Re:The shy return of vinyl? (Score 1)

Buying new vinyl is a waste. The masters are digital, so you get the worst of both worlds, the disadvantages of both analog and digital and the advantages of neither.

Yes, the masters are digital, but most mastering houses will do their job in at least 24bit/96'000 so that means the quality of the files getting cut to vinyl is going to be better than that which ends up on the CD. On top of this when the 24/96 get converted to 16/44,1 there is noise introduced even if dithering algorithms are used.

Arguably, on good (read as studio level) equipment you will be able to hear the difference between 16/44.1 and 24/96. As agreed by a lot of same mastering engineers the difference between 24/96 to 24/192 is hardly noticeable and the extra file heft is not worth it, but the 16/44.1 is clearly inferior.

Now, of course not everything which gets pressed to vinyl is recorded in ideal circumstances and not always the mastering is excellent, but in a club with an above average loud sound system I can pretty much every time tell between someone playing off of vinyl and CDs/mp3s. Thus the popularity of vinyl in DJ circles. Plus it helps to separate those that are really ready to invest into the music they play from those who don't which brings about a few more kudos :)

Some people are still cutting dubplates of their new tracks, instead of putting them on CD-Rs for a good reason too...