Emilo Choco is the real DIY Hammock Man!!!

[headchange4u]

Same thing with music. There was one point in time if you wanted to hear music, you had to play it. No there are stereos and CDs and MP3s.

I still buy vinyl (records). I have always been a stereo and music buff, and while I love my iPod and it's convenience of carrying 8,000+ songs in my pocket, nothing beats dropping the needle on my hi-fi system. Nothing beats live music though.

[Oz-sie]

Are you one of those lucky folks who can actually hear the difference between vinyl and digital? My ears were never that good, they've long since gotten worse.

Personally I hated vinyl back when it was the only real choice available. I HATE listening to all of the pops and ticks. Don't even get me started on how much more convenient digital is to listen to.

I'd always record a homemade cassette the 1st time I played an album, then put up with the hissy tape. When the digital revolution finally caught up to me I still had some great quality LPs to digitize. Great for the obscure stuff I love that never got re-released to CD's

I'm with you on the live music thing. Nothing like a great concert, unless it's a pro recording of a great concert you've already attended.

[funbun]

Are you one of those lucky folks who can actually hear the difference between vinyl and digital? My ears were never that good, they've long since gotten worse.

Yes, I can. Music is my background. Vinyl has a much "warmer" sound. I'm not sure how to explain it my something is "lost" in the digital processing.

If you get pass the crack and pops, the vinyl sounds much better to me. It almost sounds live. Although I prefer the convenience of digital.

However, there has been a big push to try and incorporate those old/analogue sounds into the digital stuff, especially with microphones. Lots of people still like the old vacuum tube amps and mics. They really do sound better. More low end I guess. But many companies are taking what made those old mics great and incorporating that sound into modern transistor mics. that way you get the old sound but not all the pop and cracks and stuff.

That seems to be a trend in our society: kind of a blend of the old with the new.

[headchange4u]

I can hear a huge difference between vinyl and CD's/digital media. Honestly the sound difference is pretty apparent if you have a decent quality stereo sound system and a good turntable. Pops and clicks are artifacts of dirty/scratched records or poor quality needles. If you have a clean record that is pristine you shouldn't hear hardly any pops or clicks.

I also love tube equipment. I actually own a tube CD player if you can believe that.

[Frolicking Dino]

I have to agree that vinyl is on a totally different level from all digital media. Something gets lost on digital media.

[Cannibal]

Everything is lost on digital music. Think of an MP3 as a "Cliff Notes" version of the music. The format for CDs is nothing more than a sampling of the music. The only reason for this was to be able to fit the "same" amount of information into a smaller file. Granted, most people can't tell the difference, but it was a matter of principal to those of us who still try to find good needles. MP3s took the CD formatting to a whole new level of sampling. What you hear on your iPod (love mine) is only a shadow of what was recorded.

[blackbishop351]

Any recording is only a sampling...and a good digital recording is much more faithful to the actual sound than vinyl, because digital media can store so much more information. More samples = better recreation. I'm not saying MP3s are somehow superior; they sacrifice a LOT of quality for small storage space. I'm talking GOOD digital recordings.

A lot of people like vinyl BECAUSE of its flaws, though, and that's just a personal preference. Much like tube vs. solid state processors...solid state equipment can produce much cleaner, more faithful sound - and is more precise to work with, electronically - but many people simply prefer tubes because of the tones created by their reproduction flaws.

[Preacha Man]

PoTAToes ---- PoTOToes,

Emilo Choco likes making his own hammocks, I like making my own hammocks, others like to buy their hammocks, but we all love hangin

[Oz-sie]

I seem to have a way of de-railing perfectly good hammocking threads.

I wish I had your ears folks. Even I can tell the difference between good recordings and most MP3 files, but I can't tell digital from analog. . . .

HeadChange: Wish I had the $ for a system that posh. A tube CD player. Wow. No wonder you 'roll your own' gear, you've already spent all your $ on the important stuff!

I'd certainly like to know how to make an Emilio style hammock for when I get stranded on a tropical island. Being good at making fiber from the local fauna would be worth the price of admission alone. For now I'm feeling good about being able to sew my own out of store-bought fabric. Small steps . . . . . Even THIS ability puts me/us light years ahead of most of the folks in this incredibly specialized culture.

Mom TRIED to teach me to sew a little, at least enough to make simple repairs to my clothes, but I wouldn't listen. She wanted to teach me to sew and cook and she wanted the girls to be able to change their own plugs and oil, basic self sufficiency type stuff. The world was a much more generalized (sane) place back in the stone age when I grew up. . . . . .

Oh well. At least I had enough sense to listen to her regarding the cooking . She'd probably be pleased to know that her testosterone impaired boy finally 'got it' and oiled up her old Kenmore to make something useful when neither one of her girls has. Too bad she never lived to see it. . . . She'll laugh when I catch up to her and let her know!