Analogue / Digital : the never ending debate

dav | 2021-04-26 03:05:02.046031+00:00

One debate that seems to come up time and time again over the last two decades in particular is the one about which sounds better: analogue or digital recordings? I'm so confused about it all that I really can't pick a winner. Perhaps I need a lot more exposure to the art of sound engineering to really know what the heck people are talking about in the first place. It was the same for me with the debate about which sounded better: vinyl or compact disk? Some felt CD's cleaned up the sound too much for some styles of music so they preferred listening to artists like Jimi Hendrix on vinyl. There is also a debate about analogue hardware vs software emulations of the hardware. How close do these emulations really get to the hardware and is it simply better to 'get the real thing' (i.e. hardware) rather than spend your money on emulations? Further, there's the debate about analogue summing, virtual amps and the list goes on.

My take on it at this time and with the experience I currently have is that while I can't make an educated call either way, there are a few things I feel I can say. I have realised through hard experience that the best chance you have to end up with a recording, mix and master you're happy with is to 'get it right at the source'. As cliched as this sounds, spending some extra time getting mic placements right and working on your guitar and amp settings is really worth it - whether you're using virtual or real equipment. 

Recently I got myself a hardware channel strip so that I could begin to understand this debate a little better. While it is a lot of fun to play with the knobs and controls on analogue gear, I found there were other benefits too. Firstly, I liked being able to control dynamics going into the DAW through the channel strip compressor. While you can do this to some extent through plugins it's a lot easier and takes up far less computer processing power to do this on the channel strip. Secondly, I appreciate being able to put some EQ shaping on the sound going into the DAW. By using compression and EQ in this way it can help you get a better sound at the source because you're focusing on exactly that - getting the best sound you can at recording time. Other features of channel strips such as saturation or colouring the sound by pushing the gain on the preamp, using the outboard de-essers and gates etc all go towards achieving this objective. Some outboard channel strips are modelled on consoles such as Neve, API and SSL (and even use many of the same components) which allow you to get something of the original analogue sound. Also, remember you can often use channel strips and their components (EQ, Compressor, Gate etc) as hardware plugins in your DAW too. 

While it is true that you can simply record clean and use plugins to achieve similar results, I feel there's some merit to using hardware in the way I outline above.   

Below is some further information that might be useful for you on this topic:

• The Infinite Studio Rack Concept 
• 6 Reasons Why Having An Outboard Channel Strip In Your Studio Could Help You To Improve Your Recordings
• Plugins vs Analog Console Which Is Better?