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'New Vinyl Quality Control – I’m Running Out of Patience' - An Article


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Frankly, this guy has no clue about record pressing, the industry, pressing plants and quality control.  I was an Ops Manager at a pressing plant and run a label.  I would say that I’m more fit to talk about these issues.
 

This man, as a consumer (nervously listening to new records and looking for issues) is exactly the type of person who needs a new hobby and/or needs to switch back over to CDs.  
 

Most new pressings are generally decent.  
 

There are good and bad pressings from every plant.  It’s ridiculous to say that everything from GZ or URP or Third Man is crap.  I have great pressings from all of these places.  I also have shitty pressings from what are known as the “better” plants around the world that will remain unnamed.  It’s the nature of the format.  Things happen along each step of record making that effect a pressing.  Sometimes even while on the press, things change drastically within 5-10 records...Every plant basically has the same QC method.  It’s how they’re enforced that sets aside quality.  Also, every job that hits the press is generally “rushed” to move on to the next job...it’s always been this way and will always be this way.

 

Color contamination is a joke...learn about the extruder and nozzle first before you even talk about a spec of black or another color in your record.   It’s the most annoying complaint and non-issue that exist in vinyl pressing.  
 

Rant done...

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The fact that anyone feels like media that's created by melting plastic between two plates and then scraped by a diamond to make sound should be as flawless as a CD is super funny to me. Quality hasn't gone down, price and therefor expectation are higher and thats it. You should really just blame people pressing movie and video game soundtracks in every gimmicky way possible for attracting nerd collector culture to the hobby. 

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14 hours ago, mertzrock said:

Frankly, this guy has no clue about record pressing, the industry, pressing plants and quality control.  I was an Ops Manager at a pressing plant and run a label.  I would say that I’m more fit to talk about these issues.
 

 
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This man, as a consumer (nervously listening to new records and looking for issues) is exactly the type of person who needs a new hobby and/or needs to switch back over to CDs.  
 

 
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Most new pressings are generally decent.  
 

There are good and bad pressings from every plant.  It’s ridiculous to say that everything from GZ or URP or Third Man is crap.  I have great pressings from all of these places.  I also have shitty pressings from what are known as the “better” plants around the world that will remain unnamed.  It’s the nature of the format.  Things happen along each step of record making that effect a pressing.  Sometimes even while on the press, things change drastically within 5-10 records...Every plant basically has the same QC method.  It’s how they’re enforced that sets aside quality.  Also, every job that hits the press is generally “rushed” to move on to the next job...it’s always been this way and will always be this way.

 

Color contamination is a joke...learn about the extruder and nozzle first before you even talk about a spec of black or another color in your record.   It’s the most annoying complaint and non-issue that exist in vinyl pressing.  
 

Rant done...

While I mostly agree with you, i'd say there are pressing plants that consistently produce higher quality records than others. There may be a bad press here or there, but nowhere near what URP, from my experience, presses, which is usually crap. I have received warped or noisy records from RTI, QRP, and Pallas, but that is far less often than URP, rainbo, Memphis, or GZ. And while I'm sure these plants can produce some fine pressings, they basically lack consistentancy and that's while MoFi, AP, Speakers Corners, and all those audiophile labels don't use them. 

 

I'd also say, the amount of records I receive that are warped, or partially warped (i.e., edge warps) has drastically increased over the last decade. Maybe I'm just unlucky, but from comments on vinyl forums, discogs, etc. I don't believe I'm alone. 

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1 hour ago, zdkaiser said:

Maybe I'm just unlucky, but from comments on vinyl forums, discogs, etc. I don't believe I'm alone. 

Or thats confirmation bias snowballing into a hive mind circle jerk. I've received 5 records that were too warped to play over 15 years and all were from Europe or shipped in a giant amazon box with no padding.

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I was about to say that 70% of new records I‘ve bought over the last 4-5 years are warped, which is a significant increase from the previous 10+ years, while most used records I buy through the mail seem to arrive without warps, but I’m reading here that someone only got 5 bad warps in 15 years, so I have to re-assess my experience. Give me a moment.

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Warps don't bother me unless they create audible disruptions to the music, which I've only encountered a couple times out of the thousands of record I've played. I find the off-center spindle holes way more irritating. Also, aside from the grittiness and higher noise floor of some of their color pressings, I don't mind GZ so much. I have plenty of perfectly enjoyable records from them, and I think they may have actually improved in recent years, unlike URP which has seriously dampened my enthusiasm for any labels that use them.

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