I've been turning this one over in my head for a week now waiting for this board to be back up. I don't know from Direct to Disk, HDD, DVD-A, or Sony HDCD, or other new formats. My favorite format for music is the original masters on 180g vinyl, virgin vinyl, or regular vinyl; reel-to-reel then casette tape; OMR gold cd, then OMR aluminum cd; then cd. Interestingly the most convenient formats seem to have the worst fidelity. Comments or difference of opinion?
Well, my question is, if you don't know the difference between the digital formats, have you heard any of them?
I have one HDCD disc, The Pizza Tapes. I haven't given it a good listen on my best equipment yet. Also, it's been my experience Grateful Dead records are usually sonically superior, which may make it more difficult to attribute better fidelity soley to HDCD. I have not heard the other digital formats. Is it your opinion they are a better experience than vinyl and tape?
I would tend to agree with you that analog usually sounds better than conversions to digital of the same music. Having said that, I have to admit that digital is more convenient. Now that SACD (Sony's new Direct Stream Digital format) is beginning to take hold, the potential exists for capable engineers like Steve Hoffman to, finally, produce digital recordings that may be all but indistinguishable from their original analog counterparts.
I know it's just a personal opinion and we each feel diferently about the audio quality of different formats, but I must say that i have a hard time taking seriously anyone who seriously thinks that cassette tapes sound better than compact discs.
Have you ever listened to an MFSL Original Master Recording dolby B cassette? I know they are hard to find now, but I have six, and they are worth a listen. Beach Boys Surfer Girl, Beatles MMT, Bowie's Let's Dance, Jackson's Night and Day, Dark Side of the Moon, and Ritenour's Captain Fingers. In all honesty I do not have a CD version of any of these albums, but they are so satisfying I have no desire to purchase the CD's.
To me playing vinyl is a ritual, I listen to the music, read the lyrics, liner notes, admire the artwork. Vinyl makes me happy, simple as that.