When is digital going to get the soul of music?

What I didn't think was possible(I kept quiet, and was happily listening to[my much improved]analog.)has happened! I will have to verify this in my own system, and it is a prototype. I heard Ori's(Oritek Audio) battery-powered(and not just any battery)Pre/Dac. In fact, I was just discussing if digital was ever going to become music with him, when he used this. The main thing was that you could listen into(and all the way back)the music. The music was whole(like analog)-and not just individual sounds. I could actually live with this! Digital usually makes me tense(and that is my main objection to it). This Pre/Dac wasn't. We switched to analog(upon Ori's insistence), and this was the main difference: Analog was cloudier. Analog's voices maybe were a little more realistic. Separation was interesting. I would say that digital still slightly draws the music to the new sound a little unnaturally(I think this could be taken into account somehow in the recording process). I'm not sure if analog's separation was quite right, either. Analog was slightly(and I mean slightly)more relaxing. Anyway, bottom line, I think an analog-lover could live with this. Nothing I've heard(and I haven't heard everythig, but everyone "oohs" and "ahhs" over slight differences in digital, while it retains the same unlistenable characteristic)to date has made digital into music-until now. To give you an idea, I have heard the Berkeley DAC(modified). While it is closer to analog in sound, it does not cross the threshold into music(for me). I was a little sceptical when Ori asked me to hear his battery powered Pre/Dac, but I should have known better(the preamp section of his pre/dac is world class, his modified Stereo 70 is a poor man's Lamm). I just had no hope for digital as music until now.

Mmakshak, I have had a similar experience with my new Mac/Amarra/Firewire/Weiss Minerva. I have found the soundstage more precise, the top end sweeter and more extended, and the bass deeper and less one note in character than my vinyl system (Shindo Labs combo).

I sought to get more information on Oritek but their webpage cannot be found. Do you have a link?

1-16-10: a date which will live in infamy.......

Tbg,I emailed Ori about your not being able to find his webpage. Mapman,I would like to have more time to listen to his battery-powered Pre/Dac in my system, but for me, you're right about a date that will live in infamy. Some questions still arise in my mind. I would think that somehow the low resolution of standard cd could be heard, but I don't think it will be disturbing. If microphoning would be less ping-pongey with digital, I think that would help with the illusion of music(I'm thinking about one of the Dire Straits cd's.) I think I might prefer listening to mostly digital, but Ori showed that analog is a teeny bit more relaxing, but digital is not tense now(I feel it in my throat.). Analog seemed to fill the spaces between sounds a little unnaturally(cloudy?). Tgb, consider yourself lucky, as I've never heard digital that was music until now.

I don't know with absolute certainty; however, I believe redbook often gets an unwarranted bad rap - I've listened to some cd's that sounded great because what occurred upstream, i.e. recording and mastering, was great.