Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab has been cutting vinyl from digital since a long, long time ago...

I've never said that. Either the record sounds good or it doesn't. It seems to me you are leaving out the collectors. At this point in time an AAA titles have more value than if done digitally.

 

Also very correct. BUT I think we all heard some of the downfalls that were evident in many of these MoFi releases ( i know I did). However, since we are being assured for years that the recordings were all done AAA , and by a 'supposedly' reputable company and source, we all (well certainly myself and everyone else I know who actually owns these releases) assumed the problem lay somewhere else.
( the original master tape was somehow flawed, the pressing was at issue, the recording was sub-par to begin with etc.,).
Do some of the MoFi DSD One Steps sound good, sure...BUT the question to be asked is how much better they would sound IF they were sourced as advertised!
I own almost all of them, some in multiple copies, IMHO there are some good ones, some not so good ones and one great one ( The SATVV). The disappointments are to me: BOTW, Simon, Portraits in Jazz, Texas Flood, Fragile, while I am happy with Unplugged, Folk Singer, The Nightfly, AhUm and Monk's Dream...and Couldn't Stand the Weather. Was I expecting more from the disappointing group, yes and no. Yes because I think Portraits could sound a lot better and I never knew why it did not, until now; and no, because I had little expectation for the others as I knew they were marginal recordings to begin with! As to the others, now i am left wondering how they could have turned out IF MoFi had not been so dishonest about their process!

 

Other than having the intention of stirring up people your post makes no sense. Superior to what?

 

Couldn’t it be ‘solved’ by comparing the One Step’s to original or recommended vintage pressings?

 

It makes perfect sense, and please don't tell me what my intention was because you have no idea. "Superior" meaning better than anything fully digital or containing digital.

 

An early one that was clearly digital, at least they have that going for it

 

We don't know the process that pushed Mofi into mastering records using a DSD source. We don't know why they decided to deceive customers. We don't know if Jim Davis was wholly responsible or just left things to the marketing department. I do understand that the buck stops with Jim Davis. Maybe Jim Davis needs to clean house.

 

No. Totally different mastering. I will say it would be really easy to pick out the old pressings. Compressed with mostly midrange eq.

 

If you actually bother reading the thread you will find many people who own the one steps also own the SACD issued by MOFI and they say the One step vinyl sound noticeably better than the SACD issued by the same company. I repeat, your post makes no sense.

 

Well, it makes no sense to you, and that's perfectly fine with me.

 

Looking back at what little ridicule there has been for the One Steps on the thread, it always seemed to me that the issue was mastering. At least that is what the majority of speak on the thread leads me to believe. AAA wont help mastering decisions that one doesnt care for. Certain aspects of mastering will show up as desirable or undesirable regardless of analogue or digital.

 

But Bob Carver didn’t have a team of YouTube influencers who banked their identity on his amps.

 

Most people either don't have vintage pressings or didn't bother to compare. It would be hard to say that YES, this is digital when Mofi kept telling us they were AAA. They just sound different.

 

What would the poll be for owners of their records 2 months ago?

 

Ok, that makes sense. I thought you meant it would be a way of determining that the One Steps were in fact digital.

 

Scarcity as a marketing strategy is something to be expected no matter the digital versus analog phone

 

Thank you.

 

Sure, but can Steve tell the difference? I'm guessing yes.

 

I appreciate your perspective but in my case I haven’t played a CD in 10-15 years... well that’s what I thought until we all learned we were playing fancy expensive CDs on vinyl. I want my analog media to be all analog and closer to its original chain. My vinyl is mostly vintage jazz, blues and rock up until the age of digital recording. If I want digital I can just flip a switch and push a button and play the same album digitally through Qobuz. I don’t care about modern digitally recorded music on vinyl since I can stream that or try a vinyl version for fun but then I know what I am getting.

I’m spending the time and trouble and expense of the turntable, tonearm and cartridge with set up and vinyl care to recover the, perhaps, ephemeral analog magic from the grooves of music from the golden age of analog recording. So now learning these records are just digital is a kick in the analog balls.

I would trade my MoFi Mingus Ah Um tomorrow for a NM OG, AP, Speakers Corner or comparable analog pressing. I gave away my noisy (expensive) OG when I got my MoFi digital version. It sounds great but as great as an all analog version? I don’t know, I really wish I had one.

 

And now for something completely different.

I know some vinyl enthusiast rip their records to digital files for mobile listening.

Has anyone explored the possibility of, for instance, taking a swell sounding One Step record, ripping it, and putting that on a SACD?

If so many audiophiles were unable to detect the DSD step, I’m curious if the opposite is also true, if the vinyl step could be detected in the SACD?

And how much, if any, of the vinyl magic could be passed on to the SACD? Or would the vinyl step diminish the sound quality?

Just at the beach on Maui wondering about such things!

 

No, because you seem to forget a few aspects..1) the original pressing was not released using the 'One Step' process, 2) the condition of the groove with an original pressing is going to be far inferior to the new release, 3) the mastering of the original is not the same as the mastering of the MoFi, so the 'flavor' that the mastering engineer wants has been added or subtracted from the two versions ( new vs. original), 4) the vinyl formulation is very different with the MoFi's than with the original release. 5) The speed difference of the release 45rpm vs 331/3.

 

Did he say anyone besides himself?

But really that is kind of reaching.

I think his statement speaks for itself?

Poor Steve, having to deal with every word he says picked apart by us lol...sorry Steve.

 

To me that is a very muddy issue, I have no idea about mastering but in my view MOFI now have the opportunity to go over and over the digital file to EQ and correct problems until they are satisfied. That is Instead of making some adjustments while a valuable original tape is running which is limiting. I am sure studios will not look kindly at an engineer playing an original tape over and over until they get everything right to do the actual mastering. I don't think that guarantees the MOFI will sound better but it helps to make their pressings sound pleasant. Possibly better in some peoples ears but that starts being subjective.

Comparisons between pressings can be hard to do, many original records remain accessible in price but the very desirable ones, in particular specific pressing are going up in price a lot. MOFI at $100 sound like a bargain compared to many originals so I don't think everybody is in the position to have numerous good pressings to make the comparisons demanded by some people here. I think the lies are the problem for many customers here, the sound is something else.