Can digital get to vinyl sound and at what price?

[Lagonda]

Whether you like his equipment or not, PQ is one of the great thinkers (and characters) in the industry.

Yes ! Silver, silver, silver , silver and more silver what a great thinker !

 

[morricab]

Yes ! Silver, silver, silver , silver and more silver what a great thinker !

That is sound investment advice ...it is currently hugely undervalued...

 

[Mike Lavigne]

MoFi vinyl with a digital transfer step is like waking up in the morning and fixing yourself a bowl of dry cereal, getting the milk out of the refrigerator, and getting ready to pour the milk into the bowl. You look at the date on the milk carton, and see that it is spoiled.

So you put the milk back in the refrigerator thinking to yourself, "maybe it'll be fresh tomorrow."

Nice analogy, except as per your logic you won’t know the milk is spoiled unless you taste fresh milk next to it

it seemed to me to be a perfectly clear analogy. we all can immediately recognize sour spoiled milk, we can smell it too. especially if we use milk every day, but even those who don't commonly drink milk have the dna to smell and taste and recognize spoiled milk as spoiled. it's not subtle. we don't require much of a reference. we are hard wired to recognize it. we are even hard wired to be wary of it being spoiled since we are going to drink it we are naturally aware. it's the most natural unconscious thing to do.

OTOH a digital step is hidden inside music, and it's not jumping out, it's a sin of omission for the most part. not a hold your nose or spitting out sort of thing. degrees of good or pleasant, not revolting.

 

[Rensselaer]

Whether you like his equipment or not, PQ is one of the great thinkers (and characters) in the industry.

I monitor this site to learn the facts, that is my agenda.
PQ says he spent over $100,000 testing neobium resistors against the leading tantalum type and found they sound better (smoother). It is that attention to the little details that make the difference between good and world-class. He pointed out how the faster the digital sampling rate, the greater the overshoot distortion, so for those who think that makes digital sound more like analogue … He says early 78RPM shellac’s where cut direct from the orchestra and singer playing through extended horns direct to the cutting needle, no electronics. Despite the horrendous surface noise, the singing and instruments sound more real than anything today, thus less is more. He said his best (and most expensive) equipment has surprisingly few parts (albeit carefully selected parts).
As I said, my agenda is to learn how to build the very best. Unfortunately, others here have different agendas.

 

[bonzo75]

He says early 78RPM shellac’s where cut direct from the orchestra and singer playing through extended horns direct to the cutting needle, no electronics. Despite the horrendous surface noise, the singing and instruments sound more real than anything today

This is spot on

my agenda is to learn how to build the very best. Unfortunately, others here have different agendas.

This is also spot on.

 

[hopkins]

This is spot on

Have you listened to pre-electric recordings with original playback equipment ? Where?

 

[hopkins]

As I said, my agenda is to learn how to build the very best. Unfortunately, others here have different agendas.

How so?

 

[Lagonda]

I monitor this site to learn the facts, that is my agenda.
PQ says he spent over $100,000 testing neobium resistors against the leading tantalum type and found they sound better (smoother). It is that attention to the little details that make the difference between good and world-class. He pointed out how the faster the digital sampling rate, the greater the overshoot distortion, so for those who think that makes digital sound more like analogue … He says early 78RPM shellac’s where cut direct from the orchestra and singer playing through extended horns direct to the cutting needle, no electronics. Despite the horrendous surface noise, the singing and instruments sound more real than anything today, thus less is more. He said his best (and most expensive) equipment has surprisingly few parts (albeit carefully selected parts).
As I said, my agenda is to learn how to build the very best. Unfortunately, others here have different agendas.

And some of us have listened to AN systems and not been impressed at all. He is a good sales guy, i will give you that. Remaking old systems and buying up other peoples companies and products does not a genius make !

 

[Mike Lavigne]

And some of us have listened to AN systems and not been impressed at all. He is a good sales guy, i will give you that. Remaking old systems and buying up other peoples companies and products does not a genius make !

i enjoy AN systems at shows as an oasis from the carnage of show sound. does it touch all the bases? a case can be made either way. not my 'go-to' choice but respect it.

 

[Rensselaer]

i enjoy AN systems at shows as an oasis from the carnage of show sound. does it touch all the bases? a case can be made either way. not my 'go-to' choice but respect it.

Fair enough. Did he say anything on the webinar that you would agree with?

 

[hopkins]

Many years ago, I got into hi-fi listening to a full AN system in a store in Paris (Triode & Compagnie - no longer exists). It sounded great - to my virgin ears. I had a pair of AN-K speakers, and have listened to other models in people's homes as well. They are an acquired taste (like pretty much everything in this hobby, so that is not very meaningful).

 

[Lee]

In my limited experience, it has been very difficult to get streaming to sound as good as vinyl, and I would not go so far as to declare success.
I’ve found some of the most significant advances here (dCS Rossini is my streamer/DAC) were very low cost, or free

- hard wire Ethernet from router rather than use a WiFi bridge

- control with Mosaic rather than Roon

People tell me the Apex upgrade and clock, about $10k each, will get me closer.

I am pretty happy where things are though. Streaming from Qobuz is generally pretty enjoyable. I’m not actively trying to make it sound like vinyl anymore. It sounds very nice on its own.

The Apex upgrade is a HUGE improvement. The clock helps a fair bit too.

For analog based recordings, compared to a reference table the table will likely win given proper setup. As much as I love my Rossini Apex the lack of the imperfect (but always getting better) ADC - DAC two-step conversion.

 

[morricab]

Have you listened to pre-electric recordings with original playback equipment ? Where?

I have and it’s very impressive despite noise and limited bandwidth…this is a oerfect rebuttal to the claims you need bandwidth to sound realistic.

 

[morricab]

Many years ago, I got into hi-fi listening to a full AN system in a store in Paris (Triode & Compagnie - no longer exists). It sounded great - to my virgin ears. I had a pair of AN-K speakers, and have listened to other models in people's homes as well. They are an acquired taste (like pretty much everything in this hobby, so that is not very meaningful).

I think their Amps and preamps are interesting…the rest not so much…

 

[Lee]

MoFi vinyl with a digital transfer step is like waking up in the morning and fixing yourself a bowl of dry cereal, getting the milk out of the refrigerator, and getting ready to pour the milk into the bowl. You look at the date on the milk carton, and see that it is spoiled.

So you put the milk back in the refrigerator thinking to yourself, "maybe it'll be fresh tomorrow."

I love ya Ron but this is over the top. At the high DSD rates that Mobile Fidelity is using, I would be extremely skeptical that anyone could distinguish any digital signature from DSD in the final product.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Fair enough. Did he say anything on the webinar that you would agree with?

i admit to only listening a short time to the video. and my exposure to AN UK performance is mostly at shows. generally i agree with Peter on what sounds good, and purity of signal path and such. but like anything how much of a good thing is too much? and where does one start to miss things? what are your expectations?

back 20 years ago i use to cross swords with Peter on audioasylum.com and it was respectful and positive. at that time our conflicts were mostly on the digital side. ancient hifi forum history now. but the ideas are still at play.

 

[facten]

I had an Audio Note 1.1 DAC a number of years ago. It wasn't my cup of tea, found it lifeless

 

[Rensselaer]

I had an Audio Note 1.1 DAC a number of years ago. It wasn't my cup of tea, found it lifeless

Is that because it is Audio Note, or because it’s digital ?
Seriously, Peter said in the webinar that in his mind digital can’t hold a candle to analogue but that he takes from the rich … or something along those lines.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Is that because it is Audio Note, or because it’s digital ?
Seriously, Peter said in the webinar that in his mind digital can’t hold a candle to analogue but that he takes from the rich … or something along those lines.

20+ years ago, the main conflict between Peter and me was his preference for redbook and with non oversampling and without filters. driven by noisy pcm dacs and efforts to overcome that issue, my perspective 20+ years ago was a preference for SACD's and dacs that moved pcm to dsd.

20 years later dacs no longer have an issue with pcm and noise, they have far advanced, dsd/SACD is no longer the solution, and digital is much better. to the degree i understand what he is currently doing, Peter still is stuck at variations of basic redbook and still leans toward silver discs.

let the listener choose what they like. i have.

 

[Lee]

20+ years ago, the main conflict between Peter and me was his preference for redbook and with non oversampling and without filters. driven by noisy pcm dacs and efforts to overcome that issue, my perspective 20+ years ago was a preference for SACD's and dacs that moved pcm to dsd.

20 years later dacs no longer have an issue with pcm and noise, they have far advanced, dsd/SACD is no longer the solution, and digital is much better. to the degree i understand what he is currently doing, Peter still is stuck at variations of basic redbook and still leans toward silver discs.

let the listener choose what they like. i have.

I'm aligned on most of this but I do have a preference for DSD files as I feel, all else being equal, they do sound a bit more musical.