your opinion about digital files

[JohnanYoko]

Flac please.

[nikthastik]

if i can't get a lossless download i'll probably purchase the cd as well as the deluxe vinyl version. overkill?, no just a huge fan who wants vinyl for home and lossless format for listening to in the car ect...

[sic transit gloria]

Kelly, please offer the download in FLAC. Whatever server you're going to use to host the files will not have any trouble holding the larger FLAC files in a single ZIP archive. To offer the album only in lossy MP3 is incongruous with the attention to detail that went into the vinyl album (e.g. reprinting the cover, repressing the albums, etc.). Don't drop the ball now by only offering mp3s. Thanks.

[damonin]

sure there are lots of tech explanations, of which i have sat down and studied too, i know all that stuff about bit rates and sample rates, i'm an electronic student anyway. but at the end of the day, vinyl just sounds great and is more fun than CD and computer files, im sure most will agree,

vinyl and cd both sound different because of the limitations that each have on the frequencies that they can produce. If a 24 bit version of the album was transferred to vinyl that it would sound different than the cd version which only is 16 bit. so there is still a reason to have vinyl around even if people are recording albums on computers...

[Dihnekis]

If a 24 bit version of the album was transferred to vinyl that it would sound different than the cd version which only is 16 bit. so there is still a reason to have vinyl around even if people are recording albums on computers...

Yes, transferring a 24bit file to vinyl can potentially yield better results than a 16bit file. However, it is really unarguable that transferring that 24bit file to an analog format results in slight loss of fidelity (pops, clicks, crackle and distortion that occur on vinyl). So no matter what, those 24bit files played back on a high quality DAC are going to sound better than those same files played back on a good turntable.

Of course, there aren't 24bit files available for most albums, so getting the vinyl for its hopefully 24bit version of the files is a benefit. I just don't really think that 24bit to vinyl sounds much better than a 16bit CD played through a good DAC. Our ears pretty much can't hear the difference between 24/96 and 16/44 (hell, they can't really tell the difference between 320kbps and FLAC), and the new distortions and impurities that HAVE to result while pressing vinyl often result in distractions from the clean digital recording. An example is skeletal lamping... vinyl rip suggests 24/96 files were used for the pressing, but my ears prefer a FLAC rip of the cd to the actual vinyl.

Vinyl from an entirely analog lineage is better than anything digital though. Also, sometimes a digital album will actually sound really nice thanks to vinyl's distorting properties (more warmth).

[damonin]

Yes, transferring a 24bit file to vinyl can potentially yield better results than a 16bit file. However, it is really unarguable that transferring that 24bit file to an analog format results in slight loss of fidelity (pops, clicks, crackle and distortion that occur on vinyl). So no matter what, those 24bit files played back on a high quality DAC are going to sound better than those same files played back on a good turntable.

Of course, there aren't 24bit files available for most albums, so getting the vinyl for its hopefully 24bit version of the files is a benefit. I just don't really think that 24bit to vinyl sounds much better than a 16bit CD played through a good DAC. Our ears pretty much can't hear the difference between 24/96 and 16/44 (hell, they can't really tell the difference between 320kbps and FLAC), and the new distortions and impurities that HAVE to result while pressing vinyl often result in distractions from the clean digital recording. An example is skeletal lamping... vinyl rip suggests 24/96 files were used for the pressing, but my ears prefer a FLAC rip of the cd to the actual vinyl.

Vinyl from an entirely analog lineage is better than anything digital though. Also, sometimes a digital album will actually sound really nice thanks to vinyl's distorting properties (more warmth).

If you have high enough quality sound equipment it is a lot easier to notice the difference between file quality. Also if 45 rpm vinyl was used it would be of higher quality than the standard 33 rpm... But yes vinyl does have a distinct warmth that is nice to hear. Recently i noticed that the pixes reissue "minotaur" was released on DVD and bluray discs taking advantage of the higher bitrate formats. which makes me wish that DVD audio or maybe even a new format on blu-ray was adopted by the public. but alas the MP3 revolution has destroyed sound quality for the mainstream and no one really cares if their 50 cent song they downloaded off iTunes is only 128kbps...

[Abel]

I think in some cases it's easy to tell the difference between 320kb/s and FLAC. Maybe it depends on how much is going on in the music or the natural timbre of the instruments and sounds. I've never been able to tell the difference with recordings of live shows, though, so I don't know why people prefer to share that stuff in FLAC all the time.

Also, speaking of DVD audio, the new 40th anniversary edition of In The Court of The Crimson King comes with a DVD:

DVD
5.1 Surround Sound mixes available in DTS 5.1. Mixed & produced by Steven Wilson.
24/48 High Resolution Stereo mixes.
24/48 High Resolution Stereo mixes of alternative takes from the original studio session.
24/48 High Resolution Stereo mixes of 2004 re-master, transferred of the original 1969 vinyl mix.
"21st Century Schizoid Man" - film from Hyde Park concert 5 July 1969.

[damonin]

yeah i was reading about compression. audio artifacts are more apparent when there are large jumps from low to high volume and vice versa since with compression they are trying to limit the amount of frequency's present in the file. removing frequency's that we are less likely to notice being gone to create the illusion of a "full sound".

[ufoinkushiro]

i've had another think about this and now i believe that both digital and analog have their own uses. i think neither is superior. i think it depends on what you want to do.

[Dihnekis]

Strangely, I prefer my vinyl copy of Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots to the DVD-Audio 24/96 files, although the album itself was almost certainly recorded on digital equipment.

Pretty much counteracts everything i said above, but this is an exception.