Analog playback on computer.

@chakster    digital has no value!

I.m sorry but I couldn't disagree more, I think we are all audiophiles and also record collectors. Why else would we buy recordings and also try to update the sound quallity on our equiptment when time and money allows us to do it. What I will throw into the pot is the term Music Lover. That is what got me into hi fi in the first place as I used to listen to music on valve radio when I was a boy and I derived a lot of pleasure from it. When I got older and started working for a living I then could buy Hi fidelity equiptment to play recordings on so that I could get more pleasure from my first love, being a music lover. Now there are some audiophiles and some record collectors who are not music lovers, you just have to look at their record collections to find it out. They generally have their music and hi fi bought from suggestions garnered from music and hifi rags . I have seen it first hand on many occasions and on visiting some of them they have usually told me they have bought from reviews from Hi Fi News and Gramophone and never even hear before they purchased. Some have even said they have bought because they liked the nice glow the valves gave off or their wife liked that box because it would fit in with the decor and again not hahing listened before purchase. I would have a component in a biscuit tin if it gave better sound.
No I shall always remain a music lover and I love streaming now because I have a computer that is as good sounding as my Gryphon CD player and I can also listen to a recording before I decide to buy it in hi rez format and it won't deteriorate no matter how many playings.

I've been scrutinizing HD downloads all morning, and they are the ultimate; no cracks or pops.

I can understand how much fun people derive from playing with their very expensive "eye candy" toys, and refuse to admit that there is a new "high end" kid on the block; never the less, the new kid is the winner; less money and baggage.

No cracks, no pops, no phisical media, no sleeve, nothing ... and easy to copy. I can understand if you're talking about new music recorded digitally, but if you're talking about great heritage of the 50s, 60s, 70s which was recorded 100% analog on mastertape, how come your digital high-resolution files can be better? Digital remaster of the analog source is the worst thing on the planet, it's better to not touch the great recordings from the past, just playing the original LPs on our expensive toys. 

The difference is that some of the old LPs are highly collectible and the prices goes up every year. I'm not talking about some pop sh*t. I'm about real music. 

The vinyl has value, it's an investment. It's real thing.
And like the collectors of Art no one interested in digital copies, only originals. 

Even 20 years old hipsters are into vinyl nowadays, because it's the real thing and digital generation of kids realizing it. 

Vinyl can not be replaced by any other media, it's the best media out there and that's why it's still alive. Pressing plants are still working all over the world. 

 

@chakster
Yes I get what you are saying about analogue being collectable and I do agree with that. But digital remastering of analogue no I cannot condone that because I have digital remasters of some of the Greatest recordings of the sixties in Classical form. Solti's Ring Cycle and Klemperer's Mahler, Das Lied von der Erde to name 2. What Decca and EMI have done with those original analogue tapes is nothing short of a miracle. Have a listen if you don't believe me.

Most LPs produced in the last 35 years have been through an AD/DA loop at one stage or the other. Even if labeled AAA, most of them have been digitized during the cutting process.

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