i completely get preferring analog media, so if it’s about the sound characteristics (that ‘warmth’), having physical media, etc fair enough. but if the goal of an audiophile is to get the highest quality reproduction of a recording wouldn’t CDs or FLACs be your best bet?
maybe this only really applies for newer music, perhaps digital releases for music recorded analogue are just digitized vinyl or reel to reel recordings but for music produced in DAWs the highest quality version available for that release would surely be either a CD or a digital FLAC release
All romatisicm aside, yes you are right. FLAC & CD are better than vinyl from a technical standpoint.
The reason that I sometimes prefer vinyl is the different mastering. Take the beatles white album for example. It’s been released on many different froms, like the original 1968 UK Vinyl, the 1978 remaster that was pressed on white vinyl (my favorite), the MFSL remaster from the 80’s (too much treble boost in the EQ for my tastes), plus dozens of other versions pressed on vinyl before we get to the two CD remasters and finally the 50th anniversary remaster.
Every one of these will sound a different, and sometimes the differences in the mastering will be more beneficial to the sound quality than the technical advances of CD/FLAC.