Right, let's have this argument. Vinyl sounds better than CD, does it? Who's first?
Yup, records sound better than CDs. I am one of the few people my age around here who has a turntable. You have a sound wave, like this ~~~~~~~~~~
A CD will emulate a wave digitally inside a grid. like this: .:.:.:.:.:. So the digital-analog converter will take the digital dots and convert them back into a wave to the best of its ability. Records on the other hand are recorded exactly how it sounded with no digitization or reconstruction needed. So it's a more accurate sound.
The reason most people think records sound like crap is because most stuff on records was recorded a long time ago when production wasn't as good. So yeah, it will sound bad because of those standards. But listen to a modern recording on a vinyl system with good speakers vs. a CD and you'll see.
Any records produced after 1980 tend to sound a lot better than their CD counterparts due to the accuracy that can be achieved these days in making the things, along with the increased recording standards. Back in the eighties my dumbass dad made the "investment" of buying an LP deck that reads the surface of the vinyl with a laser rather than a stylus - It sounds ****ing incredible, but it was a bit of a dim move on his part considering digital audio was around the corner.
Speakers, ladies and gentlemen, are digital.
Hah, good point.. Yeah, any digitization or transformation is going sacrafice some integrity, but a record still sound sweeter on a good system.
I have to say, I prefer the warm sound of Vinyl to that of a CD. If analog sounds better, then why are we on this "digital revolution" ? It would seem that compression and all that just makes things complicated and sometimes even messes audio up in some cases. I mean here we are, hyping up digital this, digital that. I would like to have a better understanding on what it is all about. I sometimes question why are we doing this, and whether I should go back to all analog or not.
I have 213 songs on my mp3 player. There are ipods that can hold DAYS worth of music.
When you can make a record player that can match that, I'll be interested. Fact is, the digital won out since the quality loss isnt that great, and its FAR outweighed by the convience of being able to store such insanely high amounts of media.
That being said, I do like the interesting vibe that records give. Its a sort of retro throwback feel. I have a few records myself, and enjoy listening to them. My two favorite are a George Carlin performance and the OST to Clockwork Orange.
Speakers are not digital. Speakers work by converting an analogue 'electronic' wave into a sound wave.