Technology changes, but Vinyl LP's live on !!!

[Steve]

I watched CBS News Sunday Morning today, and they did a story about the longevity of vinyl LPs and recorded music.  Seems the CD is a dying medium, being replaced by MP3 and digital downloads.  The ultimate music preservation medium to me, and to others concerned about true hi-fi and audio reproduction, is currently the vinyl LP record.

There seems to be a cottage industry developing to produce vinyl LPs for new artists that really care about the quality of the sound reproduction of their recordings.  Hooray!  The point of the CBS story was that in this age of computers and digital information, the authentic analog vinyl LP sound still lives on and true High Fidelity is not dead.  I will keep and use my turntable for as long as I am around.

As I type this, I am listening to the "Oklahoma!" movie soundtrack from my vintage 1958 vinyl LP.  Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones never sounded better!  In true vinyl Capitol Stereo sound.  

[mr.jaynes]

No offense intended, but Digital Audio has left me kinda spoiled: gots to have it on CD.

[Breadburner]

I have Dueling Banjos on as we speak...Vinyl of course....

[grahambino]

i salvaged most (if not all) of my parent's LPs.
Some good...Led Zeppelin III, The White Album
Some bad...Engelbert Humperdinck

I also got a bunch from my dad's cousin, but he wrote his name in permanent marker on the front of the covers, but he had horrible taste in music.
So I have most of the Village People albums along with 'Teddy Bear - CB Trucking Songs' with such hits as 'convoy' 'long-haul romance' 'broke-down heart'  
...okay i made up the last two, but you get the idea, theyre trucker country songs.

What am I doing w/ them?  Saving them from the dump I guess.  I don't have a working turntable anymore.
[]

[rwarn17588]

I'm old enough to have lived through the LP age, the CD age, and now the Mp3 age.

You can keep your LPs.

I think the vinyl fanboys are looking at the medium with rose-colored glasses. Quality of vinyl records (especially from Columbia and CBS) during the 1970s and '80s was notoriously erratic. I distinctly remember AC/DC's "Back in Black" being so poorly manufactured that the needle couldn't stay in the groove. Pretty damned irritating to hear Brian Thomas sing "Let me" over and over again.

Plus when LPs were in the shrink wrap too long, it tended to warp the vinyl to where it was nearly unplayable. Plus you had to clean the damned things all the time.

Even if you did everything right, there was no guarantee you wouldn't hear cracks and pops from defects and static electricity.

The early days of CDs were a tad uneven in quality, but that was mostly because the industry was still figuring out how to master the recordings. By the mid-'80s, whether songs were digital or analog, they were all sounding pretty doggone great.

I for one was glad CDs came along just because of less maintenance and more storage capacity. I like Mp3s for the same reason. I've got my entire collection of 5,500 songs on one little device about the size of a cigarette pack.

And suffice to say, there's plenty of other mediums than LPs to roll joints (which I strongly suspect is the REAL reason there's so much nostalgia for the things).

[FOTD]

I play my vinyls as much as cd's....there are many albums I never bought on cd's. Today I spun some Jerry Jeff Walker and Jackson Browne.

Japanese and Half Speed Masters sound a ton better than cd's. You can feel the music off the vinyls while cd's, while efficient, do not have the same warmth as the originals.....and some older albums can't be found on cd.

[HoneySuckle]

I recently inherited two boxes of LPs from my father.  Found "Bonanza" Christmas LP and it plays very well.

Tons of heavy metal as well from my brother, and some 70s softies, too numerous to mention, but was wondering, what are these worth anyway?  Should I try selling them?  If so, where?[?]

[FOTD]

quote:Originally posted by HoneySuckle

I recently inherited two boxes of LPs from my father.  Found "Bonanza" Christmas LP and it plays very well.

Tons of heavy metal as well from my brother, and some 70s softies, too numerous to mention, but was wondering, what are these worth anyway?  Should I try selling them?  If so, where?[?]

You're kidding.....right?

[HoneySuckle]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD

quote:Originally posted by HoneySuckle

I recently inherited two boxes of LPs from my father.  Found "Bonanza" Christmas LP and it plays very well.

Tons of heavy metal as well from my brother, and some 70s softies, too numerous to mention, but was wondering, what are these worth anyway?  Should I try selling them?  If so, where?[?]

You're kidding.....right?

NO!  I am not going the Ebay way, so is there somewhere IN TULSA to sell them?

[FOTD]

It would depend on condition and on demand.

Lee's was at 61st and Sheridan by The Savoy. There's a place at 31st and Sheridan back in the crotch of the old Boman Twin area.

What a "bonanza"..... If you have any old jazz or blues, let me know.

[Steve]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD

I play my vinyls as much as cd's....there are many albums I never bought on cd's. Today I spun some Jerry Jeff Walker and Jackson Browne.

Japanese and Half Speed Masters sound a ton better than cd's. You can feel the music off the vinyls while cd's, while efficient, do not have the same warmth as the originals.....and some older albums can't be found on cd.

Me too.  I have about 1,000 vinyl Lp's and about 200 Cd's in my personal collection.  My first choice for sonic preference will always be the vinyl LP.  My vinyl is mostly in pristine condition, as I know how to propery care for these "relics."  I have many LP's from the '50s & '60s that belonged to my parents and I greatly enjoy these albums today.

Digital audio is great for cheapness and quantity stored in minimal space.  For true Hi-Fi, in my opinion, nothing beats the vinyl LP.

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD

It would depend on condition and on demand.

Lee's was at 61st and Sheridan by The Savoy. There's a place at 31st and Sheridan back in the crotch of the old Boman Twin area.

What a "bonanza"..... If you have any old jazz or blues, let me know.

You think "American Beauty" sounds better on vinyl, CD, or good 'ol reel-to-reel?

[cannon_fodder]

While I can brag about owning "Thriller" on LP, and I did have "C&C Music Factory" on cassette, I have to confess to being young enough to amass most of my music on CDs.   When I moved to Oklahoma I gave all my LPs (and those of my parents) to a friend of mine that enjoys mixing up records on turn styles.  Every now and then I come across a cassette, but I don't have anything to play it in (which is too bad, I bet some of those old mixes are killer).

And that's fine.  The sound quality of an LP is far inferior to digital medium.  While it can impart a warm sound and is renowned for a personal feel- that is a result of imperfections.  If one so desired you could master a warmer sound and cracks, mild scratches, and other imperfections onto your RAW file.   That doesn't make it a better audio reproduction or true hi-fi.

quote:...concerned about true hi-fi and audio reproduction

True hi-fi?  A typical LP has a max bitrate of 432kbs (that's equates roughly to an 18Hz range a 5db flux (call it 12bits) and 2 channels:  18,000   x 12 x 2 = 432kbs).  Now pretend it isn't just off the press and it degrades from there, I'd guess something like 350kbs average. (I understand LPs are analogue and don't have bit rates, but lets pretend we wanted to encode all the information on one to reproduce the sound accurately digitally - what would we need to facilitate it).

Uncompressed "CD quality" music is at 1,411kbs (vinyl is obviously not compressed).  

Recent (5 years) MPEG-1 Layer 3 (MP3) compression audio at 44hz, 128kbs, 2 channel gives you the same playing bit rate as "CD Quality" or equivalent to 1,411kbs uncompressed.  Higher standard MP3 formats (192) bit rates of 3,500kbs. Still higher bit rates exist up to 7,000kbs but only specialized players can use them and they serve little practical use.

Audio master files and DVD audio achieves a playable audio bit rate of 9,800kbs (up to 8 tracks at 96hz, with a 7 db range), though that would leave little room for video on that track (more like VHS quality than DVD quality).

An Ipod uses only compressed audio files, the playable bit rate (what bit rate it would be if uncompressed) is around the 3,500 range.

What I'm getting at is that while you may prefer the audio sound and feel of an LP, the actually audio quality is not as high.  For what's it's worth, I encoded several of my LPs as Mp3s (44hz, 6db range, 2 channel) because I had gotten used to THAT sound and the CD version sounded strange to me (Hotel California).  So say you like them better or that they are hanging on, but arguing that the Hi-Fi or the audio reproduction is better is simply wrong.

I'm biased.  I have no way of playing analogue  music in my house (I guess I have a tube guitar amp, technically analogue) and the large number of MP3s on my computer are streamed to my digital stereo.  Even the Cds I ripped all those songs from have been thrown off my shelves and stuffed in a closet (R Kelly's hiding in the closet [don't have an R Kelly CD]).  

Bah!  Enjoy your LPs, but technically the statement that they are better reproductions is false.

[mr.jaynes]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

quote:Originally posted by FOTD

It would depend on condition and on demand.

Lee's was at 61st and Sheridan by The Savoy. There's a place at 31st and Sheridan back in the crotch of the old Boman Twin area.

What a "bonanza"..... If you have any old jazz or blues, let me know.

You think "American Beauty" sounds better on vinyl, CD, or good 'ol reel-to-reel?

I liked American Beauty better at the movie house, lol.

C&C Music Factory? That may be going back a bit (some 15 years or so) but given the innovations of their sound, as analog as they could be and retain that same groove and effect would be on cassette; it's be hard to beat digital.

[TURobY]

I still purchase vinyl for dance music. Despite the increased control available now for CD turntables, I still like the touch and feel that comes from vinyl.