How many great CDs do you have?

This is actually a very good question. One of the goals for my system has been to get most CDs to sound good enough that I do not feel like I am missing anything.

After some recent system upgrades (tube pre and DAC), most of the CDs I play (I own a few hundred I suppose) sound at least very good, if not exceptional, in the same league as good vinyl. By this I mean I believe they sound the way that the producers intended them to sound and they play nice and clear and do not produce fatigue during long term listening, which is good, but they are not necessarily absolute top notch in all cases...only a smaller percentage can be that.

This is the case whether I rip them first to the music server and access them over the wireless connection from the Soundbridge or whether played on the Denon player.

Prior to moving to the Audio Research sp-16 tube pre-amp, I did have some reservations with many larger scale orchestral pieces, particularly in regards to the smoothness and unique character of different types of string instruments compared to some of the better systems I had heard. Now, these pass my listening tests with flying colors as well.

I've been a very happy camper in regards to my system of late.....

Clearly, there are good and bad recordings in all formats. Format may limit potential but does not guarantee quality of the content delivered.

I can not say that in my collection of hundreds of lps and hundreds of CDs that either format contains a higher percentage of either bad, good, great or magical recordings. Two different masterings of the same title will usually sound different though regardless of format of each, and that often dictates which format I chose for a particular recording.

I do think that the most complex classical recordings tend to sound better on vinyl than CD in the case of many systems in that most systems are more capable of delivering the microdynamics inherent in vinyl better than the microdynamics present in digital recordings.

I believe the microdynamics of vinyl are different than those in digital because mass inertia and related physics play a prime role where as this is not the case with digital playback, which is occurs exclusively in the electronic rather than physical domain.

I have found there are ways to address that issue cost effectively with digital as well. The answer I found was careful application of tubes at the line level. I suspect tubes are just inherently better at delivering the microdynamics associated with digital sources after conversion to the analog domain prior to playback compared to SS.

By the way, the % of recordings that sound good to me is a metric I use and would recommend to gauge system quality regardless of source. When almost everything at least sounds good, and some things sound great, I feel I am where I need to be.

I've played dozens of CDs recently with a variety of material originally recorded as far back as the 1920s since my latest system tweaks. There were only 2 I recall that, knowing their age and history, underwhelmed me, and these were clearly due to lackluster CD production, period. One was an old CD mastering of Carole King's Tapestry, which was just unnaturally flat sounding and another was a CD of old Dinah Wahington blues material from teh 1950's that apparently was just transfered to CD with no attention to remastering or sound quality. Almost everything else sounds very good to exceptional at present.

Both statements are true.

"One gripe, is why do so many Top labels produce rubbish music"

Pretty easy. Marketing and economics. TOp artist cost money. These labels target audiophiles that buy a recording for the same reason they buy equipment...because it sounds good and is marketed to audiophiles.

There are many CDs on more common labels by artists who care about sound quality. Most care more about sales and profit though so the sound quality is a secondary consideration.