• The move to the new server is done. There are some software and database maintenance updates in process. This has us passing the hat around to help out. We appreciate any donations. Seriously, even a dollar helps. The payment page may be found here - https://www.audiokarma.org/support.html

The Compact Disc Revival?

I guess with physical media I'm still okay with having a physical copy of my ALL-TIME FAVORITE albums. If an album means that much to me, I don't want to "worry" - however baseless that worry may be - about a streaming service yanking it, or the streaming services going away all together (not likely, but still). With that said, I still struggle to pare my EXISTING collection down to those all-time favorite albums. It's hard to let go of an album that is "good" or even "very good" yet - not an all-time-favorite. Buying new albums, it's not too hard for me to NOT accumulate any more, unless they are "essentials." Anyway, my collection is not huge. I have around 300 vinyl records and around 300 CD's. I'd like to keep it around that count. I clearly have some CD's I could get rid of, records too. Just sucks because the ones I want to get rid of are worth virtually nothing, especially the CD's. Makes me think I may as well just keep them then!

"The struggle is real" with physical media, and I can see why many are gladly walking away. But, if you have the space and don't let your OCD get the best of you, physical media can be very rewarding too.

Physical media is definitely experiencing an existential dilemma. It's interesting to see the wildly different takes on it.
 
I'm with some of the others, in that there is something about owning, handling, and (in the case of vinyl and tape), just something "soothing" about watching that mechanical process going on--platter spinning, big reel tapes turning, that I just don't get out of streaming or digital storage.

Don't get me wrong, I use both digital storage and streaming, but I also own over 3600 albums and 2000+ CDs, and am in no rush to give them up. I keep a certain number of them in "heavy rotation", but it is fun (every month or so) to go down to the basement and just "fish" through stuff that I had entirely forgotten about. Sometimes it's a "hidden gem", and other times it's "WTF was I thinking when I bought this?"--can be quite the "adventure".
 
Alobar said:
For me, having physical media (cd's) that I have to get up and rummage through a pile of to try to find something I want to play, and then have to continually dig through the pile /drawer /cardboard box over and over simple gets old. Having thousands of tracks with a good quality media player is for me the cumulative zenith of a quest I started dreaming about clear back in the early 70's with reel tape and the primitive playlist I recorded on it. I never would want to go back to the days when physical media took up a big portion of a wall..
Click to expand...

And this I can completely respect. It isn't like having XRT20 line arrays in an 1100 sq ft house doesn't prevent ENOUGH challenges, I have something like 3500 cds and 2000 lp's. Space is definitely an issue, and one that has me flummoxed at the moment.
 
For me, it's all part of the 'ritual'. Dig around through the stacks, looking for an LP which I haven't heard for awhile, or which I'd randomly thought about recently. Carefully remove the record from the sleeve, gently place it on the platter, clean off the dust, and cue it up. Digital just doesn't offer the same effect for me, even if it's more convenient to deal with.
-Adam
 
onwardjames said:
And this I can completely respect. It isn't like having XRT20 line arrays in an 1100 sq ft house doesn't prevent ENOUGH challenges, I have something like 3500 cds and 2000 lp's. Space is definitely an issue, and one that has me flummoxed at the moment.
Click to expand...
Yeah I am under similar space constraints with my beloved JBL L200's taking up more living room than my wife would like so all my physical media (hundreds of cd's and LP's are out in the storage shed) and it all is ripped to the drive . While I also like watching wheels revolving around and around, (cd's not so much) the space simply won't allow for it, particularly when I can access it all with a few clicks of a wireless mouse at the armrest of my listening chair.
 
I own about or around 600 CD's .. began buying in 1985. Bulk were purchased in the first 15 years .. greatest hits, compilations, best of, anthology .. etc. Most purchased have been pre-owned since 2000. I did trade/sell CD's over the years .. not sure of the amount .. maybe 10% of what I've owned .. might be more, never kept track of it.
 
onwardjames said:
I've stated this many, many times - I want an effing PHYSICAL copy. Digital downloads, while convenient and lovely sounding (HiRes, talking to you) I don't have the level of satisfaction with a download that I have with an actual cd or record.
Click to expand...
And it isn’t just satisfaction. The CDs I own give me the legal right to listen to them in perpetuity. With digital rights and computing power, I worry that the music I’m renting from ITunes, etc., will someday disappear, either because the temporary storage medium fails or because a change of law allows the rights licensor to extract more rent from me.

But the CD I own gives me unarguable rights, as long as I maintain a way to decode it. Same with LPs. I make backups, which is legal to do, but I don’t copy the music and then give the CD away, which is not legal however pleasant it sounds.

Sometimes I play the CD and sometimes I play the backup, but I’m careful with my physical media. In any case, it’s always present in the cabinet when I play it from my computer.

Rick “who believes in fair copyrights” Denney
 
Also, at least with CDs and vinyl LPs, you don’t have to worry about getting them too close to the speaker. I’ve degraded a few tapes through careless proximity to speakers. Wristwatches, too, but those can be demagnetized.

Rick “fun with magnets” Denney
 
I am STILL a bit sore...and probably always will be...about how I treated my CD's in my younger days. I had hundreds and hundreds that I ruined. As soon as I bought them - usually from Columbia House or one of those other deals where you get 10 CD's for a penny, then have to buy X number in the next year at full price - anyway...as soon as I bought them, they went into one of those big black books. They were all either scratched or lost from those early years. I had a lot of crappy CD's - bad taste in music - but a lot of good ones too...lots of classic rock and grunge. What wasn't scratched, was lost when I left my CD book at a party one time, never to be seen again.

The only CD's I still have that are in good shape, I purchased from around age 20 and on (college years). I stopped putting them in books. Only took me 4 years to realize/care enough about the scratching and just stop it!

I have good memories of CD's though too.

My first Sony Discman.

Installing a CD player into my cars as a teenager (still have it!). It was a fancy one that could play mp3 discs...hundreds of songs on one CD!

CD mix-tape exchanges.

Overall, the streaming thing is much better though, if I'm being honest with myself. No more carting a huge book of CD's around and scratching them up!
 
I still have a Sony minidisc recorder that I used for location recordings. Speaking of a format that is difficult to sustain, but those got transferred to computer.

If you still have your scratched CD’s, look into Exact Audio Copy. It will actually search its users for data that can fill in errors in your CDs, when ripping them to your computer. Even scratched, your CD gives you rights.

Rick “a fan of that software for lots of reasons” Denney
 
I can only see myself getting rid of my records and CDs, when I'm old and/or disabled enough for a home for the elderly, which probably won't big enough for all my audio equipment and media. I just need to start transferring/"ripping" the content to microSD cards in time...

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini
 
Rdenney said:
I still have a Sony minidisc recorder that I used for location recordings. Speaking of a format that is difficult to sustain, but those got transferred to computer.

If you still have your scratched CD’s, look into Exact Audio Copy. It will actually search its users for data that can fill in errors in your CDs, when ripping them to your computer. Even scratched, your CD gives you rights.

Rick “a fan of that software for lots of reasons” Denney
Click to expand...

This I did not know. I've got some nearly destroyed discs from back in the day that I haven't thrown out that I'd like to rip.
See, keeping all of my junk pays off after all.
 
I have found that Flitz polish does an extremely good job removing scratches from CD's and DVD's.
 
I've had decent luck with the hand-cranked "Disc Doctor" scratch buffers. Not perfect, but have cleared up a few scratched CDs which were skipping. Almost makes me wish there was something like that big enough for use with LP records.......... :idea:
-Adam
 
Lossless said:
View attachment 1488505
iPod Classic 5.5 gen year 2005 / Sennheiser PX100 v.1 year 2003
I may then already be ahead of the game. People with their AirPods look at me like :wtf:
Click to expand...

Funny, I get the same look when I hall out either one of these;
9319ab024442c85dce114a080dc5f39f.jpg


or

il_794xN.1105755666_d5mp.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom