The truth about the vinyl sound
Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 12:46 pm
The simple truth about the "vinyl sound" is that it simply doesn't exist. Naturally, a piece of vinyl will sound like something when you play it, but there are simply so many variables in play, sometimes major variables, that an uniform thing called the vinyl sound is an oxymoron.
When you make a track in your studio, send it to mastering and receive the file later it will sound pretty much the same everywhere. You can play it from your phone, an XDJ/CDJ, even a high end player and the music will sound more or less the same, because DAC's today are pretty good and most of them don't colour the sound much. There are some, but not many variables and those variables aren't that major in 2017.
However, with vinyl this doesn't hold true. The chain from the piece of plastic to the amplifier has several steps that can change the sound, sometimes radically. From the top of my head, these variable include at least, in the order that they appear:
- Mastering. Voidloss can probably tell more about this process, but there are some things that are done differently due to the limitations of vinyl.
- The choice of vinyl itself. The format (7", 12", LP etc), 33 or 45 RPM, the thickness, colour/picture vinyl etc.
- Pressing. Some vinyl presses make consistently quality records, some have a bad rep. They also sometimes make mistakes which can result to noisy records or records that easily make the needle jump because of excess bass.
- The condition of that particular record. A scratchy, dusty record will obviously sound different than a record straight out of the vinyl press.
- The turntable itself, before we even go to the electronics. A plastic 10€ turntable with an old, worn belt will sound different than a Technics DJ turntable, which will again sound different than a hifi/high end turntable meant for listening records in your own home. Vinyl records are played mechanically so if the turntable is very flimsy it can cause the record to wobble and a bad motor or a belt can cause fluctuations in the rotating speed. And of course, if you play in a loud club the bass can cause all kinds of problems that need to be prepared for.
- The settings of the turntable. Needle weight affects of course, but there are typically other settings as well, which can affect the sound.
- The needle and the cartridge. A DJ scratching cartridge with a worn out needle will sound very different than a pristine needle in a quality hifi cartridge.
- The tonearm and the electronics inside the turntable. There's a reason why, for example, some like to change the tonearm of an SL1200 to a better one or change the wiring inside.
- The phono preamp of the amplifier, DJ mixer or even a standalone preamp. There can be huge differences in these, from crappy to fairly neutral to preamps that even seem to enhance the sound.
As we can see, there are several variables that affect the sound of a vinyl record and some of these variable aren't even that minor and of course, when you combine them you can get wildly different sounding vinyls. The same song pressed on one side of a new, black 12" single, played with a quality setup in a good condition will sound EXTREMELY different than the exact same song from a 20 minutes a side picture vinyl album played with a plastic thrift store turntable with a worn out needle, crappy cartridge and some 50€ Behringer DJ mixer as the preamp.
This is why talking about the "vinyl sound" is a bit silly, as the same song can sound either MUCH worse than the wav file of the same song but also in some cases it can sound better than that file.
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Note: I wrote this very quickly and might edit it later in case I forgot something or noticed a mistake. Kinda wanted to make a statement about this issue that gets talked about a lot, often by people with limited experience on the matter. I'm not an audio pro, but I've had my fair share of testing over the years.
When you make a track in your studio, send it to mastering and receive the file later it will sound pretty much the same everywhere. You can play it from your phone, an XDJ/CDJ, even a high end player and the music will sound more or less the same, because DAC's today are pretty good and most of them don't colour the sound much. There are some, but not many variables and those variables aren't that major in 2017.
However, with vinyl this doesn't hold true. The chain from the piece of plastic to the amplifier has several steps that can change the sound, sometimes radically. From the top of my head, these variable include at least, in the order that they appear:
- Mastering. Voidloss can probably tell more about this process, but there are some things that are done differently due to the limitations of vinyl.
- The choice of vinyl itself. The format (7", 12", LP etc), 33 or 45 RPM, the thickness, colour/picture vinyl etc.
- Pressing. Some vinyl presses make consistently quality records, some have a bad rep. They also sometimes make mistakes which can result to noisy records or records that easily make the needle jump because of excess bass.
- The condition of that particular record. A scratchy, dusty record will obviously sound different than a record straight out of the vinyl press.
- The turntable itself, before we even go to the electronics. A plastic 10€ turntable with an old, worn belt will sound different than a Technics DJ turntable, which will again sound different than a hifi/high end turntable meant for listening records in your own home. Vinyl records are played mechanically so if the turntable is very flimsy it can cause the record to wobble and a bad motor or a belt can cause fluctuations in the rotating speed. And of course, if you play in a loud club the bass can cause all kinds of problems that need to be prepared for.
- The settings of the turntable. Needle weight affects of course, but there are typically other settings as well, which can affect the sound.
- The needle and the cartridge. A DJ scratching cartridge with a worn out needle will sound very different than a pristine needle in a quality hifi cartridge.
- The tonearm and the electronics inside the turntable. There's a reason why, for example, some like to change the tonearm of an SL1200 to a better one or change the wiring inside.
- The phono preamp of the amplifier, DJ mixer or even a standalone preamp. There can be huge differences in these, from crappy to fairly neutral to preamps that even seem to enhance the sound.
As we can see, there are several variables that affect the sound of a vinyl record and some of these variable aren't even that minor and of course, when you combine them you can get wildly different sounding vinyls. The same song pressed on one side of a new, black 12" single, played with a quality setup in a good condition will sound EXTREMELY different than the exact same song from a 20 minutes a side picture vinyl album played with a plastic thrift store turntable with a worn out needle, crappy cartridge and some 50€ Behringer DJ mixer as the preamp.
This is why talking about the "vinyl sound" is a bit silly, as the same song can sound either MUCH worse than the wav file of the same song but also in some cases it can sound better than that file.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: I wrote this very quickly and might edit it later in case I forgot something or noticed a mistake. Kinda wanted to make a statement about this issue that gets talked about a lot, often by people with limited experience on the matter. I'm not an audio pro, but I've had my fair share of testing over the years.