You didn't take note of the many comments made about the limitations of vinyl then. The sound put out by much of the old gear such as compressors, Eqs, various tube amps, synths etc... heard direct through a set of speakers will be completely different than what's heard from vinyl. A modern digital recording done well using all old gear would probably quite surprise you. So for sure the actual recording media now is leaps and bounds ahead of what was available to the public (i.e vinyl) in those days.i am saying that production and mastering was shit. An if we really wanna dwelve into vintage.. then why not bring up the 60s and 70s? If all that old vintage gear sounds so nice and beautiful and full and warm, then why do the beatles sound like telephone quality?
Having said that, does vintage gear presumably also include a well set-up 2" tape run at high speed - have you ever heard one? The specs one many of those are very close to digital specs with the added benefit of real tape saturaion if you want it. The original recording done in the 80s or earlier from the tape will sound completely different to what is on the vinyl.
I don't usually read much of that around here...most KvRers use loads of s/w and digital media - most of us use those more than analogue h/w (although several of us have old gear that we do still prefer and use) This site is all about s/w...if we all hated it, we wouldn't be at KvR.The aim of my post was to rebel against morons who still put VST and plugins and new technolody down. never mind that a home pc today can potentially sound better than anything else you've ever heard.
But as with anything, mostly it's down to how you use it. For sure, I agree with you...digital recording has given us so many more options. But in talented hands a recording done on tape using old grey boxes full of tubes and circuitry can be every bit as good as a digital one and better. And likewise a bad tape recording can sound awful...so can a digital one.
There is a mammoth distinction between analogue sound processors and how they sound on vinyl. To lump everything vintage in with vinyl quality is a non-sensical starting point. Recording media is not the same thing as the media used to make the original sounds.
And anyway....I don't think a single person at KvR would actually prefer to go back to vinyl as a media. We're 100% in agreement with you. I know for a fact that I can't afford to buy my own vinyl pressing equipment, and I sure don't want to go back to the prices they used to charge to get them done externally. And I don't want to maintain an expensive multitrack tape either. I'd rather have my cheap PC thanks...but still doesn't mean I can't appreciate how good tape can sound.
I gaurantee if you go into a decent studio monitoring environment and listen to the original tape masters of some of these "awful mixes" you won't recognise them as what you hear on the record.