Vinyl Reason

Thank you Zaikesman! (Good grief!)

All these descrete answers span quite a continuum.

This thread needs a dissenting voice, so I'll supply one. I've owned several 'tables over the course of my time in audio--a much-modified Linn LP12 and an SME Model 30 among them--and I enjoyed the hell out them, though I hated the inconveniences that come with vinyl (cleaning, flipping every 20 minutes, the ever-present snap, crackle, and pop, and the endless tweaking that I had to do to dial in the performance and keep it dialed in. But I stayed with vinyl up until a year ago, because, simply, it sounded better than any digital source I had heard up that point. That changed with the introduction of EMM Labs' DCC2, paired with Meitner's modified Phillips SACD-1000. The sound that that combination produced simply staggered me. It was so much better than any digital I'd heard before, it was almost unfair. After getting the CDSD dedicated transport last year, things got MUCH better. I found myself listening to the EMM stuff more and more, simply because vinyl played through the SME was no longer consistently more enjoyable than digital. On certain recordings, I'd SLIGHTLY prefer the vinyl, but it was now so close in terms of performance (with the EMM usually winning out) that I couldn't justify keeping the vinyl any longer. And the convenience issue cemented the deal. I haven't looked back since.