Jay said:
Vinyl doesn't rely upon "steps" at all. It's an analog waveform.

Hehe, every physical medium in the macro world is composed of limited numbers of molecules and particles. You can't argue for perfect sound waves that continuously (without steps) translate energy to our ears in a way that is perfectly accurate. Our real hearing is based upon an air medium that functions in a mix of both continuous and limited ways at the same time. In that sense, vinyl has real molecular steps it takes or else it wouldn't be physical. That's all I'm trying to say. :)

Of course the number of molecules that sits in the depth of a vinyl record is huge and so I'm mostly just dicking around with my point. If the mechanical accuracy of both the writing needle and reading needle are fine enough, I'm sure it could easily beat CD audio (particularly insofar as samples over time is concerned). Otherwise, a purely continuous, analog medium that is also mechanically made is currently impossible. As such, there's nothing wrong with using digital steps to communicate sound so long as our sense of hearing can't tell the difference. I just want some of the people in this thread to cool their statements. :)