Me and this guy at work were arguing over what sounded better. My argument was that cd sounds better because there are as many imperfection in reading a bumpy piece of plastic as there is in converting to digital.

 

Which is better, Camry or Accord? Country or rap? It's personal preference, really. They each have a different sound - I prefer CDs though.

 

Ultimately, vinyl is better. No digital -> analog conversion. There is only so much data that can be obtained from a cd. You remember in calculus how you learned to integrate by breaking the problem into a series of small rectangles and summing them - this applies for CD sound as well. To get an approximation of a true analog curve using digital media, the DAC (digital to analog converter) must approimate that smooth curve using a large sampling of discrete points. A good cd player's function is to sound as close to vinyl as possible.

Now, you can make the argument that a CD is better because it sounds the same way every time and does not degrade the same way vinyl does, but as far as overall quality, vinyl wins.

Your argument that there are imperfections in vinyl only applies if the record has been used/abused. Properly taken-care of vinyl will not sound like that.

 

My argument was that the record being a mechanical device has to have some percentage of error, right? If thats the cause then i guess it would depend on how big of a percentage. Any information on that. I understand the premise but i find it hard to believe that a record (dust and scratches aside) is perfect when played through a player.

 

CDs are also mechanical - the digital information is represented physically by ridges and valleys. The difference is in how this information is read. Records are analog and translated directly into vibration (via the needle) and then into sound which is a direct reflection of that vibration. CDs must be read digitally, into 1's and 0's then translated into an approximation of the analog signal they are encoding and then are translated into the vibrations that you hear. That extra step is where the CD loses the very very last .01% of the accuracy vinyl can reproduce.

For a cheap setup, a cd player is likely going to sound better. There is less margin for error in setup and the cheap equipment does a better job of producing adequate output than cheap vinyl equipment. If you step up from cheap setups, vinyl is the way to go.

 

It's pretty damn close. Given a new record, the sound can be incredible. When you say mechanical device, you're forgetting that a CD is a mechanical device as well. Records, being completely analog like brent mentioned, are one step ahead of CD's in quality b/c they don't need to be filtered or converted.

Your argument would be like saying an MP3 is better than a CD because the CD has to spin around and be read by a laser when in fact the CD has the better quality (depending on the bitrate of course). Vinyl would be like having an infinite bitrate.

 

Vinyl outscores CD anytime, especially if it's heavyweight vinyl (most audiophile recordings are). It also helps to have a good cleaning system. A good belt drive turntable and a good cartridge will outdo a CD anytime. I tested my son and his friends once with a record and a CD of the same recording...everytime they thought it was the CD they were wrong. Then I tried several others and they continued to fail the test. I was using MoFi (Mobile Fidelity) recordings both vinyl and CD, so it was one audiophile recording against another audiophile recording.

 

Thanks, cyclone, you put that much more eloquently than I could this morning!

I think it is about time for me to start a topic enquiring as to who is a fellow audio geek.

 

Well a cd operates mechanically but is read exactly the same every time (if this wasn't the case you would have memory problems and so on). I should have phrased it differently, a record play reads data mechanically. I look at it this way, if the needle is as accurate as you say (just playing devils advocate) then you would think that things like a rooms temperature would play a factor. If its not that accurate then it leads me to believe that there is a percentage od error in the design which allows for a temperature change.

 

Vinyl isn't affected by temperature that much. Maybe if you listened to a record at -20F compared to 120F you might hear a difference with some sort of measuring device. The tip that reads the record is usually a diamond so it stays sharp and consistent.