Interesting article about the current direction in recorded music sales.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/14/vinyl-records-on-track-to-outsell-cds-and-prices-have-risen-490percent.html

Jeff

Back to the future!

I'm glad that I kept all of my LPs and that earlier this year I purchased a new turntable. I've always like LPs over CDs.

Thanx for sharing.

I still have all my vinyl too, going back to the 60's

Sorry, but sort of a mis-leading article.

No offense meant to anybody so don’t be hating on me now ....and apologies for veering a bit of topic. Us old pharts do that.

I would love to see a correctly done (good research design) double blind study that tested for discrimination accuracy of those tested regarding:

High quality mp3 vs wav vs etc.
Vinyl vs CD vs the best streaming platform
$3K speakers vs $500 speakers
High end tube amp vs a decent sold state amp

And more...

Good article. I'm surprised CD sales are still that high.

Bud

Caveat 1: I have a huge vinyl collection dating to early Elvis...including the Beatles "Butcher" album - got real lucky with that! All purchased when released. After the advent of CD's they were all relegated to the basement where they remain. I've gone from that vinyl collection to replacing most with CD's to uploading 500 CD's to iTunes to Apple Music.

Caveat 2: I owned some of the best turntables and tube amps. Mostly they too reside in the basement...well I wish all the tube amps did given the market for them now!

LOVE playing vinyl. At our local hospital radio station there's over 3000 vinyl LPs. Quality even from the 60s' is incredible.
I bought a double vinyl album last year from a friend of mine who recorded his last album on vinyl AND cd. He gave me the cd, but the difference is astonishing. Vinyl for me every time

I still have my vinyl collection (about 1500 albums), but am digitizing them to MP3 (using pretty good software designed for that). It takes a while, but it's a fun hobby. I could probably get a number of them on CD, but I don't like buying the same thing twice, and many are no longer available anyway.

And I never had very good luck trying to listen to my records while driving in the car.

Have you tried playing records in a boat?

John, if you are using software just for this task of converting vinyl to MP3, would you mind sharing the name?

Matt,
Can't speak for John, but I just record the turntable output to PT/RB, then use the PGVinyl tool sparingly (actually a pretty impressive tool once you learn it). And save as Wav.

The PGMusic VinylTool is worth exploring if you want to get your OLD vinyl albums digitized.
I have a few hundred and some are definitely collector stuff, but alas I've also abused/wore out many that are no longer available.
The PGMusic VinylTool is another hidden tool you already have but may not have tinkered with ..
The settings in the image below are my default starting point, like I said; you gotta tinker with it a bit.

Hi all
I am a great fan of vinyl, but sadly I sold my last turntable about 15 tears ago for more than I paid for it new back in the HI Fi era.
Replaced most of my collection with CDs the balance transferred to high spec cassette tape.



Still miss that sound and the Valve (tube) amps.
So much so that as some of you know I have recently bought a class A push pull valve amp for my guitar. Reminds me of those hifi valve amps like the Leak, Quad, Radford, etc. the sound I loved.
However I can see how this all happened with the move to music PC based music and software in recent years.
With the DAT audio systems and the ill fated minidisk (remember them) sandwiched somewhere along the way.

Mike

Mike, I still have all my Hi-Fi audio from the 70s. Sounds great, including the 4-track Teac deck.

Bob (rharv) thanks for the tip. I see the RIAA curve adjustment is included; also a rumble filter, not useful anywhere else. Impressive.

I love my vinyls and I probably have about 1000, but to be honest, most of my listening to music these days is via streaming... it is just so much more convenient.

Will

Guys, if your Lps are quite crackly, then use Adobe audition ( or even cool edit as it was before.) It's been a fantastic tool for me copying Lps from friends. It REALLY works at taking all the crackles & pops out of a recording. I've even used it for hiss removal from old tapes. This was the software I've used for years for recording vinyl to cds to begin with. Don't have any more to copy now. I've about 10,000 cds on two 64gb sd cards and also backed up on a 1tb ext hd, which I use to take to the studio to do my radio shows.

Yes, I've used Adobe Audition (Cool Edit) for all my stereo editing from more than a decade. But unless you are recording from an amp the turntable is connected to, converting a signal from a turntable requires a preamp and that RIAA emphasis curve. There must be some interface that does it, or else perhaps software.

Originally my goodmans turntable had two phono out sockets, and would connect to my Behringer sound module. At the moment I don't have or need a turntable as I can just record any at the hospital radio studio and take them home to edit.

My Audio Technica turntable has audio outs, which is connected to my mixer and near field monitors, as well as a USB port, which is connected to my computer.

I only convert to a CD songs that I want or need to learn, and that is very rarely.

Hi all

Some of you mention the RIAA equalization curve.
This will need to be dealt with if your pickup is Magnetic, moving coil or moving iron (magnet) like Sure, Ortifon, etc. these will also need a pre amp as the output is low a few mv. The RIAA treatment is included in pre amps made for this purpose, in hi fi amps or can be bought as free standing units to give you an equalized output at a higher level for driving what ever. If you use a magnetic cartridge.

However those using ceramic pick up cartridges, you don’t need to worry about RIAA Eq or preamps.
As they are a much higher impendence and output often 100mv to 1volt .
The eq is not required because the ceramic element compensates for the recording curve.

This means that if you don’t use RIAA eq when using a magnetic pickup it will sound thin and toppy no bass. Where as a ceramic will give you an already flatter output across the range. Into its correct impedance.

The above all assumes that you are feeding the above cartridges to their correct input impedance, that is :normally 47k moving iron(magnet),
Moving coil are often much lower impedance and need to go through a transformer to bring them up to a 47k input.
Ceramic cartridges req a much higher impedance 1M to 2M to perform as above.

Strangely, and confusing for some folks if you feed a high impedance ceramic cartridge into a 47k input the mismatch causes its output to not be flat
In fact it would be all top and no bass so you can bring it back on line by using RIAA EQ. But you would overload a magnetic cartridge input because of the ceramic cartridge high output

Have fun
Mike

One thing I'm surprised is making a comeback is cassette - more and more independent artists I follow are releasing new projects on cassette tape. Which is strange to me since I have vivid memories of how low quality it sounded.

I do think vinyl is around for the long run. If anything else, the artwork on a record is stunning when you compare it to the tiny little artwork on a cassette or CD case. Between the packaging and vinyl itself, I almost consider it a work of art itself aside from the music.

I had read something about a huge shortage of vinyl pressing equipment and the people who know how to run them. I vaguely remember reading about how records are made as a kid and it's complicated. Here's a good article about it:

Chicago gets it's first vinyl pressing plant in decades

Bob

hi



Strangely by the time cassettes came to an end, the high end cassette decks could turn in a good recording.
What was not so good were commercial releases of compact cassette recordings, owing to the fact that they often copied for distribution on high speed copiers.
As you know to double the speed doubles the frequency so you soon finished up outside the capabilities of the medium and the copies would playback at the correct speed when you played them but lacked in high frequency content.
This has always been a problem with any double speed copier for tape systems in general. 15k is 30k at double speed.
Real time copy is a much safer bet.
Mike

That happens a lot with different technologies. Whatever it is finally gets developed to where it was promised to be 20 years ago just to be supplanted by a whole new thing. The P51 fighter of WW2 is pretty much the pinnacle of prop driven fighters only to go the way of the dodo by jets and now it's coming with cars. Internal combustion engines are coming to an end too just when their efficiencies, emmissions and fuel economy has never been better. I've been reading a lot about the next crop of EV's and they will be huge in just 2 or 3 years. 200-300 mile ranges and lower end models costs in the 20-30K area. Millennials can afford those and they love green stuff.

Bob

I totally agree Mike. Most of my cassettes after CDs came out were backups of my CDs for the car. I had used Maxell XLIIS Chrome tapes and those would always sound awesome in the car, more so than mass produced, pre-recorded cassettes.

Matt -

It's the software I've mentioned before - Diamond Cut Audio Restoration. Craig Maier and Rick Carlson (the programmers - it's a small operation) participate in the forum, and they give out help when asked. I've also beta tested for them multiple times.

For the audiophiles, they also offer a flat pre-amp (hardware) to record your records (I don't have this, but thought I would mention it), and then you can apply the RIAA curve via software after the fact. This allows you to use your turntable with any record, regardless of curve used.

I just have my Audio Technica turntable plugged into the phonograph input of my Sanyo stereo receiver; the receiver provides the pre-amp circuitry (although the phonograph can provide it's own if you just want to plug into a line in). I then connect my computer sound card to the Tape 1 input/output of the receiver and I record using the computer as if it were recording using a tape deck. Anything played on the computer (Youtube videos, MP3's, BIAB/RealBand, etc) just outputs to through the stereo receiver speakers.

The software has a lot of filters (both in-depth), as well as EZ filters if you just want to do things quickly. It's not perfect, but I've found my work flow to get pretty good results in eliminating ticks, pops, hum, noise, rumble, etc.

Brother that looks like a serious turntable. I think back to the equipment I had many, many years ago. A Carver M1.5 amp and Sonic Holograph C-1 preamp. I loved that equipment! But feel on hard times for a while and sold them. Maybe I'll try to pick them up on eBay or something.

This actually reminded me that I really need to get my turntable fixed. It needs a new belt and I just haven't gotten around to replacing it, and there's so many things I want to pick up. I dunno, I'm one of those people that when I spend money on things I like to have something physical (at least when it comes to music, at any rate). I suppose I'm a little weird like that.

One of the only reasons for this is hipsters trying to connect with a past that they didn’t participate in. Trucker hats also sell well to that crowd. I use both Spotify and Amazon Music, but I buy used CDs because they still sound better than streaming and vinyl (I don’t have $1000+ to blow on a turntable and cartridge and needle that allow the quality to come close to CD quality). Now and then I will buy a CD based on new songs I’ve heard on Spotify. The vinyl craze will die off within the next 3-5 years, my guess. These same folks also think cassette tapes are the bomb. They will outgrow their hipster ways sooner or later.