit.
Now i'm no stranger to this money pit and i'll give you an example. Up until a couple of months ago i had a Naim CD5 XS powered by a Naim HiCap DR. I bought it in 2015 second hand and have always been over the moon with it. A friend and i went to a hifi shop just to have a look around and had a listen to a Hegel Viking CD player, i liked it a lot and asked to demo it at home. Once home i could compare it side to side with the Naim...........................it was a night and day moment. Once you hear something that good you just can't unhear it. Needless to say the Naim has now gone and the Hegel is sitting in it's place.
The same thing applies to record decks as well. At the age of 16 i had a Garrard SP25 MK4 that i thought at the time was the doggies danglies. It wasn't of course, but i didn't know anything better then and certainly couldn't afford anything better. My current deck is a Michell Orbe SE and has been for the last 25 years.
The cost of starting out on a Vinyl path really is not the cost of the Vinyl itself. The true cost is how much you are prepared to put into the hardware and just how far are you prepared to look down that money pit.

There's a simple rule when it comes to the hifi money pit......don't audition what you don't want to spend. Of course you can spend ridiculous money, but you don't need to in order to enjoy your music, which is what it should be about.

 

[jpaul]

Isn't vinyl still mastered with a different higher dynamic range than the CDs/std streaming versions(compressed for typical user environment),
that's what I attribute it's better(too me) sound too, both, for older vinyl, and few vinyls I've bought in last 10 years quadrophenia&electricladyland , they are perhaps not representative though. (rega3)

However I've mostly succumbed to high res stuff on tidal , a good/convenient vinyl alternative though.

I did digitize(echo a2d) some vinyl in the time before tidal high-res which, although laborious, produced good results.

 

[Mcthommo]

I have got back into vinyl over the past few years and can honestly say I enjoy it. I got rid of all my cd's a number of years ago when my Cyrus 6CD player went bung- I had ripped them all into both FLAC and Apple lossless and I can stream to my system over network as well as using Tidal, Spotify, Apple Music etc.
My system is a Cambridge Audio Evo 150 with Neat Iota speakers,REL subwoofer and the ease of streaming is great and simple. The vinyl playback to me, sounds equally as good, maybe not as clinical or harsh as the digital, a touch warmer and the odd crackle but the tactile, hands on medium is, to me, satisfying and enjoyable. Yes the price of it has gone through the roof, but a lot of that is vinyl only releases, box sets etc. that for a true fan or collector is worth paying the extra maybe. If you have the urge to try, go for it. You dont have to spend thousands to enjoy, you can still use vinyl for digital as I rip a lot of my records via a Rega fono mini USB amp into Audacity and store on my network.
Just my opinion and as my wife reminds me that no one really listens to me anyway!!

 

[mid_gen]

One thing I am missing is a good Tidal solution. Does the app on LGTVs output hires over HDMI? I'm using optical to a cheapo DAC at the moment which I know is pants....but I rarely use it over my CD collection.

One reason I would like to upgrade my amp to something with an integrated DAC and tidal connect ideally.

 

[mid_gen]

Listening to this at the moment, impulse vinyl buy last week. Really good master and pressing, reminding me how good my setup is! I do love the ritual of putting a record on of an evening.

Aboogi, by Imarhan

11 track album

imarhan.bandcamp.com

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Isn't vinyl still mastered with a different higher dynamic range than the CDs/std streaming versions(compressed for typical user environment),
that's what I attribute it's better(too me) sound too, both, for older vinyl, and few vinyls I've bought in last 10 years quadrophenia&electricladyland , they are perhaps not representative though. (rega3)

However I've mostly succumbed to high res stuff on tidal , a good/convenient vinyl alternative though.

I did digitize(echo a2d) some vinyl in the time before tidal high-res which, although laborious, produced good results.

A very interesting point.
I believe that the "loudness wars" started in the 90s, with music being ever more heavily compressed.
Vintage (old) vinyl clearly was before that, and so doesn't have anything like as much. An interesting point being that a lot of earlier CDs also don't have it. The issue with CD being that the "remasters" post 2000 then promptly DID introduce it, completely stuffing up a lot of albums. I now tend to check on this site to get a better understanding of which album version to look for:

Album list - Dynamic Range DB

Luckily I bought a LOT of CDs back in the 80s and 90s, and thus have pre-mastered versions of much of my collection. For albums I buy now, I'll tend to look at that site and then hunt around in s/h shops and on Ebay.

Back to your question about vinyl, I have seen examples of new vinyl being released with better dynamic range than their digital equivalent, and THAT is definitely a bonus point for the new vinyl in question. What I have no idea about is how common that is, and as can be seen from the linked site, it's not uncommon for a single album to have multiple versions, with different mastering applied, regardless of format.
I don't think that there's an easy answer to this, only to be aware of the complexity and have the opportunity to do a little research before buying.

 

[Purgatory]

Isn't vinyl still mastered with a different higher dynamic range than the CDs/std streaming versions(compressed for typical user environment),

Worth a watch, I'm a CD person and have recently even updated my cd player to a cambridge audio cxc v2 black transport and using a fiio k9 pro ess as the DAC. Got tired of poor quality "HI-RES" audio files that sound worse in some cases than the cd red book original and now many remastered cds.

I like Vinyl but it is not better than CD and the other issues with Vinyl is they wear every time you play them and in time will degrade to a point no cleaning will help and you need to replace them again, while a CD if scratched or gets dirty can be resurfaced or simply cleaned.

If you want the best quality sound CD is the way to go for physical media that is available now, previous/current other cd formats in HI RES are super audio cd which is dead unless you buy old cd's and MQA CD is newer and available too but not many cd's that you may like.

My finding with many of these Hi RES formats is the problem of the original files they have used and how they were mastered/remastered and where the source came from, CD's Red Book honestly still are the format to go for as long as the sources used was a good one and will sound just as good as some "Hi RES versions" and better in a lot of cases as the newer cd releases are getting much better remastering and the dynamic range is much better now on cd's as we did go threw a period of compression being king on a lot tracks and cd's got their dynamic range destroyed and everything just sounds loud and not as clear as it could have been.

Will add a bit more to this later, but just wanted to add my honest opinion on this as I have been very heavily invested in audio gear for over 35 years and really longer as I use to be into it since young threw my dads setups. I also play keyboards/piano and have studio monitor setups and high end keyboard workstations and I would like to think I have good ear as many people seem to like my setups when they listen to them and ask how they can set something up to sound as nice.

I'm happy to see vinyl back, even tape is back and also happy to see CD sales are coming back up too, proving people are tired of streaming or the poor quality of so called Hi Res downloads. This maybe down to wanting to own the music and not keep paying subscriptions or also loosing albums or tracks as these sites loose the right to use them.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Here’s a classic example of how newer masters have screwed over the DR;

Album list - Dynamic Range DB

Checkout the DR for the 80s CD version and then for the more recent re-master. Progress eh!

 

[Gray2233]

Vinyl is an experience in my mind, but rarely a viable single solution to music enjoyment. There's nothing wrong with adding a turntable to your setup and only buying a few select records, maybe have a limited shelf or two for it. See how you get on, but the ritual of setting things up and settling down into a comfortable chair with a glass of your favourite liquor is sublime imo.

I think the issues with mastering can be solved to an extent with this approach too, it allows you to buy the best versions of your favourite older albums or tracks.

 

[JasonM]

Vinyl is a worse audio format than digital.

People often think vinyl is better as they have issues with their digital sources they don't realise. If they were to listen to the same digital track in the studio that mastered it on the studios good digital equipment they would realise this and think less of vinyl. Yes I've been in one of the best mastering studies in the country listening to Spotify and it tops pretty much anything any of us (including me) have in the home.

I'm now however going to contradict what I have written above... on a very good turntable a experience happens with the audio that you don't get digitally. I've been there with a very high end vintage Pioneer direct drive playing records at 3am in the morning. So although vinyl is technically worse, on the higher end players an experience happens that I can't explain.

 

[jpaul]

Here’s a classic example of how newer masters have screwed over the DR;

Album list - Dynamic Range DB
Checkout the DR for the 80s CD version and then for the more recent re-master. Progress eh!

now need an app to scan bar codes of 2nd hand cd's to quickly identify the good ones, or categorise flacs that tidal publish with their Max/flac moniker

As expected the tidal max version of a sample new order album was a 2015 remaster with poor DR https://dr.loudness-war.info/?artist=new+order&album=power , par for the course.

Off the back of purgatories video - watched some of this guy https://youtu.be/MlccCTy4PiQ?t=1246
who have a genuine 96/24 from the uncompressed musicians mouth 120db range sample..

Seems unclear if Tidal have yet(will ever) get any 96/24 lossless music (putting exposed MQA aside), so may well explain their £10.99 price drop;
I need to try Qobuz