Vinyl cut from digital masters

If the CD is available, what would the reason sonically to buy a vinyl LP that is cut from digital masters? I can't think of any reason except artwork or collectability... Am I wrong?

 

How do you know if they are done from digital masters??

 

Lucky, the only ones (digitially cut vinyl lp's) I have, for the most part, are Beatles ones, that I am a sucker for re collecting. But really, why do I own Beatles 1 on vinyl???

At least I did not jump on the latest Japan Beatles LP's...

 

I've recorded some of the early digital Deutsche Grammophon LP recordings by Karajan to cassette and the process seemed to have tamed the shrillness that was seemingly part and parcel of that process - at least the recordings were easier on my ears. I should try the same thing with the analog connection on my CD recorder. I still have most of those "digital" Lps.

 

Steve,

Is there a difference between digital masters and a digitial recording? For example, if Brothers In Arms is a digital recording, is there ever a reason to get a vinyl copy of it (the highly recommended Simply Vinyl pressing, for example)? Or are we talking about two different things?

Bob

 

I think so...

I use "Brothers" as an example...I remember, back in the day, they made a big deal of it being a "full digital recording". Would something like that be mixed to analog tape? Some parts of this I am still learning...

 

Wouldn't different EQ choices or less digital limiting be a good reason to get the LP version? I've found that some newer LPs can be better than their digital counterparts. IMHO, of course.

 

Well, there's a few cases I can think of where you might benefit from the LP..... If the mix is at 24 bit and gets truncated to 16 bit without dither, the cd may not sound as good as the LP, especially if they have a good D/A, going from 24 bit straight to the D/A..... I'm thinking that the LP would have less damage done in this situation. The situation would also be even more ridiculous if the CD player at home has a sharp lowpass filter and a bad D/A converter chip. So, the home playback system is also a factor......


-Wes

 

The first Norah Jones album, I think, is a "full" digital recording. I've heard from a couple of audiophile friends that the vinyl sounds quite nice.

 

...some enjoy vinyl so much, it's worth the spin alone be it digital or analog...I prefer cold digital CD's.

 

Help me out with the terminology, please!

Does the term "digital master" technically refer to the actual data that is to be pressed on a CD? There shouldn't be any further editing, manipulation, equalizing, limiting, etc, of the actual digital master because then that wouldn't really be the digital master at that point. Or does "digital master" refer to any digitally recorded master tape?

Because it seems to me that if you had to choose between an LP carefully cut from, for example, a 96kHz/24-bit recording without any futzing or a CD made from the same source but with, say, excessive peak-limiting used...then the LP would be the way to go. Right?

On the other hand, I can certainly see there's no point to cutting an LP from what basically amounts to a CD, that is, 44.1kHz/16-bit audio.

 

I think you've got it, Matt.

 

The vast amount of 'audiophile' pressings on vinyl that are available now (not talking about reputable manufacturers here, sundazed/4 men with beards/classic etc) often called 'DJ pressings' or'facsimile pressings' usually without barcodes are all pressed from either cd or other digital sources. I've had a few....early two-globe motown Smokey Robinsons, mono first Velvets, capitol Fred Neil, obscure brazillian bossa, rare Blue Note sessions all sold thru legit dealers or online stores all BOOTLEGS! It seems to be a massive industry with some really quite obscure stuff available. But compare the mono VU to an original blue label verve copy and it becomes apparent that the source of the 'new' pressing was the cd version of the mono album from the 'deluxe' edition or the earlier box set. I'm really surprised that someone hasn't done the beatles..but I guess it would have to be from original needle drop source to get useable first four stereos and later mono masters?

 

It was an analog recording mixed to digital.

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jul04/articles/arifmardin.htm

 

Right, but are most Digital recordings done at 44.1kHz/16-bit audio, before they go to CD?. I thought in general, they would have been done at a higher bit rate.

 

I don't consciously rebuy digital recordings on LP with the intent of "upgrading" sonics, for the reasons Steve and others mention above. However sometimes I get the chance for some "accidental" experiments...

For example, I bought a lot of jazz vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson's LPs for the Milestone label (all digitally recorded) for cheap to get a couple of the recordings I didn't have in any format, but in the process also got a couple titles I already had on CD. In A/B'ing the duplicated titles, the LPs aren't by any means the best sounding in my collection, but they are most definitely a bit superior to the CDs.

I'm honestly not sure if these digital recordings were mixed to analog master tape or not for producing the LPs - the sleeve notes are vague on this, but I kind of doubt it given the era (all 80s records) and suspect these are from digital masters. If so could the worse CD sonics be due to greater "downsampling" in CD production (44.1kHz/16-bit as noted above) than in cutting LPs from a digital master? I don't know...all I can say is the LPs sound a little better than the CDs.

 

Scorpio??

 

That's what i thought too, but they are not actually bootlegs are they?.

 

Not bootlegs. Totally legit.

From vinyl.com who sells a ton of this crap:

Are these LP's audiophile recordings?

No. Though some of our albums have been remastered from original analog tapes and could be considered audiophile quality, most are not. Unless stated otherwise, it should be assumed that our reissues have been digitally remastered (usually) from a digital audio tape/D.A.T. provided to us by the label

 

Many people have said that the Smile LP sounds better than the CD. I haven't played the copy I got last week. Wasn't the vinyl was cut from the 24 bit digital ProTools data, which would agree with a previous poster who hypothesized that going from high resolution digital to LP might sound better than high resolution digital to CD?

 

Are the new MoFi half-speed mastered vinyl releases of John Lennon (Imagine, Plastic Ono Band & Mind Games) all copied from digital sources?
For those who have these vinyls, do they sound very analog?