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But you can't have that recording, you get the one made from a stamper in some sort of material (like vinyl) that won't take the exact shape of the stamper, and in any case doesn't have anything like the dynamic range necessary. Then you run a needle through it that (to a very high degree of probability) isn't half as precise as the cutter, run up a millivolt or two through at least one equalizer (RIAA) and three stages of amplification (mV, line level, and amplifier). That signal travels through a couple of hundered discrete components (if you're lucky) of some clutch of ASICs to become a useful voltage signal.

Only now does the sound (really some simulation of the sound) in front of that unknown mike make it to the mike's analogue, the speaker. But the speaker isn't really the mike's analogue because instead of a single capsule it has at least (to a very high degree of probability) two drivers on each of two sides so the corespondence is one mike capsule = 4 dynamic drivers (and another bunch of signal transformng LCR components at a minimum or a bunch of A/D - processing - D/A ASICs again.

OOOOhhh how I love those Black Gate capacitors - they really let you hear how weathered and dry the the poor piccolo player's hands were last winter.

I have my Reference Recordings of Scheherezade and Harry James, several RCA Shaded Dogs produced by Wilkerson, some Mercury's like the Rach 3 and especially Columbia's and telarcs of the Cleveland where I know the sound of the hall in which they were recorded..

These are all I refer to when listening really critically for the effects of hardware on the music. No worries about studios.

All we can ask of "pop" recordings is hearing the bass line or whether the lyrics are obscured in the playback or swallowed whole by the singer.

I'm knocked out by listening to the 3 way line-up I have right now of Marantz 2215B, the pair of Dignity Audio 300B's and the Jolida 202A that are stacked on top and next to each other so I just switch a few wires and there you are.
Plus I can go back and forth between ultra-complex 4-way monster speakers and little sealed 2-way with first order crossovers.

Hey, It's FUN!