Higher End DACs

[crwilli]

Originally Posted by audioguy3107

Well, you can just put a bucket out front in the driveway and a sign that says......”Taking donations for audio equipment”.



- Buck

Glad I am in a different neighborhood so our buckets don’t compete.

[Masterlu]

[Weirdcuba]

It was really a great day at the show. Super excited about the DAC and superkomputer. Now, I just have to get everything home, get the room built, and get it set up.

[crwilli]

Originally Posted by Weirdcuba

It was really a great day at the show. Super excited about the DAC and superkomputer. Now, I just have to get everything home, get the room built, and get it set up.

...and invite your buddies over for an evening of listening!...

[ufguy73]

Originally Posted by 2fastdriving

Regarding the digital vs analog, you need to determine how much you will actually use the vinyl rig. It's a lot of work and hassle to do vinyl but it is also rewarding. As for the cost.. I don't think you need to buy a gold finger to be very very happy. That's overkill for your first setup IMHO. You can put together a great analog setup for much less.

when I got my Mcintosh in the first place, the system of my dreams was vinyl based...as that's what I grew up on and that's what all my fond memories of music were predicated on (I no longer have all my vinyl albums...or cds for that matter - a long story )...

but as I start to think about cleaning, maintenance, searching for the 'right' pressings, etc....I am starting to really question if that's the right answer for me.

Agreed on the Goldfinger...but I really am enamored with the CA Master Innovation

[Charles]

Originally Posted by ufguy73

when I got my Mcintosh in the first place, the system of my dreams was vinyl based...as that's what I grew up on and that's what all my fond memories of music were predicated on (I no longer have all my vinyl albums...or cds for that matter - a long story )...

but as I start to think about cleaning, maintenance, searching for the 'right' pressings, etc....I am starting to really question if that's the right answer for me.

Agreed on the Goldfinger...but I really am enamored with the CA Master Innovation

I grew up with vinyl. Never liked it. Way too much trouble and never liked the sound. Vinyl lacks bass. Every time you play a record you wear the groove. So the sound changes every time you play it.

Also record scratch and record maintenance. Vinyl very unpredictable. You don't play a record for a year and then play it. Surface noise has crept in. Where did it come from? What did I do wrong?

IMO, far better to attempt to achieve the "liquidity" of vinyl with top notch digital playback. As I said vinyl is flawed to begin with. Vinyl lacks bass. It simply can't produce a solid 25-30 Hz note.

I stopped cleaning cartridge needles and placing tonearms on records years ago. Question: how much tracking force on average is the top quality arm now requiring? When I stopped it was 1-2 grams. Has it changed? Does anybody know?

[slowGEEZR]

Well, you know what opinions are like. Let me give you mine. Vinyl does not lack bass, thank you very much. Perhaps your experience has convinced you of that, but that does not make it fact. I've got records that have been played many many times that sound as dynamic and as good as they did when new. The frequency range of vinyl exceeds that of Redbook CD playback. The only time you can hear any vinyl groove noise on a good record and with good playback gear, is between songs and that only at very high volumes. With many records you'd be hard pressed to hear groove noise, except at the very very high volumes. You're welcome to come hear my setup, here in Round Rock, TX and verify for yourself.

[Charles]

Originally Posted by slowGEEZR

Well, you know what opinions are like. Let me give you mine. Vinyl does not lack bass, thank you very much. Perhaps your experience has convinced you of that, but that does not make it fact. I've got records that have been played many many times that sound as dynamic and as good as they did when new. The frequency range of vinyl exceeds that of Redbook CD playback. The only time you can hear any vinyl groove noise on a good record and with good playback gear, is between songs and that only at very high volumes. With many records you'd be hard pressed to hear groove noise, except at the very very high volumes. You're welcome to come hear my setup, here in Round Rock, TX and verify for yourself.

What is your system? What is your tracking force? What is your turntable/arm/cartridge? I'd be particularly interested in your tracking force, not to make any counter point but just to know how/if things have changed.

For example, I don't think vinyl can handle the dynamic range of a motion picture sound track like Aquaman. Of course most everything I say is just opinion. But it is a fact that every time you play a record, the grooves wear a little and as the grooves wear, the sound must change, unless I'm missing something.

Having said that I'm sure that vinyl has improved a lot. I'm sure that vinyl bass of today is adequate for most music but not for all. Vinyl is not going to do justice to notes 30 Hz and below at very high volume, IMO. A lot of folks have subs and want to hear these notes at high volume.

p.s. This may be why many have both vinyl and digital playback, i.e. to experience the best of both. I think I just made your point.

Charles

[audio bill]

Guess I'm becoming a bit of a geezer myself , but I'm with slowGEEZR on this topic! To answer the question from Charles back in the day higher end cartridges were made with very high compliance and could therefore track lightly often around 1 gram or so. Modern cartridges are now of more moderate or low compliance and typically track from 1.5 to 2.5 grams, but that's just an estimate and there will always be some outliers.

I run a Nottingham Dais turntable, Origin Live Enterprise-C arm, and Ortofon Cadenza Bronze cartridge. This setup tracks at 2.5 grams, and has a nude mounted Replicant 100 stylus which maximizes vertical contact area with the groove. That allows it to track with an eerie level of silence, since it contacts surface area of the groove which hasn't been contacted (or damaged) by other more basic stylus profiles. More advanced stylus profiles also allow higher tracking forces with less wear since their weight is distributed over a significantly larger contact area. Precise setup is more critical with more advanced stylus profiles.

Vinyl has a much wider bandwidth than you might think. There have been some recordings of vintage organs down to their 16 Hz pedal, and if the recording is properly mastered it is reproduced in its full glory on vinyl. Some Direct to Disc recordings of Virgil Fox come to mind as examples of this. In the high frequencies finer cartridges are known to have extension up to 40 KHz (CD4 masterings used the first 20 kHz for the front channels and from 20 to 40 kHz for the rear channels!) Try to get that extended frequency range on a CD but it can't be done, since it's physically limited by Nyquist's Sampling Theorem to less than half of the 44.1 kHz sampling frequency or ~22 kHz.

Record cleaning techniques have of course evolved over the years as well, so while you may remember vinyl playback as being noisy with endless pops and clicks that is no longer the case. If you have LPs properly stored and cared for it can be relatively noise free other than if you hit a scratched or damaged section of the album. Thorough cleaning on an appropriate LP cleaning machine is only done periodically, with just a simple dusting using a carbon fiber brush before each play. It's not as difficult, time consuming, or as extensive of a ritual as some would have you believe. The sound can be quite captivating!

[W9TR]

With every improvement I make to my digital chain I am getting closer to the sound of my vinyl rig. With the NAS, server, cabling, and DAC I am in for about half the cost of my vinyl rig.

I’m not sure I’d recommend a deep investment in vinyl playback with digital getting so good.

My best sounding source is still the very best vinyl pressings I own, but the digital stuff is catching up very quickly.

Tom