Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply • Hacker News Board

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#101

Post by lrem » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

taurath wrote: post #16

lrem wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Manual transmission has clear advantage in responsiveness. Being used to manual, I've just driven an automatic for three days. Despite having 50% more power than my old car, it felt terribly slow because of the gear shift delays.

Try a newer or higher performance automatic. In performance cars you can’t get close to the shift speed!

That's a current Volkswagen T-Roc, odo 5000km, that drove me nuts this week. Then, I'm not saying I can shift quicker than that. Instead, I can shift 20s before stepping on the throttle.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#102

Post by boudin » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 2:24 PM UTC

eganist wrote: post #2

I haven't found an objective explanation for why some populations prefer vinyl analog over any digital renditions of a sound. Can anyone share some insight? (I've listened to both, and the description of vinyl or even analog sound as being generally "warmer" never resonated with me.)

I listen to both and one stuff i actually enjoy is the one purpose object. When listening to a record, as the record player can only do one thing, I don't get side-tracked like on a phone or on a tv where you find yourself randomly looking stuff online.

I did realise while browsing in recors shops that, even if i never had access to that much music in my life as nowdays, i never known less about new bands. I haven't found the equivalent in streaming services. In the end, what comes closest online is music blogs.

In term of sounds, i guess it's a question of taste. I do enjoy music both ways so, in the end, that's not what's make a difference for me. I'm not sure i could tell the difference between a vynil and a digital version if it was not from the sound of dust.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#103

Post by TMWNN » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 2:25 PM UTC

chadcmulligan wrote: post #26

eganist wrote: post #2

I haven't found an objective explanation for why some populations prefer vinyl analog over any digital renditions of a sound. Can anyone share some insight? (I've listened to both, and the description of vinyl or even analog sound as being generally "warmer" never resonated with me.)

Don't start looking for the people who think crt monitors are better for gaming then - https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/

CRTs are definitely superior for display lag (huge for competitive gamers), and also for retro gamers playing titles designed for CRTs' blurriness.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#104

Post by NoSorryCannot » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:04 PM UTC

sonthonax wrote: post #91

stereolambda wrote: post #88

Don't forget that some "obscure" music is marginally cheaper/easier to obtain on vinyl. For example space age pop, which is one of things in the sweet spot for collecting (for pleasure, not for money): used to be popular and mass-manufactured, now almost no one cares, so the market has a lot of this relatively cheap. Living in the former communist country, I regret not having easy access to heaps of Western vinyls in…

I think a lot of millennials who formed their music taste in the age of Napster, LimeWire, Torrents and Spotify seem to think the internet has everything (given the illusion of limitless choice). This is of course not the case and there's so much music that's only realistically available on vinyl.

The entire mainstream music industry moved on from vinyl records decades ago and a vinyl-only release today is going to exclude most people in any generation. At least the people that grew up pirating will likely be aware that a vinyl rip is a thing!

And millennials seem to have been largely responsible for vinyl's limited resurgence anyway.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#105

Post by numpad0 » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:09 PM UTC

sterwill wrote: post #98

numpad0 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CD is way overrated. Terrible, even. Like, if you compare film to digital photography, but film was represented by ISO160 monochromatic Kodak, and all the digital photographic technology was represented by a 640x480 prototype camera from 2001, instead of a RED or even a yesteryear phone, then it’ll be immediately obvious that analog far outperforms digital full stop. That’s how vinyl remains “superior”. CD is terribl…

This doesn't make any sense. You haven't explained how CD is "terrible"; you just made some comparison to an obsolete digital camera. You put the CD in, press play, and a nearly perfect representation of the source signal with enormous dynamic range and clarity comes out of your DAC. How is this like a 20 year-old digital camera?

Well, at very least, Compact Disc is a 1980 standard... not like 20 years old, more like 40 years old. I don't understand why statement like above is met with a response like yours. It's a shitty '80s format that beat vinyl in affordability, why defend it as if CD is the pinnacle of digital recording technology? It is not, never was. Just say yeah CD sucks you gotta try DSD, and move on.

Anecdotal but I feel some sort of acoustic 'odor' to CD, that no other digital formats have: CD rips and even CD-DSD conversion has distinct tone that tells the data had been on a disc. Something's wrong with the standard and/or its mastering.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#106

Post by RyJones » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:19 PM UTC

eganist wrote: post #2

I haven't found an objective explanation for why some populations prefer vinyl analog over any digital renditions of a sound. Can anyone share some insight? (I've listened to both, and the description of vinyl or even analog sound as being generally "warmer" never resonated with me.)

It's OK to like the things you like. It has nothing to do with objective explanations.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#107

Post by jslabovitz » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:27 PM UTC

jakobegger wrote: post #31

eganist wrote: post #2

I haven't found an objective explanation for why some populations prefer vinyl analog over any digital renditions of a sound. Can anyone share some insight? (I've listened to both, and the description of vinyl or even analog sound as being generally "warmer" never resonated with me.)

I hate everything about CDs. The flimsy jewel cases that break all the time, the tiny artwork, how easily CDs scratch, how choosing a song requires clicking stupid buttons, the delay after inserting CDs, the high pitched whine of the motor, the sound of the stepper motor as it moves the laser... When I listen to music, I want to slow down and relax, and taking a record out of the sleeve is just so much nicer than fid…

> ... how choosing a song requires clicking stupid buttons, the delay after inserting CDs, the high pitched whine of the motor, the sound of the stepper motor as it moves the laser...

Some of the earliest CD players are superbly constructed — and have some of the best sound. I have a couple of Sony decks from the mid-1980s that are quiet, quick, and have excellent controls, complete with 20-odd direct buttons for individual songs. Playing a CD on these machines feels just as mechanically satisfying as playing a vinyl record. You have to spend some time & money finding them, but it’s not hard to pick up a top of the line 1980s player for a few hundred dollars. For me, it’s absolutely worth it.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#108

Post by noisem4ker » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:27 PM UTC

mayniac wrote: post #72

eganist wrote: post #2

I haven't found an objective explanation for why some populations prefer vinyl analog over any digital renditions of a sound. Can anyone share some insight? (I've listened to both, and the description of vinyl or even analog sound as being generally "warmer" never resonated with me.)

On top of what everyone else has said: reliability. My record player + amp have never had any problems I couldn't fix on the spot. Only things I've had to repair/replace were needle cartridges and the belt, both of which take under five minutes to fix. My vinyl setup has outlived my smartphones and will likely continue to do so. Streaming music can have problems I can't easily fix. It's like the difference between an…

Let's call it repairability, not reliability.

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#109

Post by 7thaccount » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:31 PM UTC

tomduncalf wrote: post #86

mlang23 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I tried spotify a few years ago, it was exactly this aspect that totally failed my expectations. I wanted a service like Spotify as a replacement for genre radio. I wanted something that somehow figures out my tastes, and generates a mix for me. In my experience, this totally fails unless you happen to like the most commercial pop music available. Whenever I tried to coax it to play some alternative and undergro…

I suspect you didn’t use it for long enough for it to develop a good profile of your tastes. I’ve been using it for 5 years and the recommendations are my favourite feature, and on the whole very impressive. I’d consider myself into quite underground music (electronic/techno, nothing mainstream or commercial at all, I’d wager even most people who consider themselves into electronic music wouldn’t have heard of a lot…

Is there a good service that doesn't require FB?

Re: Manufacturing plant fire threatens worldwide vinyl record supply

#110

Post by cormacrelf » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 3:35 PM UTC

numpad0 wrote: post #105

sterwill wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't make any sense. You haven't explained how CD is "terrible"; you just made some comparison to an obsolete digital camera. You put the CD in, press play, and a nearly perfect representation of the source signal with enormous dynamic range and clarity comes out of your DAC. How is this like a 20 year-old digital camera?

Well, at very least, Compact Disc is a 1980 standard... not like 20 years old, more like 40 years old. I don't understand why statement like above is met with a response like yours. It's a shitty '80s format that beat vinyl in affordability, why defend it as if CD is the pinnacle of digital recording technology? It is not, never was. Just say yeah CD sucks you gotta try DSD, and move on. Anecdotal but I feel some sor…

CD may be 40 years old, but human ears didn't change at all in that time. If you can tell CD from other recordings, it is almost certainly because the mastering (which is not something intrinsic to the standard) was deliberately changed for CD because it could reproduce sound better, so no format-specific mastering hacks were needed to make it sound good. Face it, you don't have golden ears.

For example, if a studio today were to master something for cassette, it would dramatically turn up the high end to compensate and probably bypass some saturation or exciters because the format has its own. Similarly, any studio not tweaking their masters for the perfection of CD was probably doing the material a disservice. Heck, today, some tracks are deliberately mastered to sound good on iPhone earbuds.

(The usual article cited in these discussions is https://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html, which happens to make this point briefly under "Different media, different master" and "Better masters". Edit: another fun article is https://www.soundguys.com/high-bitrate-audio-is-overkill-cd-..., with the fantastic pull quote, "There is no safe listening level to hear the difference between these files".)

CD doesn't need to be the pinnacle of digital technology, because our ears don't know any different beyond it.