When and how did you, if at all, realize vinyl is better?

yes, GregKohanmin nailed it .

@ptss so true!! I had to return Linn Akurate player because its digital power supply totally f$&@-ed up the rest of my system!  

I got into the lp culture when i was 15 by winning a raffle that gave me 7 lps of my choice. My collection ballooned from there. At university i went to a hifi show and bought my first turntable, amp and speakers. When my engineering friends introduced me to cd i thought it was emperor's new clothes syndrome. CD sounded awful next to my humble set up that was more detailed and had  an obvious vibrant dynamic range advantage compared to the silver discs. I am lucky or perhaps stubborn that i never wavered. Believing my ears even when i was a hifi leper. I often now have friends i went to varsity with with and their silver discs and hi res downloads over for dinner. No comparison and regularly suprise them with a 30 year old lp that is sublime. 

I realised it 53 years ago, later reconfirmed my opinion 37 years ago when CD's and players entered the market in force. I fortunately never "dumped" my record collection for the new format. My 25,000+ collection of LP's is  still growing - perhaps foolishly as I doubt I have enough years left in me to enjoy each and every LP one last time.

I admit I was spoiled when growing up as my parents (modest means) owned a Lenco and I had access to that TT plus a Fisher 500B along with Altecs. During the 60's that'd be considered a great system for an average household. It definitely trained my ear to good reproduction and CD's weren't it. Being a realist however, I do own and have CD's and player but, they are rarely used.

Vinyl snobs should have a bit more sensitivity towards their compatriots who live in the digital world. My hat goes off to those who continue to improve their digital playback. I would do the same given the time and funds. I guess it comes down to what fork in the road you took at least for those who don't pursue both. 
The one person that I have come into contact with who now lives in the digital audio world and has experience that surpasses by many orders of magnitude my own, makes a pretty good case for the consistency of digital vs the setup problems inherent in vinyl, not to mention other problems inherent in getting that great vinyl experience. 
The somewhat predominant view that vinyl reaches higher skewed me towards this medium when it was time to put together a system. It would cost a pretty penny to mach my vinyl system, not to mention the time involved. To those who have gone in both directions simultaneously and found digital to suit your ears, have at it. My intuition tells me that at some time digital has to surpass vinyl. However, as long as my trip down my stairs leads me to the level of enjoyment I have now it's best for me to drop the needle.