Is Vinyl More Dynamic than CD?

Many audiophiles say that vinyl is more dynamic sounding than CD, but now it appears that these claims are not as outrageous as they seem.

Christine Tham, a frequent audio asylum poster, has carried out a dynamics comparison of LP vs digital formats, and her findings are quite interesting. LPs do in fact have a usable dynamic range far greater than the measured dynamic range would suggest, and LPs consistently have higher relative dynamics over digital formats: http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/specsformats/LPsvsCDsDynamics.php

 

Interesting. Thanks for posting it. I have both and like both and hear them as sounding more or less exactly the same, so it doesn't really matter to me whether vinyl is more or less dynamic than CD.

 

interesting, i would think the differences between the eac 'rip' and the direct from cd replay would make those that contend that transports make no difference sit up a little. of course all my music is ripped with eac anyway now
cheers

julian

 

I find it really interesting that she manages to prove her point using vinyl from what I see as the grim and dark days of the mid 80s, i.e. pretty lame pressings on thin recycled vinyl. Australian vinyl pressings seldom have much to do with a first generation master tape at all, they tend not to stack up well globaly in the quality stakes. Had she compared original 50s-60s US Blue Notes or vintage yellow/black UK Beatles albums with current CDs the difference in favour of vinyl would be even greater!

Tony.

 

Except that the "direct from cd replay" was read by the CD transport, converted to analogue, out through the CD player's analogue outputs, through the amp, amplified and out the amp's analogue outputs, then converted back to digital by the soundcard, which I'd suggest might account for the differences

 

I don't see why it should be outrageous to think they limit peaks on CDs, most of us have always known it. I saw the difference on peak-hold meters when I archived a lot of vinyl to DAT about 13 years ago

 

does she say how much you need to spend before you hear this?