What makes you pick a particular Music format?

[Falstaff]

Mainly records, then cassettes, then r2r. Lastly I have maybe 100 cd's. I even have some 8 tracks but thinking I may not need another tape medium. Oh, minidisc. Have a portable player but in the market for a component player/recorder.

 

[Quadman2]

Wonder what the NEXT music format is gonna be?

I started a thread on "virtual music formats". Some of the better known performers are taking part and even investing in these computer generated musical platforms.

Some posters indicated that the fidelity is improving at a rapid rate and I've heard that the cost of required headsets are drastically coming down from what they were at the start.

Any predictions/directions that music formats could go?


Q2

 

[orsen]

MP3 & Flac files on my computer are just too dang convenient to bother with most of that other stuff. I gave up on vinyl in 1984.

i mostly listen to flac and lossless from my pc thru a tube buffer it convienent and allows loud volume when i want
but i do still buy vinyl, thats more of a weekend thing

 

[kirk57]

Probably like 60% streaming, either music I've ripped from CDs to my music server, or Pandora.

The other 40% vinyl. There remains for me a sort of connection to the physical media of an LP that somehow connects me to the time the vinyl was created, which is quite often the same time the artist was alive and recording,

I'm sure this is all in my head and the real reason is that I'm old

 

[jrtrent]

At the time I was buying my first higher end system (and selling off the Philips, Pioneer, EPI level of gear I had enjoyed up to that point), CD's had just entered the market. Comparing it to vinyl, I couldn't believe CD's would last very long, so I put my money into a Linn turntable and, over time, built my system around its strengths (eventually settling on Linn amplification and Sara speakers). I've auditioned a lot of digital sources over the intervening decades, but nothing engages me in the performance quite like vinyl does, so that continues to be my format of choice.

 

[sqlsavior]

Lately, it's been cost and availability. I couldn't resist some of the RCA Living Stereo and Mercury Living Presence CD box sets, at a little over a dollar a disk. If you even could get them all in new vinyl, at $30 a disc, that would be $1800 for a set. $70 is much more to my liking.

 

[KDAC]

Contrary to their diminished reputation, I love .mp3s. I simply became tired of changing vinyl, cassettes, and CDs while listening and transitioned to listening to music via my server in 2001. My last heartfelt vinyl purchase occurred circa '89, I dropped cassettes upon my first CD purchase in '92 and went "whole hog" beginning in 2001 after ripping all of the aforementioned and future purchases to .mp3 (CBR and VBR). I love the convenience of listening to a relatively vast library of music via the LAN at home or the internet pretty much anyplace on the planet while away from home.

 

[DaveVoorhis]

Streaming. I'm tired of my old CD collection, and now I'm all about the variety. In an ideal world, I'd never hear the same thing twice, but still could if I wanted to.

 

[jrtrent]

Lately, it's been cost and availability. I couldn't resist some of the RCA Living Stereo and Mercury Living Presence CD box sets, at a little over a dollar a disk. If you even could get them all in new vinyl, at $30 a disc, that would be $1800 for a set. $70 is much more to my liking.

That's a great point! It's not like I don't own any cd's at all. I often pick one up by the artists of concerts I attend, and I love getting things like the 100 cd set of Russian Legends (mostly older, live classical performances by outstanding Russian pianists, violinists, and cellists). Of course, the 50-cent bargain-bin vinyl finds are also a great value and tons of fun.

Contrary to their diminished reputation, I love .mp3s

I have a pretty good collection of old-time radio plays in mp3 format that I've purchased on compact discs. One example is that there are 212 Sherlock Holmes episodes (a little under a half-hour each) on just 3 cd's at a total cost of $15--lots of entertainment that takes up very little room, and terrific for long drives across state or just my daily, 30-minute commute to work.

 

[Chris Brown]

I am a fan of lossless digital audio. I don't personally consider a CD to be a "format" though. It's simply a container via which digital files are stored. As such, the CD itself is not even necessary when there are other ways to transmit those exact same files...

Digital audio has spoiled me a bit. I'm no longer interested in any a format that degrades a bit every time you play it, or any format where you can't make a perfect copy if you want to, etc. The only reason I have some LPs is for the cover artwork and the novelty value. The only reason I have some cassettes is nostalgia.

 

[KDAC]

Wonder what the NEXT music format is gonna be?

I started a thread on "virtual music formats". Some of the better known performers are taking part and even investing in these computer generated musical platforms.

Some posters indicated that the fidelity is improving at a rapid rate and I've heard that the cost of required headsets are drastically coming down from what they were at the start.

Any predictions/directions that music formats could go?


Q2

I thought about your question for awhile and have come to a rather simple (and unscientific) conclusion: Size-compressed, yet bit-perfect .wav files. Why? Universality. Just about any device ranging from a desktop PC, tablet, smartphone. dedicated media player (e.g. iPod), DVD/Blu-ray/multi-format media player, smartwatch, et al. can currently easily play .wav files with no conversion. The method of transport can be via a wireless LAN, re/writable CD, or even a USB "stick" presuming any of the aforementioned devices have no or very limited storage capacities. It's common knowledge that the .wav's standard bit rate of 1,411 kbps matches that of red book audio CDs (16-bit/44.1 kbps), thus providing the ability to have a "perfect" copy of one's desired audio material. I'm no expert in executing file formats, but my vision essentially boils down to .mp3-sized .wav files (~10 MB per file assuming the upper limit of .mp3 encoding @ 320kbps CBR) permitting playback on just any current device while minimizing, if not outright eliminating, concerns as to whether or not said device will play the file. I know some of the tech nerds in audio may laugh me right out of the forum, but it's an idea.

 

[grillebilly]

I want something I can hold in my hand. Next in importance is cost. I have always enjoyed records the most but CD's are so cheap now it's the best way to build on the music library. I have a few hundred CD's that haven't been listened to yet so I am far from getting bored with what's on hand. I'm not into "files" at all, maybe it's narrow-minded, but I like owning the record or CD.

 

[Djcoolray]

My vinyl is #1, CD's are OK, I don't want you all to fall off your chairs, laughing, but I use Directv and Verizon's feeds about six hours during the day, and I don't find it too shabby. Have you tried it?

Why should anyone laugh, too many people do the samething for the same reason and don't know why. Directv being satellite has great sound if you have a receiver with very low distortion. See, people don't realize the concerts from new artists to the archived from the past that can be seen and heard in awesome stereo. Let alone being able to record it. Why should a person be rigid and only continue to do things as they did coming out of high school?

 

[KDAC]

I want something I can hold in my hand. Next in importance is cost. I have always enjoyed records the most but CD's are so cheap now it's the best way to build on the music library. I have a few hundred CD's that haven't been listened to yet so I am far from getting bored with what's on hand. I'm not into "files" at all, maybe it's narrow-minded, but I like owning the record or CD.

Same here... Even in 2016, there's something about tangibility. I'm into files, but still enjoy at least a quick glance at liner notes and physical cover art. What I no longer enjoy is having to navigate thousands of CDs, hundreds of cassettes and ~200 vinyl albums to select one to listen to.

 

[Djcoolray]

Besides a format is only as good as its use and not its preference....

The format is based upon the activities of the person that listens to music wherever they are and by whatever they happened to be doing. They didn't design boomboxes with the intention of being home entertainment devices.

 

[superdog]

I've yet to find a good enough reason to move on from cd's as my favorite serious listening media.

That's kind of where I'm at.There are some lps that do what cds don't.My serious listening teeth were cut on cds.

 

[FauxHall]

For me, leaving my ranch home with the big man cave in the garage and moving to distant foreign countries to live in hotel rooms and a small apartment helped me in going to a system where hi-res digital files are my predominant media and that's where my money goes. I was very enthusiastic about SACDs but I no longer have a player. Making space for the physical media and then packing up and moving with it are big downsides.

I also listen to a lot of FM because I have ONE good station here in Abu Dhabi (like right now.) I bought a TT mostly for looks and to impress - my collection of vinyl will be limited. I still sometimes buy from the limited range of CDs available here but I rip them on my laptop and then store them on the Sony HAP-S1 internal hard drive with backed up on the computer.

But downloading hi-resolution DSD and FLAC files is where it's at for me these days.

 

[rlisin]

I now use standard and hi resolution lossless files as my primary format for reasons of convenience (including portability). I switched from CDs and SACDs last year when I finally found a DAP/DAC that offered comparable sound quality for a relatively low price.

Vinyl is my secondary format because I like the ritual and the simplicity. The ritual helps to focus on the music, by simplicity I mean that I understand exactly how the music reproduction works here (the mechanics of it), while with digital format I understand the general ideas.

I still use CDs and SACDs simply because I have a lot of them (around 6 thousand). Especially SACDs for multichannel music.

 

[uofmtiger]

I have music in most of the recent digital formats and vinyl. I mainly listen to music streaming services, though. The unlimited variety is hard to beat. My own collection of CDs are ripped to lossless and supplement on-demand streaming.

Every now and then, I will buy SACDs or vinyl just to get a different experience. With SACDs, I am often more interested in the multichannel mix and vinyl is more about the experience of seeing the album art, liner notes, and, in some sense, the nostalgia of the overall experience.

That being said, vinyl has a unique sound and often comes with a digital download if you buy from Amazon, so I like that aspect, as well. But 95 percent of the time, it is simply on-demand streaming from Apple Music (who I think usually have the best masters because of their MFiT program) or YouTube Red.

 

[biscuithead]

I grew up with CDs as a 90s child, so that just makes sense to me. I listen to vinyl and tape, but those have issues with noise and/or sound that CDs simply don't have. That doesn't mean I don't enjoy them; they just aren't #1. Plus, good-condition vinyl is ridiculously expensive compared to a CDs (especially used CDs) and the CDs are easier to get onto my hard drive, which is where all the music ends up. At first it was portable music players when I hadn't gotten into hi-res yet, but same concept.

I feel the same... but I have an equal amount of CD/Sacds/DVDs as I do vinyl ... I am now starting to not look at records in GW, I check out the CDs instead.