LP experience: Digital better than Analog?

I think you have answered your own question - at least with regard to your own listening preferences. Now maybe you will want to try some well-recorded CDs?

there are "serious audiophiles" who swear by a lot of things... that doesn't make them correct...

For the first time in a while, I sat down earlier this week and played a few records. The sound was warm, sweet and smooth; I wanted to play more, but there was a slight problem with the table's speed (it began running slow for some reason). I hope it's not going to die on me soon, as I recently upgraded other things and don't have the money for major upgrades on a turntable. It's a VPI HW19-MkIV, purchased way back in 1993.

By contrast, yesterday I was playing CDs on one of my recent upgrades, a McIntosh MCD301; I was done after 3 CDs. There just wasn't the urge to keep going. As good as the 301 is, I was more at ease with the vinyl. It may be I need to upgrade my amplification (2 pair of B&K monos), it may be the particular selections, but the vinyl was a more connective experience. The 301 isn't fully broken in, I suppose, but I'm not sure that's the difference.

its a tuff one, find myself with a foot in both camps on the record /cd thing.

in my opinion it comes down to your preference in music mostly, as before you look at anything else, you have to appreciate that the quality of the recording makes a larger difference to the ability of the system than anything else.

recordings on vinyl made in and before the 80's have a vastly larger dynamic scale for a start-and i mean VASTLY. and also tend to hold more information about the background/room ect that today is cut out of the recording much more effectively-but many ppl like this information.
modern records realy arnt as impressive and do tend to be muddled as they are mastered digitally then dac'd to vinyl-that kills the quality.

i feel that turntable sound better with valves also.-many will disagree.
but in my experience nearly all valve power amp users also use high efficiency speakers-and they (imo) happen to be a MUST for good sound reproduction.

so one choice tends to lead to preference in another.

in your case- if you find yourself listening to the likes of chemical brothers ect then the recordings of that type have information in the lower registers not available on a record- so due to the music being driver by the bass in this type of music i would strongly suggest cd/ solid state amplification is the only choice.
i do think the majority of sound quality improvement is avalible through better speakers-so concentrate efforts there- go diy if you can -its sooo worth it!
ps if you like chemical brothers -have you tried;
morcheeba
massive attack,
trentmoller,
zero 7,
groove armada
goldfrapp,
hot chip'
ladyhawke,
modjo,
mylo,
ect??

I use a VPI machine to clean records. There are less expensive options available also. Check Audio Advisor.

At the least, a proper brush and cleaning fluid would do it. The plus for the machines is they'll dry the LP also, the vacuum taking up excess fluid. If you have really dirty records, a machine might be the best solution. Nitty Gtitty makes one (Record Doctor) which is simpler than the VPIs for less money.

Do yourself a favor and buy a spray bottle, distilled water and rubbing alcohol.
Do a 50/50 mix. Spray on the vinyl and wipe in with a record brush. Wipe off with a piece of clean cotton cloth, moistened with more distilled water, and then a dry cloth.

I like to do one more step, and use a clean brush attachment on a vaccum to suck up any remaining particles, while still moist.
Its a lot cheaper than those machines, and it will bring those LPs back to at least 95% like new.

Does your turntable have both analog and digital outputs?
Maybe you just prefer the digital one. There are lots of reasons this could
be. As long as you are happy, then smile

yeah i was wondering how this happened as well--how did you manage to connect the table to a digital connection? was there a dac involved somewhere before the avr? some kind of eq involved? a phono preamp? in any case glad youre enjoying the table--cleaning does make such a difference...

There are a number of possible explanations for what you perceive.

When you use the digital connnection, you change a lot more than just the connection. You also change other parts of the signal path. You also no doubt change the loudness that your turntable plays at for a given position of your receiver's volume control. This alone can bias your preferences.

When you use the digital connection, you are switching between using the phono preamp in the turntable to the phono preamp in the receiver. It is possible that the phono preamp in the turntable is a better match to the turntable and cartridge than the phono preamp in the receiver.

Phono preamps are somewhat different from other amplifiers in that their input can interact with the phono cartrdige and lead to audible differences in the cartridge's frequency response.

Of course, you may unknowingly favor one path over the other because of something that you read or were told that you now don't recall.

So, there are a number of reasoanble explanations but without further study, its hard to say which is the most important one.