Vinyl doesn't rely upon "steps" at all. It's an analog waveform.
The biggest limitation of vinyl is the frequency response, which has a narrower range than CD. It cuts off around 18KHz I believe, whereas CD goes to about 20KHz. However, most people over 25 can't hear 20KHz very well anyway.
You hear in analog. Hearing music recorded on vinyl is like hearing live music, even with the low-level hiss and occasional clicks and pops.
If you hear a difference between music on CD and a live performance, you'll hear a difference between high-quality vinyl on a decent setup and the same recording on a CD.