Tony & Dan
I've no doubt you enjoy you vinyl collections.
I certainly enjoy mine and prefer the experience of playing vinyl over any other format.
However -
"a good properly set up well-made turntable will beat the living hell out of almost any CD played back on a conventional CD player"
"Beat the living hell"??? What does that mean? Is this a WWF match?
Your description of the gear in that statement is vague to say the least.
I'm sure the DeParavicini is a stellar piece of gear. A fair comparison to vinyl playback on it would perhaps be some exotic $10,000 CD transport playing through a Pacific Microsonics HDCD D to A converter.
Anybody won the lottery here?
"disappearance of the playback device itself, and getting to the sound contained in the source material"
If by "source material" you refer to the vinyl pressing, that sound would include surface noise, limited bandwidth, limited dynamic range, limited channel separation, IM distortion, inner groove distortion, etc. compared to the original source material - the master tape.
I work at a mastering studio. We've done some very high budget reissue projects that were released in both formats. We start by comparing the original master tapes to several EQ'd cutting masters made at the time of the original release and to original release 1A pressings (played on a "high quality properly set up turntable") to hear the sonic differences. These comparisons are important. Our intent is to be faithful to the original release. There will be the inevitable reviews in audiophile magazines comparing the reissue to their "holy grail" original 1A pressings played on some esoteric turntable setup that costs more than my annual NYC apartment rent.
We don't have a lathe, so vinyl masters are cut at a highly respected facility in town from the original master tapes. Again using EQ'd cutting copies and 1A pressings as references. The reissue producer and our mastering engineer attend the session. Audio path from the repro head to the cutter amp is pure analog. Pressings are made on 180 gram virgin vinyl.
At our facility, we prepare the CD masters. Again remaining faithful to the sound of the original release. Decisions are made as to which processing will be done analog and which will be done digital. After any analog processing, program is digitized from the original master tape through Pacific Microsonics converters. Digital processing (if any) is applied. The 44.1 kHz 16 bit CD master is assembled and sent to the plant.
We get the test vinyl pressings and play them on our "high quality properly set up turntable". Ultimately we get pressings we approve. Do they sound good? They sound great. We compare the new pressings to the original pressings and EQ'd cutting masters. Do they sound the same? Close, but no. I'll not attempt to list the dozens of possible reasons why.
Then we compare the CD test pressings to our CD 44.1 kHz 16 bit master files. Do they sound the same? Very much so.
We compare the CD to the vinyl. Do they both sound good? Yes, we've done our job as best we can. Do they sound the same? No. How could they? Apples vs. oranges.
Which release format would you prefer? That's up to you.
Here's a less complex scenario. A client comes in with a new project mixed to 1" 2 track analog tape. He want to release both on LP and CD. He insists that absolutely no processing be done to the master. He's confident of his mixes. We comply & do a straight transfer to digital with absolutely no processing in the generation of the CD master. The same master tape is brought to the disc mastering house. The same 1" 2 track playback tape machine used at our facility is transported to the cutting facility to eliminate that variable. Master discs are cut, again with no processing, flat from the master tape, Pure analog.
Highest quality pressings are made and approved.
A CD pressing and a LP pressing are compared to the original master tape.
Which one sounds more like the master tape?
I'm afraid the CD would give the LP a good, old fashioned, James Caan, Godfather I, garbage can lid to the head beating.